- Joined
- Jul 12, 2011
- Messages
- 6,297
Last year, I purchased a folder from John Greco via one of his ebay listings. It had a FFG tapered hawkbill/wharnie type blade that drew me to it, because anyone who knows me as a knife nut pretty much knows I tend to favor wharncliffe blade profiles. Anyway, the price was right (less than $50), and after reading up on the materials used and the man's reputation, I decided to pull the trigger. I found out that John Greco has been involved in knifemaking for a very long time, and this particular folder uses a German 8670 steel, likened to L6 with some subtle differences in its alloy content. Moreover, everyone who had anything to say about Mr. Greco's work had nothing but good things to say.
The folder is a framelock, with scales coming in at almost 2mm thick (0.076"), made of the same 8670 steel as the blade which is just shy of 5mm at the spine (0.190", same thickness as my Horton TAC-4, and we know how beefy Mr. Horton builds his knives). The knife came pretty rough as far as finish on the scales was concerned, and was sharp in some places. The blade however, was beautiful. I decided that I would try and improve the fit and finish if I could. I ordered some micarta and other folder hardware online, and took stock of what lay ahead of me.
Prior to this endeavor though, I had a knife done by So-Lo (Solosknifereviews on YT) and it came back exceeding my expectations. He put the finishing touches on my CPM-M4 Frankenmilitary and it's one of my favorite knives to carry and use. I've put up pics of that knife all over, as I love to show it off. I decided to pack all the parts and sent it out to Randy (So-Lo) and told him to take his time with it as I wasn't in any type of rush.
A couple of weeks ago, he messaged me that he was almost done and needed to do some tweaks here and there, had an issue with the lockup and contacted Mr. Greco himself to which he had some ideas to share regarding the issue. He also posted a vid of it on YT:
[video=youtube;xtxGnI_L6zY]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtxGnI_L6zY&feature=plcp[/video]
Well, I got it back today. I am really liking the modifications and will no doubt carry it often after I maybe try my hand at slimming down the handle profile a bit so it isn't so thick in the pocket. I also fixed the lockup by replacing the stop pin with one thats slightly thicker. The lockup was very close to the non-locking scale (which is now a liner), but not touching it. I told Randy that I wasn't concerned about it at all since the carburized framelock is the same material as the blade, and wear would be at a minimum, if at all. I changed the stop pin anyway, and that made lockup a lot better.
Here are more pics:
I'd like to thank Randy (SolosKnifeReviews/So-Lo) for the great job on the Greco!
The folder is a framelock, with scales coming in at almost 2mm thick (0.076"), made of the same 8670 steel as the blade which is just shy of 5mm at the spine (0.190", same thickness as my Horton TAC-4, and we know how beefy Mr. Horton builds his knives). The knife came pretty rough as far as finish on the scales was concerned, and was sharp in some places. The blade however, was beautiful. I decided that I would try and improve the fit and finish if I could. I ordered some micarta and other folder hardware online, and took stock of what lay ahead of me.
Prior to this endeavor though, I had a knife done by So-Lo (Solosknifereviews on YT) and it came back exceeding my expectations. He put the finishing touches on my CPM-M4 Frankenmilitary and it's one of my favorite knives to carry and use. I've put up pics of that knife all over, as I love to show it off. I decided to pack all the parts and sent it out to Randy (So-Lo) and told him to take his time with it as I wasn't in any type of rush.
A couple of weeks ago, he messaged me that he was almost done and needed to do some tweaks here and there, had an issue with the lockup and contacted Mr. Greco himself to which he had some ideas to share regarding the issue. He also posted a vid of it on YT:
[video=youtube;xtxGnI_L6zY]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtxGnI_L6zY&feature=plcp[/video]
Well, I got it back today. I am really liking the modifications and will no doubt carry it often after I maybe try my hand at slimming down the handle profile a bit so it isn't so thick in the pocket. I also fixed the lockup by replacing the stop pin with one thats slightly thicker. The lockup was very close to the non-locking scale (which is now a liner), but not touching it. I told Randy that I wasn't concerned about it at all since the carburized framelock is the same material as the blade, and wear would be at a minimum, if at all. I changed the stop pin anyway, and that made lockup a lot better.
Here are more pics:
I'd like to thank Randy (SolosKnifeReviews/So-Lo) for the great job on the Greco!
