Do you Mod your Opinel?

My no. 8 is getting modded. Nothing fancy, just reshaping the handle to be a bit more ergonomic for me and making the blade a drop point. i may etch a design on the blade just for fun.

Ric
 
i am not a huge opinel user, but all my number 9 seemed to need was to have a rasp taken to the wood where the nail nick is so i can pinch it out.
 
I've posted this on a few forums before now so I apologise if I've posted it here or you've seen it before.
Opinel customizing.
You can even get oversize handled ones for carving, Opinel ebauche I believe I've seen posts about them on this forum, if you're interested Google images for Opinel ebauche gives a good idea what you get.
I wish I'd known about them before I "customized" my #12 to within an inch of it's life. :(

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A severely distressed #8, but it fits my hand and opens easily.
 
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8steve88 said:
Opinel customizing.
You can even get oversize handled ones for carving, Opinel ebauche I believe I've seen posts about them on this forum, if you're interested Google images for Opinel ebauche gives a good idea what you get.
I wish I'd known about them before I "customized" my #12 to within an inch of it's life. :(
Click to expand...
Ive visited the site in the link several times before.
Some Opis there are beautiful, some fugly.
Many are pure work of art hence (relatively) uninteresting from my POV, as I buy and use Opinels purely for severe practical use.
They lend themselves well to modding, as they are so cheap and easy to work with when modding.
In my case, I wanted a couple of dedicated #12 cardboard slicers and thats exactly what I ended up with.
The knives are scary effective at continued cardboard cutting. When one knife goes dull, I change to the other.
I could not be happier with the current shape.
Must admit, that Im not the slightest bit tempted by making 'art' Opinels, though some on the site looks very good indeed.
 
What I do is hold the knife and draw round my fingers with a pencil then grind finger grooves with a dremel, then make room to get to the nail nick from both sides so I can pinch the blade making it easier to open. I'm more into the usability than the art side but I love seeing the carving that these exhibit.
 
This one has the bump in the "fin" facing your palm taken off and a dip has been sanded to allow pinching the blade. That's all that is necessary, although more can be fun :)

You can shorten the blade to various degrees and shorten the handle to match and this will increase pocketability while retaining the blade stoutness of the larger size. The blades get thinner as well as shorter as the numbers go down.

They are actually pretty good untouched.


 
The Opinel customizing site is killer, Steve88. Thanks. Everyone should see it.

Somehow I don't think I'll get as excited over an option for Gunner Grips now....
 
I've modded a few of them. Some I thinned the handle to make for a less bulky pocket carry and others I've modded for other reasons like matching my kitchen knives. But to be fair, they are the most comfortable in my hand when left stock from the factory.

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