ESEE 6 sheath question

A short primer here on Kydex vs injection molded polyethylene. The injection molded sheaths will out perform the Kydex every time . Why? The injection molded sheath can be molded to fit with much closer tolerances than kydex, perform well at extreme temperatures and has 'memory' to always go back to the molded form even when stressed out of shape or heated to extreme temperatures.

Kydex will fail at extreme temperatures ( we are talking -20F and lower or above 110F) , has no memory so once it is stressed particularly with heat it will not return to it's molded shape and it cannot be fit to really close tolerances to knives.

So why use Kydex if Poly is so great? Cost has a lot to do with it on the front end. Like Jeff said every injection molded sheath is gonna run about $6K or so in mold cost up front and then the mold has to be maintained along the way. The machinery to injection mold is quite expensive also so the number of injection molders are less so price in each piece can be an issue. These cost issues also affect how many and how fast you can make changes to injection molded sheaths.

Kydex conversely is a much lower tech product requiring not a lot of expensive machinery or expensive up front mold cost. In fact you can find videos on making Kydex sheaths with sheet goods and a toaster oven:) We can make changes really quick with Kydex sheaths and changes are easier made for the end user (you) if you want to modify your sheath since there is a lot of extra material around the perimeter of the knife. And although Kydex may loose it's tension with too much heat you can also reheat it and reform that original tension with a little patience.

I could go on with pros and cons for each material but basically after considering initial costs we look at what the end users want and a large number of you like and want Kydex. So we use both, trying to apply each to it's best use and what the demand is. The 3 and 6 have had some military applications and the military generally likes injection molded since it doesn't fail at temp extremes so that dictated why we used poly on those particular sheaths. Mike

Thanks Mike for that great information. :thumbup:

Now I only have the ESEE-4 and so I have no experience with your injection molded sheats. It sounds not that bad to me - maybe I have to test them in the future.
Mike or Jeff, do you have noticed big diffrences between both materials in the jungle, just curious?
 
I rarely carry any of our knives in the jungle. It's usually some cheap machete.
 
I rarely carry any of our knives in the jungle. It's usually some cheap machete.

Typically Jeff, I've read about your preference for them. I've never been there and I wish to find some time and get there.
I've seen Mike carrying a RC-3.
 
I said "rarely." We have carried our knives down ther but not enough for me to say any prefernce over one sheath type to the other.
 
Back
Top