Fugly but functional Knife

Brian Andrews

Brian Andrews

Joined
Dec 11, 2006
Messages
1,659
I have a knife design that has been rattling around in my head for some time. I have to admit, it is also not solely my brain child. The design also comes from months of chatting with Ben Piersma, owner of Ben's Backwoods.

One of the most underrated knife features (in my opinion) is a swell on the top of the handle. When you close your hand around an object, having something filling in that space is pretty damn important to comfort. It is something that a simple oval shaped handle can do very easily, but becomes trickier with a full tang knife style like this one. It seems so many knives are cut out of a piece of stock that is flat across the spine and the back of the handle. While easy to do, it can never match the comfort level of a swell like this, in my opinion anyway.

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The second key feature on this new knife is the first finger groove and guard area. A true guard gets in the way when doing things like batoning notches on a flat surface (like a log). But, having a little bit of something there can be*beneficial*for the grip I am about to talk about.

Previously, one of my primary concerns with this area of the knife was to get the first finger groove as close to the cutting edge as possible. Easy to understand because it is a matter of leverage. The farther away from your hand the item you are cutting, the more leverage it has. Power cuts are done up close.

However, this one is a bit different. I put some space in there for a very good reason. Ben has been known to grip his mora's with his whole hand going over the guard. It kind of puts your first finger half over the cutting edge, but it is not scary to do. It feels like it centers the whole knife in your hand, and gives it a balance that is not achieved by simply "getting close to the edge." It allows a lot of control and makes doing things like feather sticks a really fun task. Since Ben grabbed his Mora's this why, I try to optimize this area of the knife specifically for that, and I have to say it feels wonderful.

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The picture I have of my holding is attempting to show that grip. I was trying to take the picture with a big camera and no tripod so I had no choice but to do it up close and left handed.


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I will try and get a better picture, but if you watch Ben's video on the Ghillie Kettle, right around 0:20*you uwill see him using this knife technique.

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Thanks for looking,
Brian
 
Looks great to me! The one thing I'd change personally would be to widen the blade, but that's my own personal preference. Looks like a true working tool. I like it! :cool::thumbup:
 
Looks nice to me. If you were to make it out of thinner stock and put a flat or convexed grind on there, it would make a dandy boning knife as well.
 
yep, all good points.
I don't do the hump, but instead a long curve on the spine. It's more comfortable to me than a straight spine.
Also, the front of the underside of the handle requires careful consideration so you can get close to the back of the edge without getting cut. I generally find choils on medium belt knives to be crutches for an under-designed handle.

That's not a fugly knife at all. Form follows function and it looks to be well-executed. The only thing I'd change stylistically is to give the front of the handles a bit of curve instead of a straight perpendicular to the spine.
 
Good looking knife Brian. I to have made a few knives with a handle spine swell. I find them pretty comfy in the hand like you said.

Bryan
 
sicily02 said:
Good looking knife Brian. I to have made a few knives with a handle spine swell. I find them pretty comfy in the hand like you said.

Bryan
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Hey Bryan,

It has been a long time. I will have to give you a call and catch up! I hope all is going well for you and your family.

Take care,
B
 
That's a great looking knife you've got there. Looks really nice for food prep and the like.
 
Brian, I totally agree with what you say.

I've always been a fan of the curved spine handle in it being more ergonomic then all those knives constrained by their straight bar stock.

The difference in real world use performance is amazing.


I always like a single finger groove to help a knife index in hand, being, as you point out, the first or second finger.



Your on the right track.


The one change I would suggest is lowering the angle of attack, I find lowering the blade relative to the handle reduces fatigue in long term use.


It's a very cool knife my friend.




Big Mike
 
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Sweet looking knife, Brian. Nice work - looks like it would be real nice in the hand.
 
I was given the assignment recently to take a finished blade, with no handle, and to use modeling clay to make a grip that was as comfortable as i could in as many positions as i could. The handle shape of the clay is very fugly, but it was a very good exersize in handle shapes and comfort.

When i first gripped the clay, and squeezed it down, the hump that you have was there, not only on the top of the handle but aslo on the right side where my palm is.

I havent made any handles on belt size knives since i did all that, but should be in a couple days, will be cool to see how my handles change
 
Hey guys,

Thanks for all your comments. I appreciate you checking out this thread.

One thing about knife preferences, is that they are all preferences. Fortunately, there is no right or wrong, or else there would be ONE knife that everyone would have :) I have made many, many blade shapes, and understand where the suggestions for change are coming from. But, on this particular knife every single little feature that was done was done with a preference in mind, which ends up having a trade off for some other type of use, and preference.

Realizing that my tastes are very, very specific, this one is tailored to all my nit picky preference. Of all the knife customers I have, and knife people I know, and knife like this would appeal to only 2 other people I know. I didn't expect everyone to like it as it is, and like what I did and why, but in the end, it meets exactly what I want. Today anyway :) Ask me again tomorrow :)



joe444 said:
When i first gripped the clay, and squeezed it down, the hump that you have was there, not only on the top of the handle but aslo on the right side where my palm is.
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I did the clay experiment also, so time ago. It is a very cool exercise, but there are couple things to think about with it.

One, with regards to the swell on the side. You have to realize that feature on a handle would absolutely fill in your hand. You also have to realize though if pressure gets applied there or not. In your normal up/down motions that come from cutting, pressure does not get applied there (for me anyway). It would come from a side to side motion, which I don't do, so I decided that feature was not worth the trade off for me. Everything is a trade off, right? :)

Second, something that fits your hand may still need some tweaking once leverage is applied to the blade. When you put pressure on the blade, it tries to rotate the knife in your hand, which creates 2 critical areas. The first being where the spine hits the web of you hand between your thumb and the first finger. This one is the most obvious, and most people get it. If a knife is too narrow there, or has corners, it hurts your hand under pressure, and the knife gets sold. The second one is much more subtle. When the knife tries to rotate, it is also held in place by your pinky finger. Have the "shape" where your pinky wraps around the handle. This was taught to me by a friend who suffered a pinky injury and was much more sensitive to shape in that area to most. But, once he turned me on it, I realized how much of a comfort difference I could make by paying attention to that area.

Just some things to think about.

B
 
Brian,

The design would probably work well for many people. I can see your thought process here.

I have to say though, that the handle on the hybrid design you made for me a couple of years back is about as ideal a design as I have ever used.
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I like it. It's not fugly, just different. One of my biggest gripes when using a knife for an extended period of time, is the fatigue I feel in the centre of my palm. Would this swell eliminate/alleviate that?
 
I love the blade. A thin, narrow, scandi ground blade is one of the handiest I've found for working wood. Not sure about the humpback...I'd have to hold it to know. I think it looks fine, though.
 
Heck Brian I don't think you could make a Fugly knife if you tried !

I've said it many times before but to me the handle is even more important than the blade, you can always tweak a blade a little till it cuts how you want but if the handle is too thin for comfort you are in trouble.
 
Handle ergonomics and design is one of the most important aspect of a knife
Sorry to say, but a slab of 1/8" 1095 spear shaped scandi ground is very similar across knives
But a comforable handle is what makes a knife for me

The most comfortable knives I own are:
  • The Mora Companion has an amazing handle that does what you are designing, with a curved top, swelled bottom grip and narrower in the from and back, with a front handle choil and a widened butt at the end for the little finger.
  • Also the Helle Harmoni has the curve and swell, and the front choil in the wood handle with a more pronounced little finger hook for pull cuts
  • The Enzo Trapper also has the curve and swell but less, and no back hook like the Enzo Camper
Worth looking at how they do it

Thumb position dependant on the front choil
The front choil in the handle will determine your first finger, which will then position your thumb
The futher forward the handle choil, the futher forward your thumb
The thumb gives the most leaverage for very controlled piviot cuts with the thumb as the center of the piviot when on the back of the blade
So handle choil forward allows the thumb forward over the first part of the blade
 
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