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Grind?
- Thread starter mykel m
- Start date
- Joined
- Oct 19, 2005
- Messages
- 19,688
The Scandi grind is a hot fad. The benefit is (only one) that Scandi's are the easiest to push through wood. The chief drawback is strength. I find them to be (personally) inferior, and don't go walking out into the woods with one on my side.
Convex is stronger, and processes wood fine. Its easier to maintain, hands down. And it handles a variety of other tasks (butchering, food prep, chopping, etc) better than the scandi hands down.
PLUS! The Convex sabergrind is VERY hard to accomplish correctly. It is a very rare grind to find because of this. Conversely, the Scandi grind is done on a jig. I could teach my 8 year old to do this grind. Its a mass production grind. I started doing them because of customer demand, period!
IMO there is a misconception about convex grind being the easiest to do. WRONG. The lack of a hard backing surface behind the belt makes this grind the trickiest! But, to a new maker, the slack belt convex is often the first they try. THESE GRINDS SUCK ASS! Their steep geometry looks like an appleseed and don't perform for shit! A proper convex grind will be very thinly ground, and will appear to be flat until you hold a straightedge up to the bevel. I get asked constantly at Bladeshow if my knives are flat ground! I smile my ass off when folks say this!
Additionally, often convex grinders make aesthetic mistakes. Little dimples in the spine at the plunge, where they've pushed the belt into the spine by mistake. This pic is of an early Nessmuk I did. You can see this aesthetic flaw perfectly on this knife. It took me 300 knives before this mistake was conquered, and the convex sabergrind was born. (Dylan's sorry ass mastered this after only 25 or so knives.)
Even easier to accomplish than the Scandi grind is the 'convex scandi' grind. This is simply a short convex grind. Really, Hannah (8 years old) could do this on her first try. It cuts. You can carry it, not for me. The only thing thats challenging about a Scandi grind is making sure the bevel is in one plane. The convex scandi avoids this minor hassle because of its convex nature. I've not bowed to this fad grind yet because, why do it? The convex sabergrind will beat it for performance, highlights a much more skillful grind, is just as easy to maintain in the field, and gets blunted by repeated sharpening an order of magnatude slower.
YMMV.
Convex is stronger, and processes wood fine. Its easier to maintain, hands down. And it handles a variety of other tasks (butchering, food prep, chopping, etc) better than the scandi hands down.
PLUS! The Convex sabergrind is VERY hard to accomplish correctly. It is a very rare grind to find because of this. Conversely, the Scandi grind is done on a jig. I could teach my 8 year old to do this grind. Its a mass production grind. I started doing them because of customer demand, period!
IMO there is a misconception about convex grind being the easiest to do. WRONG. The lack of a hard backing surface behind the belt makes this grind the trickiest! But, to a new maker, the slack belt convex is often the first they try. THESE GRINDS SUCK ASS! Their steep geometry looks like an appleseed and don't perform for shit! A proper convex grind will be very thinly ground, and will appear to be flat until you hold a straightedge up to the bevel. I get asked constantly at Bladeshow if my knives are flat ground! I smile my ass off when folks say this!
Additionally, often convex grinders make aesthetic mistakes. Little dimples in the spine at the plunge, where they've pushed the belt into the spine by mistake. This pic is of an early Nessmuk I did. You can see this aesthetic flaw perfectly on this knife. It took me 300 knives before this mistake was conquered, and the convex sabergrind was born. (Dylan's sorry ass mastered this after only 25 or so knives.)
Even easier to accomplish than the Scandi grind is the 'convex scandi' grind. This is simply a short convex grind. Really, Hannah (8 years old) could do this on her first try. It cuts. You can carry it, not for me. The only thing thats challenging about a Scandi grind is making sure the bevel is in one plane. The convex scandi avoids this minor hassle because of its convex nature. I've not bowed to this fad grind yet because, why do it? The convex sabergrind will beat it for performance, highlights a much more skillful grind, is just as easy to maintain in the field, and gets blunted by repeated sharpening an order of magnatude slower.
YMMV.
Last edited:
- Joined
- May 18, 2009
- Messages
- 1,831
They are easier to sharpen too...
- Joined
- Oct 23, 2006
- Messages
- 1,461
The Scandi grind is a hot fad. The benefit is (only one) that Scandi's are the easiest to push through wood. The chief drawback is strength. I find them to be (personally) inferior, and don't go walking out into the woods with one on my side.
Convex is stronger, and processes wood fine. Its easier to maintain, hands down. And it handles a variety of other tasks (butchering, food prep, chopping, etc) better than the scandi hands down.
PLUS! The Convex sabergrind is VERY hard to accomplish correctly. It is a very rare grind to find because of this. Conversely, the Scandi grind is done on a jig. I could teach my 8 year old to do this grind. Its a mass production grind. I started doing them because of customer demand, period!
IMO there is a misconception about convex grind being the easiest to do. WRONG. The lack of a hard backing surface behind the belt makes this grind the trickiest! But, to a new maker, the slack belt convex is often the first they try. THESE GRINDS SUCK ASS! Their steep geometry looks like an appleseed and don't perform for shit! A proper convex grind will be very thinly ground, and will appear to be flat until you hold a straightedge up to the bevel. I get asked constantly at Bladeshow if my knives are flat ground! I smile my ass off when folks say this!
Additionally, often convex grinders make aesthetic mistakes. Little dimples in the spine at the plunge, where they've pushed the belt into the spine by mistake. This pic is of an early Nessmuk I did. You can see this aesthetic flaw perfectly on this knife. It took me 300 knives before this mistake was conquered, and the convex sabergrind was born. (Dylan's sorry ass mastered this after only 25 or so knives.)
Even easier to accomplish than the Scandi grind is the 'convex scandi' grind. This is simply a short convex grind. Really, Hannah (8 years old) could do this on her first try. It cuts. You can carry it, not for me. The only thing thats challenging about a Scandi grind is making sure the bevel is in one plane. The convex scandi avoids this minor hassle because of its convex nature. I've not bowed to this fad grind yet because, why do it? The convex sabergrind will beat it for performance, highlights a much more skillful grind, is just as easy to maintain in the field, and gets blunted by repeated sharpening an order of magnatude slower.
YMMV.
My mileage doesn't vary at all.
My mileage is right in line with yours, brother.Convex is king for me. I've never found a grind that did anything better than it and was still tougher than a pine knot. It is literally the best of all worlds , imo.
And Andy's dead on right about grinding a good convex. There's not many makers out there that I've seen that grind a convex the way he does. It ain't easy.
Iz
sharpening a Scandi grind looks very simple, especially for those people who normally can't sharpen a knife without a Sharpmaker, or other gadget.
there's a good video on youtube where Ray Mears shows how to sharpen a Scandi. it's just keeping the single bevel flat against the stones, so there's no guessing about the angle... however the drawback seems to be that it takes three grades of water stones to sharpen one, at least the way the video shows.
but he also shows how to sharpen it in the field with a Falkniven diamond and ceramic sharpener.
there's a good video on youtube where Ray Mears shows how to sharpen a Scandi. it's just keeping the single bevel flat against the stones, so there's no guessing about the angle... however the drawback seems to be that it takes three grades of water stones to sharpen one, at least the way the video shows.
but he also shows how to sharpen it in the field with a Falkniven diamond and ceramic sharpener.
GregS
Gold Member
- Joined
- May 6, 2008
- Messages
- 6,022
He makes it look really easy.
- Joined
- Oct 19, 2005
- Messages
- 19,688
To properly sharpen a Scandi, you have to remove metal along the entire plane that makes up the bevel. That, or you have to put a microbevel on the edge. This microbevel makes the edge stronger, and makes sharpening a zip. But, it blunts the knife quickly, and when you need to get the edge back to zero, you have to remove a lot of metal. This is why modern Scandi enthusiasts don't want that extra edge bevel there. They use the Scandi 'zero' ground.
I've never enjoyed sharpening Scandi's. In fact, I've never enjoyed sharpening with stones at all. Sandpaper just seem so much easier to use, and carry, and its not fragile. But usually, I just steel, then strop my convexes to restore the edge. Very rarely do I move to sandpaper. I've never needed it on an excursion at all, and if I did wear a knife to dull on a trip, I'd certainly only need the paper once. Unless I was hiking the AT trail or something.
I've never enjoyed sharpening Scandi's. In fact, I've never enjoyed sharpening with stones at all. Sandpaper just seem so much easier to use, and carry, and its not fragile. But usually, I just steel, then strop my convexes to restore the edge. Very rarely do I move to sandpaper. I've never needed it on an excursion at all, and if I did wear a knife to dull on a trip, I'd certainly only need the paper once. Unless I was hiking the AT trail or something.