Just received my snakewood Mnandi from TNK today, excellent service and a truely beautiful knife. Saw two snakewood models online previously, but the grain patterns were a bit blotchy, glad I waited for this one. Wish I had a digital camera handy... debating about whether to keep the clip on, since it hides part of the wood and will be more damage prone riding in the upper part of my pocket.
The lube from the factory felt rather gritty, so I striped it down (plus, I'm the type of kid who has to immediately take apart his toys) and put in a bit of Fomblin grease. The action is silky smooth now.
Breakdown is a bit harder than on a Sebenza, the screws and stop-pin are fitted with very tight tolerances and require a fair amount of effort to seperate. This is good, smaller dimensions need a better fit; there is no blade play, but a slight amount of flex can be felt in the thin Ti handle when applying pressure to the blade, not unexpected.
Blade sharpness isn't quite hair-popping, but it does slice paper with ease. I will probabily give it a slightly polished micro-serration type edge anyway, better for cardboard, which is what I mostly use a knife of this size for.
The lock is Seb quality, granted it's thinner, but still very positive. Though I wonder, has anyone had problems with grit getting trapped between the Ti and the wood inlay?
Overall impression: snakewood is extremely cool, definitely worth the extra money. The few minor flaws
with the folding action and blade sharpness are easily corrected. Blade lockup is excellent for a folder of this size.
The lube from the factory felt rather gritty, so I striped it down (plus, I'm the type of kid who has to immediately take apart his toys) and put in a bit of Fomblin grease. The action is silky smooth now.
Breakdown is a bit harder than on a Sebenza, the screws and stop-pin are fitted with very tight tolerances and require a fair amount of effort to seperate. This is good, smaller dimensions need a better fit; there is no blade play, but a slight amount of flex can be felt in the thin Ti handle when applying pressure to the blade, not unexpected.
Blade sharpness isn't quite hair-popping, but it does slice paper with ease. I will probabily give it a slightly polished micro-serration type edge anyway, better for cardboard, which is what I mostly use a knife of this size for.
The lock is Seb quality, granted it's thinner, but still very positive. Though I wonder, has anyone had problems with grit getting trapped between the Ti and the wood inlay?
Overall impression: snakewood is extremely cool, definitely worth the extra money. The few minor flaws
with the folding action and blade sharpness are easily corrected. Blade lockup is excellent for a folder of this size.