First off, I am going put down a few pieces of information I havent been able to find anywhere else about the Sebenza.
Weight: 4.8 oz.; 136 gr.
Overall length, actually measured on this Sebenza: 8 7/32
Blade length: 3.487
Handle length: 4.74
Blade thickness: .121
Scale thickness: .150
Overall thickness: .456 (less clip)
Edge thickness: .023
The knife has a nice heft to it, certainly gives a feeling of confidence when holding it and using it. The blade grind is quite interesting, hollow ground using an 8 wheel I believe, but toward the point the hollow runs out and if viewed from the spine, it becomes very slightly convex. Makes for a blade with excellent slicing ability, yet it has a very strong point. The blade shape is very practical, slightly dropped point would make for an excellent hunting knife, perfect for opening up a deer. The edge has good curvature, would be quite good for skinning or most general cutting purposes. The edge is ground thin enough for anything a folding knife of this size would normally be used for. The thumb stud is well designed and quite comfortable to use repeatedly. The knurling on the spine for a thumb ramp is very attractive, but needs improvement. The cuts are to shallow, it gives only marginally more grip than a flat area would. If cut just a little deeper, they should provide much more grip. The rest of the spine beyond the ramp has a very nice radius, however. Blade grinding is excellent, with the naked eye, I can find no difference from one side to the other.
As most of you know, bushings and standoffs are used on all three fasteners that hold the handle together. This is a very good improvement over most folders, since you tighten the down screws and the knife is ready. You dont need any thread locking compounds and there is no adjustment needed for the pivot. The screws could use some improvement, they appear to be standard oval head socket screws, which is fine for this application, but the sockets are bit loose for a standard 5/64 hex wrench. A 2mm hex fits slightly better, but not as good as it should. (No the screws are not metric, but many stainless screws have a loose fit, standard alloy socket head screws have a much closer fit and dont round out as easily, but wouldnt be practical in this application since they will rust.) After repeated removals, the sockets on these screws could easily become rounded and need replacement. The ergonomics of this handle are about average in my opinion, but handle comfort is a very personal thing. I would most likely prefer the Classic shape over the Regular. The scallops cut into the bottom of the handle may provide for a more slip resistant grip, but after extended use, become uncomfortable. The clip does an excellent job of keeping the knife clipped into your pocket without being to difficult to remove. The extra bend that CRK puts into it is a nice addition to help the clip do its job. On the downside it is not very comfortable in the hand when using it for extended periods of time. If you need to hold the knife in a fencing grip, the clip would start become an irritation after a while. The current clip design doesnt allow it, but I think that for a knife in this price range, tip up or tip down is an option that should be available, even if that means that you buy a knife either one way or the other, but cant have both. Since quality is always mentioned when one discusses CRK products, I will mention one minor defect with the clip on this particular knife. It doesnt quite fit into its pocket properly. I know I am very particular on this point, but if I am to give a complete review, I think this is a fair point to mention in a knife costing $345.00. It only needs about .001 removed from one side to fit better, so we are not talking about much. I also have every confidence that if this were my knife and I sent it back to CRK, they would fix it without any questions asked.
When the lock bar moves over to lock the blade open, it does so with authority. I cant imagine any normal situation that would cause this knife to unlock accidentally. It moves across to cover the back of the blade by about 1/8 and it takes a pretty strong push to unlock it. This is another area where I would most likely prefer the Classic handle since it gives you a larger area to push on to unlock the blade. One other point of minor contention is the area adjacent to the lock bar on the handle. This is a bit hard to describe without photos but here goes. The slab which has the cut for the lock bar, at the very end of the cut, where the blade locks; the part which does not move to engage the blade should be rounded off. To put this another way, if you hold the knife normally, with your index finger covering the slot for the lock bar, the corner of the fixed part of the slab is exposed when the lock bar moves over. This corner should be radiused as again, after extended use this could cause some irritation to the index finger. I have found this to be the case on all frame locks that I have looked at, so it is certainly not unique to the Sebenza, but I think it is something that could be addressed. Again, both of these are very minor flaws.
In conclusion, I would have to agree that when compared to any production knife that I have looked at, including William Henry and Lone Wolf, the Sebenza beats them in quality. I assume from what I have read here that they are extremely consistent from one knife to another and if something is amiss, they will do their best to fix it. If you are in this price range and need a full size frame lock folder, the Sebenza is the standard to measure up to. Custom makers may do equally well, but I have yet to see a production knife that has all of these features and precision.
One more side note. It has been mentioned several times that the Sebenza might be an inferior knife because Chris Reeve will not fix the knife under warranty if you flip it open. The fact of the matter is that if you are flipping the knife open, you are imparting impact stresses to the stop and the pivot. These stresses are very different than a the normal forces encountered when using the knife to cut even very hard material. Ever try pushing a nail into a piece of oak instead of using a hammer. Yes, automatics and assisted openers are flipped by a spring, but these are controlled forces which if properly engineered, are accounted for in the design of the stop and pivot. If you manually flip a knife, the manufacturer has no way of knowing how hard of often you are going to flip the blade. To account for any stresses which these parts might see, the manufacturer of the knife would have to make the stop and pivot significantly larger than the requirements of such a knife. I, for one prefer a balanced approach to design. I have yet to see a need to flip any knife open. If you need something other than the one hand opening designs, buy an assisted knife, an auto or a fixed blade. If you have any questions I may not have answered in this rather lengthy review, please post them and I will do my best to reply.
Richard
Weight: 4.8 oz.; 136 gr.
Overall length, actually measured on this Sebenza: 8 7/32
Blade length: 3.487
Handle length: 4.74
Blade thickness: .121
Scale thickness: .150
Overall thickness: .456 (less clip)
Edge thickness: .023
The knife has a nice heft to it, certainly gives a feeling of confidence when holding it and using it. The blade grind is quite interesting, hollow ground using an 8 wheel I believe, but toward the point the hollow runs out and if viewed from the spine, it becomes very slightly convex. Makes for a blade with excellent slicing ability, yet it has a very strong point. The blade shape is very practical, slightly dropped point would make for an excellent hunting knife, perfect for opening up a deer. The edge has good curvature, would be quite good for skinning or most general cutting purposes. The edge is ground thin enough for anything a folding knife of this size would normally be used for. The thumb stud is well designed and quite comfortable to use repeatedly. The knurling on the spine for a thumb ramp is very attractive, but needs improvement. The cuts are to shallow, it gives only marginally more grip than a flat area would. If cut just a little deeper, they should provide much more grip. The rest of the spine beyond the ramp has a very nice radius, however. Blade grinding is excellent, with the naked eye, I can find no difference from one side to the other.
As most of you know, bushings and standoffs are used on all three fasteners that hold the handle together. This is a very good improvement over most folders, since you tighten the down screws and the knife is ready. You dont need any thread locking compounds and there is no adjustment needed for the pivot. The screws could use some improvement, they appear to be standard oval head socket screws, which is fine for this application, but the sockets are bit loose for a standard 5/64 hex wrench. A 2mm hex fits slightly better, but not as good as it should. (No the screws are not metric, but many stainless screws have a loose fit, standard alloy socket head screws have a much closer fit and dont round out as easily, but wouldnt be practical in this application since they will rust.) After repeated removals, the sockets on these screws could easily become rounded and need replacement. The ergonomics of this handle are about average in my opinion, but handle comfort is a very personal thing. I would most likely prefer the Classic shape over the Regular. The scallops cut into the bottom of the handle may provide for a more slip resistant grip, but after extended use, become uncomfortable. The clip does an excellent job of keeping the knife clipped into your pocket without being to difficult to remove. The extra bend that CRK puts into it is a nice addition to help the clip do its job. On the downside it is not very comfortable in the hand when using it for extended periods of time. If you need to hold the knife in a fencing grip, the clip would start become an irritation after a while. The current clip design doesnt allow it, but I think that for a knife in this price range, tip up or tip down is an option that should be available, even if that means that you buy a knife either one way or the other, but cant have both. Since quality is always mentioned when one discusses CRK products, I will mention one minor defect with the clip on this particular knife. It doesnt quite fit into its pocket properly. I know I am very particular on this point, but if I am to give a complete review, I think this is a fair point to mention in a knife costing $345.00. It only needs about .001 removed from one side to fit better, so we are not talking about much. I also have every confidence that if this were my knife and I sent it back to CRK, they would fix it without any questions asked.
When the lock bar moves over to lock the blade open, it does so with authority. I cant imagine any normal situation that would cause this knife to unlock accidentally. It moves across to cover the back of the blade by about 1/8 and it takes a pretty strong push to unlock it. This is another area where I would most likely prefer the Classic handle since it gives you a larger area to push on to unlock the blade. One other point of minor contention is the area adjacent to the lock bar on the handle. This is a bit hard to describe without photos but here goes. The slab which has the cut for the lock bar, at the very end of the cut, where the blade locks; the part which does not move to engage the blade should be rounded off. To put this another way, if you hold the knife normally, with your index finger covering the slot for the lock bar, the corner of the fixed part of the slab is exposed when the lock bar moves over. This corner should be radiused as again, after extended use this could cause some irritation to the index finger. I have found this to be the case on all frame locks that I have looked at, so it is certainly not unique to the Sebenza, but I think it is something that could be addressed. Again, both of these are very minor flaws.
In conclusion, I would have to agree that when compared to any production knife that I have looked at, including William Henry and Lone Wolf, the Sebenza beats them in quality. I assume from what I have read here that they are extremely consistent from one knife to another and if something is amiss, they will do their best to fix it. If you are in this price range and need a full size frame lock folder, the Sebenza is the standard to measure up to. Custom makers may do equally well, but I have yet to see a production knife that has all of these features and precision.
One more side note. It has been mentioned several times that the Sebenza might be an inferior knife because Chris Reeve will not fix the knife under warranty if you flip it open. The fact of the matter is that if you are flipping the knife open, you are imparting impact stresses to the stop and the pivot. These stresses are very different than a the normal forces encountered when using the knife to cut even very hard material. Ever try pushing a nail into a piece of oak instead of using a hammer. Yes, automatics and assisted openers are flipped by a spring, but these are controlled forces which if properly engineered, are accounted for in the design of the stop and pivot. If you manually flip a knife, the manufacturer has no way of knowing how hard of often you are going to flip the blade. To account for any stresses which these parts might see, the manufacturer of the knife would have to make the stop and pivot significantly larger than the requirements of such a knife. I, for one prefer a balanced approach to design. I have yet to see a need to flip any knife open. If you need something other than the one hand opening designs, buy an assisted knife, an auto or a fixed blade. If you have any questions I may not have answered in this rather lengthy review, please post them and I will do my best to reply.
Richard
