Modded Native V

phillipsted

phillipsted

Joined
Oct 4, 2010
Messages
1,315
I bought a Native V a few months back intending to re-scale it with some wood. I tried several different woods, including stabilized redwood and stabilized maple burl - but none of them worked out. They were either too chippy or not strong enough at the desired thinness. I finally settled on an old piece of "True Mulga" from Mark at Its A Burl. The Mulga is a type of Australian desert Acacia, and is resinous, hard and very dense. I used the wood unstabilized and did not put any finishing coat on it - save for a polish with Renaissance Wax.

TedP

















 
Thats a beauty Ted! I recall reading a while back that you don't use any power tools for your scales. Is that still true? If so, that's even more impressive!
I may need to try some of that Mulga myself...

-Steve
 
Very nice work Ted. Your Native 5 reminds me a lot of the one Rich (Gull Wing) did for me in Mexican Ebony back when they first came out.
 
Just wow! Very beautiful. It looks like it's really comfortable in the hand.

I noticed that some of the screws don't look like they fit perfectly. The scales are so beautiful that they should just bee pinned to the knife. No need to ever take those scales off.
 
sogflash said:
Just wow! Very beautiful. It looks like it's really comfortable in the hand.

I noticed that some of the screws don't look like they fit perfectly. The scales are so beautiful that they should just bee pinned to the knife. No need to ever take those scales off.
Click to expand...

Thanks, Sogflash. Yeah, for some reason, I misdrilled the pivot hole - must have slipped slightly when I was setting it up. Strangely enough, the hole in the scales for the pivot is about 1/64" larger than the corresponding hole in the liner. Not sure why... must have something to do with tolerances and allowing adjustments.

spketch said:
Thats a beauty Ted! I recall reading a while back that you don't use any power tools for your scales. Is that still true? If so, that's even more impressive!
I may need to try some of that Mulga myself...

-Steve
Click to expand...

Steve - Thanks! I try to do almost all of my work by hand. On this knife, the exception being the drill press. It is awful hard to drill precise holes by hand. Oh, and I also sliced these scale slabs off of a much larger block of Mulga using the bandsaw. But I did all the thickness planing, shaping, contouring, sanding and fitting by hand.

I love the hands-on aspect of this work - it serves as a type therapy for me. Or, as my wife says, "it keeps your hands busy and keeps you out of trouble." :cool:

TedP
 
That is beautiful! It takes the knife to a whole new level in my opinion. It's like the new Spyderco "Platinum" line if I may be so bold. Mike
 
That's a great mod. I have the forum version and I hope to do something similar to it one day.
 
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