- Joined
- Jan 8, 2005
- Messages
- 597
Its true - you'll never satisfy your addiction by getting better knives, more expensive knives... every one you get just leaves you wanting more. I finally got a Sebenza this year - and was that enough for me? No way! So I dove in and bought my first real custom, the Super Dark Angel v2 from Mikkel Willumsen, with black carbon fiber, a limited run of 10 made for True North Knives.
Here's the ad copy:
THICKER AND BEEFIER! THE DARK ANGEL V.2 - URBAN TACTICAL- THICK FRAME LOCK FLIPPER FOLDER. CPM 154 STAINLESS HOLLOW GROUND BLAST WASHED GROOVED BLADE. SERRATED THUMB RAMP AND FRAME. TEAR DROP OPENER. THICK TITANIUM FRAME WITH GROOVED AND TEXTURED CARBON FIBER OVERLAYS. TITANIUM BACKSPACER POSTS. BLAST TITANIUM FRAME AND POCKET CLIP- TIP UP CARRY. I.K.B.S. BEARING PIVOT SYSTEM - SMOOTH OPENING AND SOLID LOCKUP. BLAST STAINLESS SCREWS & PIVOT. SOLID DEPENDABLE HARD USE FOLDER.
There's some great photos on the TNK site, at http://www.truenorthknives.com/tnk_1mainframe.htm
Here's a shot with a Skirmish and a Sebenza so you can see the size. It looks huge when it's by itself, but it's no bigger than the Skirmish.
I love a titanium framelock and I love a folder that can be used for "self defense should the need arise," (SDSTNA) as the phrase runs. When I saw the picture of the knife, and having read good things about other products from Mr. Willumsen, I decided that this was the new knife for me. Here's a few other shots:
So, is it the greatest Christmas present since the Big Wheel? Yes - mostly. It is a very solid, beefy build. This is a big strong knife. The blade is really thick for a folder but overall it's still totally pocketable. It fits in the same pocket sheath as my Skirmish, so the swap was easy. It's not too big or too heavy for every day carry. And the IKBS bearing system for the pivot is amazingly good. This thing opens like ice moving over teflon. It has a strong detent with a little ball bearing set into the inside of the spring part of the frame lock (it matches up with that hole in the corner of the leaf you can see on the plain side of the knife) which goes into a hole in the blade - and good thing, because once you clear the detent, it basically drops open at free fall speed. There is just no resistance. I passed it around at a Christmas party, and instead of the usual "oh it's so big" everyone was hypnotized by the smoothness of the IKBS action. It's not the rock solid, no side to side movement at all that my Skirmish and Sebenza has, it's more of the little tiny bit of wiggle you get with most decent folders. I couldn't tighten it up more than a little, though, because there's no torx or other hole on the plain side of the pivot! It's fine though, in terms of feeling solid. The framelock is well regulated and it clicks in solid. I tested the lock (I test ever lock on every knife I have, because I love my fingers) and it's well done.
I usually don't use the flipper, I just index finger the hole in the blade past the detent and whack! it's open. It's really, really fun to open. I was suprised by the ease of closure - the springiness of the leaf is not as strong as the Skirmish, for instance, it moves out of the way very easily. I'm going to have to be careful not to over-open it over time.
The handle shape has great ergos and doing some moderate cutting of heavy packing cardboard and the like went very well - after I sharpened the thing. And there's the first issue I had - maybe a minor issue - this thing was, to my taste, a butter knife when I got it. OK, it was some sharp, and I know some makers will leave the final sharpening to the customer. And some folks don't like a "delicate" edge. But I want something that will shave hair easily and "catch" on my finger nails, and it was nowhere near that. So a full half hour with the Sharpmaker later, and I was a lot happier, although the final half toward the tip never did sharpen up well - just too blunt. It's plenty sharp now, "whiffs" through heavy hardboard, that's good enough for me.
Since the knife has essentially a pure fighter shape, I wanted to test it a bit, so I did a full power slash at a one inch Oleander branch. Oleander is good for this sort of thing, it's fairly soft but you need decent edge geometry to get through it. It made it almost all the way through - and to my great surprise, my hand hurt like hell. Wha? In my excitement I hadn't noticed a great big frikkin flaw in the finish of the knife - the entire upper edge of the titanium side never got radiused! I don't know if it was a careless error or a design error but this buyer of a $600 custom was NOT PLEASED. It was a sharp clean 90 degree shoulder all the way from above the pivot to the rear of the handle - very uncomfortable on hard use. The front of the knife, where your hand never goes, has a very nice radius... so maybe it was a shop oversight.
Maybe if he lived around here and not in Denmark I might have sent an email, mailed him the knife, and I bet Mr. Willumsen would have had no problem touching this up. As it is, I'm a little handy (and didn't want to send my new toy anywhere at all), so I chucked a fine stone grinder head in my dremel and knocked the edge down a little. What I did is very suble but it's a hell of a lot better than having left it crisp and edgy as it was.
The titanium side is very smooth - if the whole knife was like that, you'd never use it. But the carbon fiber side is super grippy, it feels like G-10 with the sandpaper finish, and has those grooves in addition. The end result is that the knife is totally solid in either hand and there's no problem at all with grip. I really like the way he did the carbon fiber.
A final point, the decorative groove on the carbon side of the knife, that runs from the tip to the hole, is pretty and all, but stuff gets stuck in there, making cleaning more difficult. My test medium for this was when I cut a Duraflame log in half. I would have left it off the knife.
Don't get me wrong - this is a good knife. Its sold as a hard user, not a safe queen, and that's how I'm treating it. When I pull this out and it flicks open like magic and I cut a garden hose in half, I like to know that it's one of only ten in the world - and also it really does feel great in the hand. Plus, it's a great comfort to have in the pocket when out and about the city late at night. It's a near ideal design for SDSTNA.
Finally a tip of the hat to Neal Ostroff of True North Knives - excellent service, including a very fast return phone call when I had a question, and for $30, I had my knife the day after I bought it. I can't recommend TNK highly enough.
Here's the ad copy:
THICKER AND BEEFIER! THE DARK ANGEL V.2 - URBAN TACTICAL- THICK FRAME LOCK FLIPPER FOLDER. CPM 154 STAINLESS HOLLOW GROUND BLAST WASHED GROOVED BLADE. SERRATED THUMB RAMP AND FRAME. TEAR DROP OPENER. THICK TITANIUM FRAME WITH GROOVED AND TEXTURED CARBON FIBER OVERLAYS. TITANIUM BACKSPACER POSTS. BLAST TITANIUM FRAME AND POCKET CLIP- TIP UP CARRY. I.K.B.S. BEARING PIVOT SYSTEM - SMOOTH OPENING AND SOLID LOCKUP. BLAST STAINLESS SCREWS & PIVOT. SOLID DEPENDABLE HARD USE FOLDER.
There's some great photos on the TNK site, at http://www.truenorthknives.com/tnk_1mainframe.htm
Here's a shot with a Skirmish and a Sebenza so you can see the size. It looks huge when it's by itself, but it's no bigger than the Skirmish.
I love a titanium framelock and I love a folder that can be used for "self defense should the need arise," (SDSTNA) as the phrase runs. When I saw the picture of the knife, and having read good things about other products from Mr. Willumsen, I decided that this was the new knife for me. Here's a few other shots:
So, is it the greatest Christmas present since the Big Wheel? Yes - mostly. It is a very solid, beefy build. This is a big strong knife. The blade is really thick for a folder but overall it's still totally pocketable. It fits in the same pocket sheath as my Skirmish, so the swap was easy. It's not too big or too heavy for every day carry. And the IKBS bearing system for the pivot is amazingly good. This thing opens like ice moving over teflon. It has a strong detent with a little ball bearing set into the inside of the spring part of the frame lock (it matches up with that hole in the corner of the leaf you can see on the plain side of the knife) which goes into a hole in the blade - and good thing, because once you clear the detent, it basically drops open at free fall speed. There is just no resistance. I passed it around at a Christmas party, and instead of the usual "oh it's so big" everyone was hypnotized by the smoothness of the IKBS action. It's not the rock solid, no side to side movement at all that my Skirmish and Sebenza has, it's more of the little tiny bit of wiggle you get with most decent folders. I couldn't tighten it up more than a little, though, because there's no torx or other hole on the plain side of the pivot! It's fine though, in terms of feeling solid. The framelock is well regulated and it clicks in solid. I tested the lock (I test ever lock on every knife I have, because I love my fingers) and it's well done.
I usually don't use the flipper, I just index finger the hole in the blade past the detent and whack! it's open. It's really, really fun to open. I was suprised by the ease of closure - the springiness of the leaf is not as strong as the Skirmish, for instance, it moves out of the way very easily. I'm going to have to be careful not to over-open it over time.
The handle shape has great ergos and doing some moderate cutting of heavy packing cardboard and the like went very well - after I sharpened the thing. And there's the first issue I had - maybe a minor issue - this thing was, to my taste, a butter knife when I got it. OK, it was some sharp, and I know some makers will leave the final sharpening to the customer. And some folks don't like a "delicate" edge. But I want something that will shave hair easily and "catch" on my finger nails, and it was nowhere near that. So a full half hour with the Sharpmaker later, and I was a lot happier, although the final half toward the tip never did sharpen up well - just too blunt. It's plenty sharp now, "whiffs" through heavy hardboard, that's good enough for me.
Since the knife has essentially a pure fighter shape, I wanted to test it a bit, so I did a full power slash at a one inch Oleander branch. Oleander is good for this sort of thing, it's fairly soft but you need decent edge geometry to get through it. It made it almost all the way through - and to my great surprise, my hand hurt like hell. Wha? In my excitement I hadn't noticed a great big frikkin flaw in the finish of the knife - the entire upper edge of the titanium side never got radiused! I don't know if it was a careless error or a design error but this buyer of a $600 custom was NOT PLEASED. It was a sharp clean 90 degree shoulder all the way from above the pivot to the rear of the handle - very uncomfortable on hard use. The front of the knife, where your hand never goes, has a very nice radius... so maybe it was a shop oversight.
Maybe if he lived around here and not in Denmark I might have sent an email, mailed him the knife, and I bet Mr. Willumsen would have had no problem touching this up. As it is, I'm a little handy (and didn't want to send my new toy anywhere at all), so I chucked a fine stone grinder head in my dremel and knocked the edge down a little. What I did is very suble but it's a hell of a lot better than having left it crisp and edgy as it was.
The titanium side is very smooth - if the whole knife was like that, you'd never use it. But the carbon fiber side is super grippy, it feels like G-10 with the sandpaper finish, and has those grooves in addition. The end result is that the knife is totally solid in either hand and there's no problem at all with grip. I really like the way he did the carbon fiber.
A final point, the decorative groove on the carbon side of the knife, that runs from the tip to the hole, is pretty and all, but stuff gets stuck in there, making cleaning more difficult. My test medium for this was when I cut a Duraflame log in half. I would have left it off the knife.
Don't get me wrong - this is a good knife. Its sold as a hard user, not a safe queen, and that's how I'm treating it. When I pull this out and it flicks open like magic and I cut a garden hose in half, I like to know that it's one of only ten in the world - and also it really does feel great in the hand. Plus, it's a great comfort to have in the pocket when out and about the city late at night. It's a near ideal design for SDSTNA.
Finally a tip of the hat to Neal Ostroff of True North Knives - excellent service, including a very fast return phone call when I had a question, and for $30, I had my knife the day after I bought it. I can't recommend TNK highly enough.
