My new (beater) Hawkbill....

M

MacTech

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Jan 7, 2006
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I went to Home Despot today to pick up a 5 gallon bottle of Dihydrous Monoxide for the office DiHmo cooler, and while i was walking the aisles in the tool department (hey, i'm a guy, i'm genetically predisposed to check out the tool department ;) ) i looked at their laughable selection of "knives", about the only decent things there were the Leatherman tools

as i scanned the cheap Sheffield knock-off knives (a Buck 110 clone, and a Spydie-esque "tactical" folder with a thumb-oval hole and CE blade, i saw a "Hawkbill" blade folder, looked like a cross between a linoleum knife and an Opinel, and it was cheap, $8

i figured "what the heck", worst case, i'd have a beater i could use for all the stuff i wouldn't dream of doing to my *good* blades...

i got it into the car, and slit open the clampak with my Jester, and pulled the knife free of the packaging....

i kept my standards *low* for this knife, it appears to use standard carbon-steel for both the blade, and the liners, the wood handles appear to be plain wood, no stabilized wood or fancy weather-proofing here, in fact, even in it's *sealed* clampak, i noticed a few spots of surface rust on the sides of the lock release well near the lockbar lever

the lock release lever is located towards the rear of the knife, much like a Buck 110, lockup is solid, *NO* blade play, the lock notch in the tang of the blade appears reasonably deep, and the blade appears to lock positively, it resists normal pressure to cause the lock to fail, but make no bones about it, i have no confidence in the lockbar on this knife, as far as i'm concerned, it's *cosmetic* only, i'll treat this knife like a slipjoint, and assume the lockbar *will* fail....

time to thumb-drag test for sharpness....

.....Geez, i've handled sharper *BUTTER* knives....

the paper cut test was equally pathetic, it's 2 3/4" blade could barely cut apart a standard sized Post-It note, and it produced a very ragged cut through paper, the actual edge bevel was pretty bad, uneven grinds on both sides, dings in the blade right out of the factory sealed package, tiny oxidation spots on the edge bevel...(this is an *unused* knife, mind you) the *WORST* factory performance of *any* knife i've used, heck, even my Buck Metro with the crappy 420J2 bladesteel was sharper out of the box...

Since i was looking for a crappy knife to test out how sharp i can get it on the Sharpmaker anyway, i'm not *too* dissapointed in it, this was more an experiment than anything, i *bought this knife *expecting* it to get loose with use, have the lockbar fail under "heavy" use (like cutting cardboard boxes ;) ) and corrode, i bought this blade with the sole purpose of *abusing* it, i *want* to beat on this one to see if i can get it to fail

overall, i'd rate the knife in factory condition the following way;

Fit and Finish; 2 - rust spots around lock bar, pieces of lint embedded around the edge of the wood scales, rust spots on the metal bolsters, blade slighty out of center when folded, lockbar is cosmetic at best (treat this one like a slipjoint)

Lockup; 8 - surprisingly solid lockup for an $8 knife, absolutely *no* horizontal or vertical play, we'll see how long that lasts under hard use though...

Ergonomics; 5 - nothing to see here, move along, your basic, low-end folder, not uncomfortable, mind you, but nothing special either

Sharpness; 1.5 - uhh......they *did* sharpen this one, right?.... uneven grinds, wavy bevels, tiny oxidation spots in the edge bevel itself, it's like they didn't even *try* to sharpen it....

Overall rating (factory condition); 4

i wasn't expecting much from this knife, and i got *exactly* what i expected....

pics tonight when i get home
 
Results from first "Cut-Off" competition;

Contender #1; Sheffield Hawkbill (2 3/4" blade)
Contender #2; Spyderco SE Dodo (2" blade)

Subject; 8" piece of cardboard (J-B Weld hangcard)

Contender #1; 3 3/4" cut, lots of resistance, ragged edges, lots of tearing, it *tore* more than it *cut*, small fragments of cardboard left on blade

Contender #2; 8"+ cut, *no* resistance, cut not only thru the cardboard, but also thru the plastic "bubble" that contained the JB-Weld tubes, wanted to keep cutting, but ran out of cardboard
 
Well, this was *unbelievable*.....

the Sharpmaker was *unable* to put even a usable *utility* edge on this piece of crap, so I'm downgrading the ratings accordingly....

Fit and Finish; 1 (downgraded from 2) scratches and wear marks already appearing around the pivot point of the blade, there are dings and scratches in the bladesteel

Lockup; 8 - (unchanged, still solid lockup)

Ergonomics; 3 (downgraded from 5), the handle is a little slippery even when dry, the wood is too smooth

Sharpness; -5 (yes, NEGATIVE five, downgraded from 1.5), i never thought i'd encounter an *unsharpenable* knife, the Sharpmaker barely put a usable utility edge on this crapknife, it may be time to take it to the bench grinder, i certainly can't make it any *worse*....

Overall rating (after sharpening attempts) -2 (yes, NEGATIVE two)

final verdict, don't waste your money, i'll be leaving this one at work as a loaner knife-shaped object
 
That kind of review is important too -- we should post more of them, for the newbies who see things like that in the store and think, "Hey, that looks just like the knife I saw reviewed on Bladeforums ... it's a hawkbill, anyway ... it looks almost like the one I saw reviewed on Bladeforums ... and it's cheap ... what the heck ..."
 
MacTech said:
don't waste your money, i'll be leaving this one at work as a loaner knife-shaped object
Click to expand...

:D

I've had better luck with BudK knives, hahah.
 
I'd work it some more on the coarse rods. The steel may be and is probably soft so putting a good edge on it could be tricky.

Another thing you may want to do is fix the wood with some sandpaper and then refinish it. I'm not sure if you'd want to invest the effort though.

Good review.
 
I actually found a use for this piece of crap....

i put it in my car's center console with a magnesium fire starter, if i ever need to use the magnesium fire starter, i'd much rather shave off magnesium shavings and spark them with a beater knife, there's no way in hell i'd subject my good knives to that kind of abuse
 
Hmm, that's odd. I bought the same knife this past weekend from Home Depot. True, it was dull as a butterknife out of the package, but I was able to get an edge on it with a diamond sharpener. So far it has done everything that I've asked of it, which, however, was only to a) cut string, 2) scribe a line on some cedar fencing, 3) slit the paper tape on a package; this is about all I ask of any knife though, unless I'm working on a carpentry project. I don't see any signs of corrosion on mine.

Hawkbills can be hard to sharpen; maybe you just need to try again, starting coarse, as suggested above. Then spray it down with some anti-corrosion agent and throw it in the glove box.
 
Took a closer look at the knife after my previous post, but still don't see problems like you have on yours. Your comments about the lock are right on, it's very solid, perhaps too solid, since it's hard to press the lock bar enough to disengage. The only manufacturing flaw I see is some roughness on the edge of the inside liners near the bail; a piece of sandpaper will smooth that out in no time.

The knife does have what I consider to be a common design flaw in hawkbills: the handle is not shaped to conform with the shape of the blade, so when you close it, the tip holds most of the back of the blade out of the handle. This makes the knife bulkier than it needs to be in your pocket, and probably is not doing the tip much good either.

But hey, for less than $9 ...
 
Lenny, I've been tempted by the Opinels, but never quite have gotten around to ordering, whereas the Sheffield was right there in front of me...

I've also been tempted by Sheffield's sailor's knives, but again, haven't gotten around to it. Inertia plays a large part in my finances.
 
Cougar, this knife sparked the flint rod so well i may not even *need* to use the magnesium shavings, it created a *massive* shower of sparks, finally found something it *does* do well...
 
It's a matter of the inconsistant heat treat, which means the knife you can can be a crap shoot sharpness wise
 
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