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The BladeForums.com 2024 Traditional Knife is ready to order! See this thread for details: https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/bladeforums-2024-traditional-knife.2003187/
Price is$300$250 ea (shipped within CONUS). If you live outside the US, I will contact you after your order for extra shipping charges.
Order here: https://www.bladeforums.com/help/2024-traditional/ - Order as many as you like, we have plenty.
My Spyderco Delica 4 FFG
- Thread starter MostMenAreRuthless
- Start date
ejames13
Basic Member
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- Mar 30, 2015
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Because that's where the blade tang interfaces with the lock bar. The knife would have to be completely redesigned.
- Joined
- Jan 18, 2015
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Wow, first and only post in over a year of registration!
Well, I guess I'll say "welcome!"
And if you're concerned with how it flows when closed, there are alternative handles.
Wilkins grips also cover the exposed tang a bit, as well as the Boomer scales that look similar to the Lynch ti scales above.
(I think I might have already posted these photos in this thread..?)
- Joined
- Jan 18, 2015
- Messages
- 2,182
Haha, tell me how you really feel though.
I posted similar thoughts regarding some deep carry clips in another thread, but I leave it on this one.
It does work, and the handle is actually pretty amazing. I personally enjoy choils.
Wish I could just hand it to you right now to try and you might see for yourself.
Fortunately I do have plenty of factory stock Delicas I can also grab if I feel the need, and I do often.
Sorry for the frankness. I believe you. It probably feels great. The clip... I'll shut up now. I just can't see anything I'd change on the Delica. I've thoroughly tested it in FFG, and am quite impressed. The handle feels perfect, even in hard use. I love the ricasso on it, that can be used to choke up on like a choil, but yet there's no choil.
Forgive my poor English first. I am not an native English speaker and I am trying to improve my English.
I have quite a few knives so far and I am trying to put out what I understand about these knives.
What I have:
Spyderco:
Dragonfly 2, ZDP 189 - just a great knife. Smooth to open. Nice swedge at the back of the blade (like Native 5). Features a groove in the back lock release button like all Japanese Spyderco back lock models (correct me if I am wrong, since Caly 3 has it, Delica 4 has it, DF II has it). It cut through pencils like they are made of Tofu. And I use it a lot to cut those Lego plastic bags when my kid is around since the knife is so small and so precisely controllable and then should be relatively safer.
Tenacious - just a great knife at this value even it is made in China
Chaparral - another back lock. Also smooth to open like DF II, much higher feeling due to the carbon fiber laminated outer surface and full side exposed steel liners, and steel backspacers. Shape and ergonomics are just like a sage. I guess why Chaparral from Spyderco? Because they have a Sage 4 for back lock but with bolster design and huge price. And they are shy to release a sage 4 in laminated CF like Sage 1, so they reduce the blade size a little bit to have a new model. But this is very confusing actually. They can just make a Sage 4 like a 3" Chaparral. Anyway Sage series are to ode those locks, not the metal bolsters.
But the horrible thing about Chaparral are exactly as what Nick Shabazz said in his youtube review of this knife:
1. the back lock release button is just a huge pain to press. First because the blade is very thin, so the release button is also very thin. Secondly, no other non-Japanese made Spyderco back lock knife features that so comfortable groove design they have on those Japanese made back locks. This just make me confused. Why??? It seems to me some older version Native featured this, but not on Native 5 fore sure. But Native 5 is thick in blade and in the release button.
2. Taichung made middle level models normally does not do chamfer on the side edges. So the liner edges are sharp, the blade back edges are sharp, the Spider hole is sharp. So Taichung knives normally have higher feelings, but actually poor fit and finish. Sure the more expensive more than 200USD Taichung models will have good fit and finish, but not on the 100~200USD models. Just a shame!!
Since the release button is such a pain to press, I cannot imagine this knife deserve any often use. The thumb will sore very fast, you just don't want to use it anymore. I spent so much time to file out a similar groove like on DFII and Delica 4. Now with the groove gaining its shape, the knife becomes better and better to me.
Techno - above 200USD (originally) Taichung model, so the fit and finish just great. Nothing to complain here. All edges are chamfered and rounded, just great.
But the knife is just confusing me more when I play it more. Too heavy and too robust for such a small sized blade knife. Too slippy due to the full Titanium and no inlay design. And the Titanium finish is also very slippy, not like the Sebanza I have. And most critically the finger guard is minimized against the original design. Combine being super slippy and not enough finger guard, you just feel not safe to use this knife. Techno is such a robust knife, so it should be designed for hard use. But with that super slippy body and the non existent finger guard, are you kidding me, hard use? I was just so disappointed with this knife with so high fit and finish so I went to check the original design of that Polish designer. The original design is hugely different at several "minor" point. These differences just ruined this knife in my opinion. Very bad. Why the design deteriorated instead of improved when introduced into the Famous Spyderco portfolio? Just unbelievable.
Delica 4 - Never a fan of this knife. Opening is NOT smooth as the other two back lock. Just feel the opening 180 degree moving path. First from 0 to about 60 degree, huge force to work against for safety reason, OK. Then from 60 to about 135 degrees, very smooth actually quite loose. Then from 135 to 180, again you will feel some force. This tough-loose-tough feeling is just bad for me. DF II and Chaparral are both not like this. They are just tough-smooth, then bang open.
And another big issue with disassembing and re-assembling, the backspacer is very soft plastic. And there is pin on it will be pushed by the spring further inside so that when I am trying to put the steel liner back, the plastic pin is just offset and not in the correct position!! My solution is to take the spring out and install the liner first and install the spring in the last procedure and that took me so much time and effort to do it. Please enlighten me if you have better ways. But I think the soft plastic backspacer and that plastic positioning pin will be the biggest weak point of this knife.
And the ugly design with that notch when blade closed. DF II does not have it. And the unnecessarily over long handle.
Dice - Such an ugly knife, I just don't want to talk about it. I just want to sell it in no time. I just regret having bought it. I think I remember buying it one year ago for its bling bling such as flipper, ball bearing. But flipper is just useless for me. It is a menacing way to open the knife, not suitable for the situation I need to use a knife. Ball bearing is really smooth. But the knife is just so so ugly. I just cannot believe it when I hold the knife in my hand. Oh man! A shame on the aesthetics choice.
Spyderco wishlist:
Sage 5 - Compression lock. I just don't want to buy PM2, just too big for me but I like this lock so much. Back lock is just a pain for big and strong knives. Just work fine with DFII for me. And they put steel liner wrapped by the scale. This a smart way since they cannot do the chamfer correctly for 150USD Taichung knives. This may replace Chaparral as the best gentleman knife.
Para 3 - Also a compresson lock. This may replace my Tenacious/Delica as an outdoor knife.
Native 5 FRN lightweight - just want to try American made back lock and this may be a support to Para3 as an outdoor backup. I really don't want to buy another back lock anymore. But just want to give it a try and the price is great for an American made knife.
Memory - such a gem. I like it so much. But it is also quite expensive. Maybe I just need to sell my Techno and Dice to get this. Liner lock is more decent for a gentleman knife, perfect shape and appearance. Elegantly, naturally and smooth to open and close. I got a Lionsteel Mini recently for these considerations.
Benchmade: 940-1, Mini Barrage, Sequel
Chris Reeve: Small Sebanza Insingo with Micart Inlay, Mnandi
Lionsteel: SR2, mini
I have quite a few knives so far and I am trying to put out what I understand about these knives.
What I have:
Spyderco:
Dragonfly 2, ZDP 189 - just a great knife. Smooth to open. Nice swedge at the back of the blade (like Native 5). Features a groove in the back lock release button like all Japanese Spyderco back lock models (correct me if I am wrong, since Caly 3 has it, Delica 4 has it, DF II has it). It cut through pencils like they are made of Tofu. And I use it a lot to cut those Lego plastic bags when my kid is around since the knife is so small and so precisely controllable and then should be relatively safer.
Tenacious - just a great knife at this value even it is made in China
Chaparral - another back lock. Also smooth to open like DF II, much higher feeling due to the carbon fiber laminated outer surface and full side exposed steel liners, and steel backspacers. Shape and ergonomics are just like a sage. I guess why Chaparral from Spyderco? Because they have a Sage 4 for back lock but with bolster design and huge price. And they are shy to release a sage 4 in laminated CF like Sage 1, so they reduce the blade size a little bit to have a new model. But this is very confusing actually. They can just make a Sage 4 like a 3" Chaparral. Anyway Sage series are to ode those locks, not the metal bolsters.
But the horrible thing about Chaparral are exactly as what Nick Shabazz said in his youtube review of this knife:
1. the back lock release button is just a huge pain to press. First because the blade is very thin, so the release button is also very thin. Secondly, no other non-Japanese made Spyderco back lock knife features that so comfortable groove design they have on those Japanese made back locks. This just make me confused. Why??? It seems to me some older version Native featured this, but not on Native 5 fore sure. But Native 5 is thick in blade and in the release button.
2. Taichung made middle level models normally does not do chamfer on the side edges. So the liner edges are sharp, the blade back edges are sharp, the Spider hole is sharp. So Taichung knives normally have higher feelings, but actually poor fit and finish. Sure the more expensive more than 200USD Taichung models will have good fit and finish, but not on the 100~200USD models. Just a shame!!
Since the release button is such a pain to press, I cannot imagine this knife deserve any often use. The thumb will sore very fast, you just don't want to use it anymore. I spent so much time to file out a similar groove like on DFII and Delica 4. Now with the groove gaining its shape, the knife becomes better and better to me.
Techno - above 200USD (originally) Taichung model, so the fit and finish just great. Nothing to complain here. All edges are chamfered and rounded, just great.
But the knife is just confusing me more when I play it more. Too heavy and too robust for such a small sized blade knife. Too slippy due to the full Titanium and no inlay design. And the Titanium finish is also very slippy, not like the Sebanza I have. And most critically the finger guard is minimized against the original design. Combine being super slippy and not enough finger guard, you just feel not safe to use this knife. Techno is such a robust knife, so it should be designed for hard use. But with that super slippy body and the non existent finger guard, are you kidding me, hard use? I was just so disappointed with this knife with so high fit and finish so I went to check the original design of that Polish designer. The original design is hugely different at several "minor" point. These differences just ruined this knife in my opinion. Very bad. Why the design deteriorated instead of improved when introduced into the Famous Spyderco portfolio? Just unbelievable.
Delica 4 - Never a fan of this knife. Opening is NOT smooth as the other two back lock. Just feel the opening 180 degree moving path. First from 0 to about 60 degree, huge force to work against for safety reason, OK. Then from 60 to about 135 degrees, very smooth actually quite loose. Then from 135 to 180, again you will feel some force. This tough-loose-tough feeling is just bad for me. DF II and Chaparral are both not like this. They are just tough-smooth, then bang open.
And another big issue with disassembing and re-assembling, the backspacer is very soft plastic. And there is pin on it will be pushed by the spring further inside so that when I am trying to put the steel liner back, the plastic pin is just offset and not in the correct position!! My solution is to take the spring out and install the liner first and install the spring in the last procedure and that took me so much time and effort to do it. Please enlighten me if you have better ways. But I think the soft plastic backspacer and that plastic positioning pin will be the biggest weak point of this knife.
And the ugly design with that notch when blade closed. DF II does not have it. And the unnecessarily over long handle.
Dice - Such an ugly knife, I just don't want to talk about it. I just want to sell it in no time. I just regret having bought it. I think I remember buying it one year ago for its bling bling such as flipper, ball bearing. But flipper is just useless for me. It is a menacing way to open the knife, not suitable for the situation I need to use a knife. Ball bearing is really smooth. But the knife is just so so ugly. I just cannot believe it when I hold the knife in my hand. Oh man! A shame on the aesthetics choice.
Spyderco wishlist:
Sage 5 - Compression lock. I just don't want to buy PM2, just too big for me but I like this lock so much. Back lock is just a pain for big and strong knives. Just work fine with DFII for me. And they put steel liner wrapped by the scale. This a smart way since they cannot do the chamfer correctly for 150USD Taichung knives. This may replace Chaparral as the best gentleman knife.
Para 3 - Also a compresson lock. This may replace my Tenacious/Delica as an outdoor knife.
Native 5 FRN lightweight - just want to try American made back lock and this may be a support to Para3 as an outdoor backup. I really don't want to buy another back lock anymore. But just want to give it a try and the price is great for an American made knife.
Memory - such a gem. I like it so much. But it is also quite expensive. Maybe I just need to sell my Techno and Dice to get this. Liner lock is more decent for a gentleman knife, perfect shape and appearance. Elegantly, naturally and smooth to open and close. I got a Lionsteel Mini recently for these considerations.
Benchmade: 940-1, Mini Barrage, Sequel
Chris Reeve: Small Sebanza Insingo with Micart Inlay, Mnandi
Lionsteel: SR2, mini
Last edited:
- Joined
- Mar 7, 2001
- Messages
- 4,608
Ricky,
Welcome to the forum!
This hopefully helps for reassembling the FRN lockbacks:
http://www.instructables.com/id/How...-reassemble-a-Spyderco/step6/The-tricky-part/
PS: you should try Stretch in FRN
Welcome to the forum!
This hopefully helps for reassembling the FRN lockbacks:
http://www.instructables.com/id/How...-reassemble-a-Spyderco/step6/The-tricky-part/
PS: you should try Stretch in FRN
- Joined
- Jan 6, 2016
- Messages
- 1,204
Hi rickyro! FWIW, the lock bar on my Chaparral was also very hard to depress when I first got it. I had another issue so I decided to take it apart, clean everything, and reassemble. When I put it back together I was surprised at how much easier it was to push the lock bar. I'm not sure what I did to cause this change but the knife was much better afterward and no more sore thumb. Keep in mind that Spyderco doesn't recommend taking your knife apart and you can void the warranty if you cause damage while doing so. I would recommend contacting their warranty and repair department and have them take a look at yours. It really is a great little knife and it shouldn't be painful to use.
I have been sceptical about the Delica for a very long time... I was more into more robust 3.25" blade folders, the back lock is really not a love story for me and the VG10 is nothing that bring dreams in my sleeps....
This was until I finally get a good deal on a nice looking Zome Declica...
And this nice it just right...
nothing is wrong into it if you consider why it has been designed for
It is one of the best EDC I own.
I think it is on pare with my mini-griptilian and my small sebenza 21... which is quite a performance when you consider the respective prices of these knives
IMHO best value for an EDC
I carry it without clip, tossed into my pocket with a piece of paracord to help graving it into the pocket
Heading home from a camping trip to see mine that just got delivered. Looks great!!
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
- Joined
- Nov 29, 2013
- Messages
- 2,493
Bump this thread back up to the top where Delicas belong .
I've been carrying a Hap40 of some description all holidays and my other Delicas have been feeling a bit left out .
I started the holidays off with the intention of carrying just my Super Blue , but two days in it became obvious that our climate here in the Southern hemisphere tropics at this time of the year just isn't conducive to Super Blue and corrosion was a constant battle .
It got cleaned up , oiled and put back on the shelf .
Here is a pic of what I'm talking about , if you look closely you can see rust developing inside the Spyder hole where the Super blue steel is exposed between the Stainless laminate . This developed over about a 24 hour period and must have started when i opened the knife with dirty sweaty hands .
The Hap40 has had no major issues , but again if you look closely at this pic you will see tiny spots near the tip of the blade which is the start of corrosion .
I'm not worried about either of these knives because I've sorted out the problems and also my knives get used not pampered so marks and patina are just a fact of life .
Ken
I've been carrying a Hap40 of some description all holidays and my other Delicas have been feeling a bit left out .
I started the holidays off with the intention of carrying just my Super Blue , but two days in it became obvious that our climate here in the Southern hemisphere tropics at this time of the year just isn't conducive to Super Blue and corrosion was a constant battle .
It got cleaned up , oiled and put back on the shelf .
Here is a pic of what I'm talking about , if you look closely you can see rust developing inside the Spyder hole where the Super blue steel is exposed between the Stainless laminate . This developed over about a 24 hour period and must have started when i opened the knife with dirty sweaty hands .
The Hap40 has had no major issues , but again if you look closely at this pic you will see tiny spots near the tip of the blade which is the start of corrosion .
I'm not worried about either of these knives because I've sorted out the problems and also my knives get used not pampered so marks and patina are just a fact of life .
Ken
Last edited:
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- Sep 3, 2006
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- 3,131
The Delica is awesome. One of my faves along with the Native. Just a no nonsense, get stuff done folder.
- Joined
- Sep 27, 2011
- Messages
- 1,864
I ALMOST became a heretic this week and sold my SB Delica! Thankfully, it didn't sell! My plan was to use the funds to buy a Sage 5 or a Para 3 for one of my comparisons for the sake of this thread. So, a new comparison will be coming soon, but it may be delayed a little while. . . The SB is back in my pocket where she belongs!
In the meantime, here are some SB Delica pics for you to enjoy!
In the meantime, here are some SB Delica pics for you to enjoy!
- Joined
- Nov 29, 2013
- Messages
- 2,493
Both are favourites of mine , but given a choice I'd take Hap40 every time.
This ZDP189 and my moderfied Hap40 have done 98% of my knife duties at work for the last year or two so I've given both steels a workout .
Ken
- Joined
- Sep 27, 2011
- Messages
- 1,864
Well folks.... the Delica has continued to dominate my pocket time and continues to slice, dice, cut, and do everything it's supposed to do.... but uh-oh, a stranger is rumored to be coming to town. A stranger with a great family heritage and a progenitor loved by the masses. Could this stranger, this new creature on the scene be SO slicey and SO dicey and SO cutty that it could kick the Delica from my pocket? Well, the new stranger will arrive in a few days and will be given a chance to prove its worth against the mighty and powerful Delica....