Question for the BM 705 history buffs

Joined
Jun 14, 2001
Messages
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Hi all,

I recently picked up a BM 705 from my local dealer that looks a bit different. This is a standard 705 with G-10 scales and 154CM steel, but it has the following oddities:

1) The edge is not ground all the way back - there's about 0.125" of unsharpened edge near the handle.

2) The edge is slightly recurved.

Is this an older version of the 705? Or just a bad example? The thing that makes me think it might be an older version is the slightly recurved edge, since my understanding is that the 710 has the recurve but the 705 does not.

Thanks for your help,

Matthew
 
I just took my 5-year-old 705 out of my pocket to compare to your description. (1) The approx 1/8" nearest the handle is not sharpened. In fact, there is a little bit of a "bump" in the edge at the proximal end of the sharpened edge, and then a "recess" that isn't sharpened. (2) There really is nothing that I could call a "recurve". Of course, I have sharpened this blade myself and even reprofiled the edge, so I couldn't claim that the edge as it is now is anything like the original, but the difference in the edge profile is just that I made the primary bevel more acute ("back beveled"). I am pretty sure that there never was a recurve, unless it was so slight that no one would ever have been likely to notice it. (3) The main reason that I doubt yours was an "older version" of the 705 is that mine is ATS-34 rather than 154CM. I'm pretty sure that Benchmade changed over to 154CM later.

Paul
 
Yep, 154cm indicates it's probably no older than about 2 years.

I would say it's a bad grind, but if you want a recurve it's something unique :)
 
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