In case anybody was wondering what the inside of a Ryo-H looks like...
You can see that it uses the standard hidden Rockstead pivot system. The button lock is retained in place by the blade during assembly and disassembly. As stated before the clip mechanism is complex.
The detent is the piston and spring next to the blade. It appears to me to be overly sprung, but this is likely due to the design intent of the Ryo. It is styled after a Japanese higonokami utility knife, which is a friction folder. So the Ryo is really designed to act like a friction folder with a detent and a button lock added. The pivot is adjusted so that the blade actually falls free without the influence of the button lock, however the pressure of the detent makes the action much stiffer.
Disassembly and reassembly notes:
The screws are titanium. This means they are SOFT. They are T5 torx and have very shallow heads. These are not the deeper, larger, steel torx heads you are used to. If you apply too much torque, they will strip in an instant. Rocketed applies some pretty serious thread locker as well. It look a 400 deg heat gun to loosen mine. The detent spring will likely fly out at you as it is under a lot of pressure. Other than that it comes apart very easily. Assembly requires loading the detent spring in place and getting the handle on without it flying out. Reminds me of reassembling a Microtech HALO, except in 1/48 scale with tweezers.
I know its sacrilege, but I will be cutting the spring down slightly to reduce detent pressure to my liking.
You can see that it uses the standard hidden Rockstead pivot system. The button lock is retained in place by the blade during assembly and disassembly. As stated before the clip mechanism is complex.
The detent is the piston and spring next to the blade. It appears to me to be overly sprung, but this is likely due to the design intent of the Ryo. It is styled after a Japanese higonokami utility knife, which is a friction folder. So the Ryo is really designed to act like a friction folder with a detent and a button lock added. The pivot is adjusted so that the blade actually falls free without the influence of the button lock, however the pressure of the detent makes the action much stiffer.
Disassembly and reassembly notes:
The screws are titanium. This means they are SOFT. They are T5 torx and have very shallow heads. These are not the deeper, larger, steel torx heads you are used to. If you apply too much torque, they will strip in an instant. Rocketed applies some pretty serious thread locker as well. It look a 400 deg heat gun to loosen mine. The detent spring will likely fly out at you as it is under a lot of pressure. Other than that it comes apart very easily. Assembly requires loading the detent spring in place and getting the handle on without it flying out. Reminds me of reassembling a Microtech HALO, except in 1/48 scale with tweezers.
I know its sacrilege, but I will be cutting the spring down slightly to reduce detent pressure to my liking.
. Sent an email in advance to Rockstead and they kindly invited me to come visit. When we got there the owner invited us into his office where we talked and he showed me their entire current line up. I can't really explain it in words but it's absolutely breathtaking having every Rockstead right in front of you ready to be fondled and played with. The problem is I only took two pictures because I was too busy talking with the owner and drooling all over the knives that I completely forgot to take more pictures which i'm kicking myself for every time I think of it. My advice is if you have the opportunity and the means of getting a Rockstead, by all means go for it. They are absolutely amazing knives and don't deserve the label of "production knife" as they are well above and beyond that. 
.
). This isn't intended as an advertisement for Daniel per se, more as a "what do I do when my Rockstead needs to be resharpened" comment, but the two are related; his work has always been so superb, that I have complete confidence in his ability to use the best process on a particular piece to produce not only an extremely sharp, but very stable edge. I would probably direct any questions about a potential Rockstead sharpening (DLC friendly? Would the Chi, with its different grind, also see such results etc.) to his shop directly...not sure Daniel will be commenting here. But, bringing it all back home to Rocksteads, based on my experience, I would not hesitate to go to him again for sharpening a ZDP Higo.
