Scale Material Durability

T

twhman

Joined
Dec 7, 2006
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I have a question that I have not seen discussed much. What is the durablity of the various scale materials.

Bone and Horn - I would think that these would be similar and have good durablity as a scale material. I don't believe water would effect these and they would be pretty hard to scratch or mark will using them or when stuck in a pocket. They may crack if dropped. Nice looking - probably second only to wood in my opinion.

Wood - I love the look of wood grips but I suspect in a EDC knife that other materials are better. I would think that they would hold up to some water in most uses since they would not be continously wet but that they could be much for easily damaged.

Fiber Reinforced Plastic - I would think these are pretty much indestructable in normal use as an EDC. I think pretty low marks in the looks department though.

Carbon Fiber - I noted that Lone Wolf is using Carbon Fiber. I would think these would be pretty much indestructable and waterproof. I wonder if they scratch - they look like they have a shiney surface?

I would be interested in other thoughts on these materials and what others we like and why.
 
The CF on Lone Wolf folders like the T1 is smooth. It has a protectant clear coat that can get scratched, but the CF itself is very hard. The CF Spyderco uses is textured tho and not shiney. CF, FRN, Zytel, and G10 all can be of various textures from smooth to pocket-shredding rough...it just depends on the texturing machined in from manufacturing.

FRN (Fiber Reinforced Nylon...probably what you meant by plastic) can be made very grippy, but I agree with you on the aesthetic and quality feel points. It's also fairly flexible. I prefer Zytel, which tho is still a form of FRN, it feels and looks better. I believe it has more glass content or something...I forgot what's different with Zytel, but it does feel and look better to me.

G10 is also very popular and something I prefer over FRN or Zytel. When textured, it's very grippy. When smooth, it still has a bit of grippiness to it and I like the feel where you can feel a bit of the fibers. It's also very hard and flexes much less than FRN/Zytel (I can't flex solid G10), it's fairly temperature neutral, and can handle very high temperatures without melting/distortion. Different mfrs texture their G10 differently tho.

Aluminum is another scale material. I like the anodized aluminum scales on Kershaw knives. The texture isn't smooth and gives it a nice feel and a bit of grip. Strangely it feels like it gives a bit (like it's soft), even tho it isn't. I like it. When anodized, it's nice and corrosion resistant. But anodize does come off and then it looks scratched up and if bare aluminum is exposed, it will oxidize. Aluminum is also fairly soft, so if you drop it, it will dent. Tho, it is quite rigid.
 
zytel is just a line of FRN from dupont i believe. it comes in an assortment of varying fiberglass content
 
Good remarks on bone and wood. They are OK with users who treat ther knives as cutting tools, not sharp prybars, so they stand up well under normal use. Of course, I also have my share of bone handled slip joints waiting to be rescaled better than my first job at age 13.

Fiber reinforced plastics is a much bigger game - and could include carbon fiber. The surface finish on them is whatever the designer/maker does with it - from polished, bead blasted, grooved, checkered, to rasp and file like. G10 is a fiberglass reinforced resin that has excellent stiffness and comes in many colors, textures, and variations. Like carbon fiber, you can look into the depth when it's chosen and treated to do so. Carbon fiber is presently more limited, and pretty much used for that deep look and high tech market.

Fiberglass reinforced nylon is a different creature developed for strength and ease of injection molding. It appears on less expensive mass produced knives, and is usually styled with checkering or kraton inlays. It largely comes in black because of the limited marketability of the huge range of colors it could come in. I have only seen red, hunter orange, and hunter green. I'm sure others exist, maybe blue, but they are rare. If Makita offered a 3" flat ground drop point in a responsible looking handle it would be a killer premium just for the color. Dewalt, too.

Lots of other injection molded plastics show up in the slip joint market, usually colored Delrin. Yellow and simulated bone are most common. I'm not sure what the Swiss Army knives use for plastic scales, and they so come in a variety of colors, including anodized aluminum. The plastics seem to be less durable over the years - I have a fishing version with cracked scales just falling off.

Molded "rubber" handles have been around for a century, and the newer compounds are quite durable, offering a non slip grip, lack of blister points, and, again, easy manufacture. Some strip them off and add micarta grips to improve durability on hard use knives. Micarta is another older material using layered fiber materials in a resin compound, and was revered in its day for indestructability. Maroon was a favorite as Westinghouse made so much for electrical switch gear; less commonly used then was natural in canvas weave, or rag, both of which are now more common on field grade fixed blades.

Metals have made a huge inroad since the days of cast aluminum kitchen handles. Following the Gerber Mk II with spattered cats tongue grip, many more knives, especially folders, offer aluminum or titanium scales. CAD machining has made them relatively inexpensive, although titanium is very hard on machine tooling. Titanium does offer a broader palette of colors, the Rainbow Leek being an example. Aluminum follows with a more limited array of anodizing, which can lead to a slick grip even over checkering. Flat black finishes are often common.

I'm sure this doesn't even begin to exhaust all the possibilities.
 
Didn't know FRP and FRN were different...good to know!

Whatever Zytel Camillus and CRKT uses on their scales, it feels better than any FRN scale I've ever felt.

tirod - What's thermoplastic?...is it like FRN? And what's Kraton? I know how it feels, but is it molded plastic also I assume?

Oh, and the color from the rainbow Kershaws are from a Ti coating that's heated. The base metal isn't Ti tho. Pretty. I love the look of my rainbow spyderfly.
 
I like Micarta over most anything else really. It makes for a lightweight strong folder, a durable comfortable handle on both folders and fixed blades, is pretty much immune to most everything that affects bone, stag and wood like humidity, drying out, cracking, splitting, and chipping. I like G10 but it doesn't hold threads near as well as Micarta when used by itself on folders, and it seems to be easily scratched to me also but it is a more rigid and stable product than Micarta by itself. Nevertheless Micarta can make a very good long term handle all alone also and is sure a step up in class from FRN which is quite strong and durable in its own right but still looks too much like plastic to satisfy me for most knives I plan to carry. Micarta is also easier to work, seems safer to the health and lungs in particular and when bead blasted has a nice grippy texture to it. It can also be easily buffed to a high shine or sanded and finished a number of different ways to show the layers or to leave it flat. G10 can be done this way to some extent also and is also quite attractive. My favorite folders are usually ones with either G10, Micarta, or one of these materials with liners of titanium.

STR
 
JSR said:
What's thermoplastic?...is it like FRN? And what's Kraton? I know how it feels, but is it molded plastic also I assume?
QUOTE]

Plastics (the fancy name is polymers) consist of large molecules. Plastics can be broken down into two groups. Thermoplastics and Thermosets. Thermoplastics get soft if you heat them. Thermosets do not. The reason goes back to those large molecules. Thermosets have molecules that are connected to one another. Polymer chemists call those connections "crosslinks". Thermoplastics do not have crosslinks.

Plastics that are not crosslinked (thermoplastics like nylon) get hard because the long molecules get entwined around each other so that the mass cannot move. If you heat them up, they get soft because the molecules have enough energy to move past one another. This movement begins to happen at a temperature that polymer chemists call the "glass transition temperature". Above the glass transition temperature thermoplastics can begin to flow or move under pressure. If you heat them enough, they may liquify. (It depends, sometimes they decompose before they liquify.) Below the glass transition temperature there is not enough energy for the strands to untangle and the polymer cannot flow. It can bend, but it will return to its original shape unless enough force is applied to actually break it.

Thermosets (think epoxies, like the resin in G10) get hard because they can, theoretically, crosslink themselves into one giant molecule. The molecules are held together by chemical bonds instead of just by entanglements. If the length between crosslinks is short, like with most epoxies, the resulting cured plastic will be quite hard. When you heat them up, they do not get soft because the chemical crosslinks are still holding them together. If the length of molecules between the crosslinks is long, you get a bouncy thing such as tire rubber. Thermosets have a glass transition temperature, but they do not flow above it. But their response to applied stress is somewhat different above the glass transition temperature compared to their response below it.

Kraton is a molded plastic as you surmised.

More than you probably wanted to know.
Click to expand...
 
Thanks for all the information. There is so much knowledge on this board it amazes me. Thermosets vs. Thermoplastic dang there is a bunch of info.

I never knew what Micarta actually was until now.

I still like the look of wood with stag/bone close behind.
 
Wow that's some good info knarfeng! Actually that explains the differences really well and I like that type of detail.

Oops, forgot about Micarta...and STR's micarta looks amazing!

Aside from Lone Wolf and Spyderco, who else is using CF for scales?

Oh, and what's Kydex???
 
CRKT has used carbon fiber on some of their M16's. The smaller version was relatively inexpensive and a good user in the spear point design.

Tell us all about Kydex, knarfeng. All I remember is that it's two plastics molded together that can be heat formed. I have a sheath for my Camp Tramp that flat works in it.
 
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