SFT vs. Tapered Tang

[NoFair]

No. And above I see a lot of claims that it reduces the strength. I do not believe it does. The handle is a composite structure. Any batonning I would have done with a full thickness knife I would do with tapered or skeletonized tangs. I've never in over 3500 knives fixed a problem with a tang whether that was tapered, or skeletonized or neither. The two breaks I've had have been toward the tip. I've read better makers than me say that tapering a tang does not reduce the strength. That is misinformation IMO.

Theoretically it will reduce strength a bit, but I've never seen a knife fail in the part of the handle where tapering has reduced the thickness of the tang. So in practical use it doesn't reduce strength

Do you remember if my 1/8 S35VN Ladyfinger and 3/16 O1 Camp are skeletonized? The Ladyfinger feels lighter than I'd expect a full tang to be, but it might be the thin stock that is making it feel nimble and light.

 

[Paul Brach]

In addition to significantly improving the feel, I think that the aesthetics are improved. Andy's stacked handles particularly highlight this as a design element. If you look at the back of a tapered tang Fiddleback with a high contrast spacer running parallel to the taper your eye is drawn to the V shaped symmetrical lines. To me, this combination of elements is both pleasing and powerful. Loveless used red spacers that highlighted the same thing on his tapered tangs, but to me Andy takes it a step farther.