Spyderco BushCraft UK spalted maple scales

[Gary W. Graley]

I recently acquired a second's version of this knife, as most know there
was quite the depressing fracturing of the scales on this model, the wood
wasn't as stabilized as thought, so there were many with fractures usually
near the first brass pin in the scale.
This one had a fracture/crack on both sides of the handle, one far worse
than the other, I applied superglue into both cracks and then, as I had planned
on doing, just a bit of slight modification to the scale's contours

Rob Hudson is a fairly well known knife maker and one that is recoginzed for
his octagonal shaped handles, which provide a very secure grip.
When the Bushcraft arrived I loved the wood, so MUCH character!
and the edge, WOW, I had always wanted to try one of these out,
even as thick a blade it is, it still sliced into cardboard readily, I was amazed.
Love the scandi edge this has, the O1 seems to be heat treated very well too,
keeping it's edge for quite a while.

BACK to the mod I did on the handle, after I glued the cracks, I took the knife
out to the shop and with my fairly primitive tools, ground down the handle
into a somewhat octagonal shape, without losing the palm swell or the nice
contours near the guard and butt of the handle.

What this does is to provide some flat surface for your fingers to purchase a grip,
the fully round handle, to me at least, can tend to twist/roll in the hand, while
the octagonal shape, your finger tips rest against a flat surface helping to keep
the knife in a little more control.

Here are a few images, quickly taken today, hope you can see the octagonal flats
that I sanded into the scales...

and as you can see, the palm swell is still there, you just get a bit more control of the knife, for me at least;

Very rugged knife, I've not tried to baton through anything yet, but that wasn't the purpose for
my having it, just a very sharp, nicely handled knife, all is good and the cracks are smooth
we'll see how long they stay smooth...

G2

 

[sodak]

That's a beautiful job! I like it a LOT!

 

[elscorcho_73]

very nice job.

 

[Gary W. Graley]

Thanks guys, of course, being the level headed fellow that I am,
I plumb forgot to take BEFORE images colour me silly, but there
should be some folks around that have this wonderful knife that
hasn't changed the contours of the handle and might post an
image to compare the difference, it is kinda hard to tell from
a photo, so in my photos I tried to get the contrasting light
to show the lines/edges of how the facets are formed.

Also a quick question, I started to use my edge pro to polish
up the bevel but found it to be slight convex, so the stones
were hitting mid point of the bevel, looks and feels flat but
there is a bit of a convex to it, the question is, will it harm
the edge if I continue sharpening the bevels to an absolute
flat plane?

thanks,
G2

 

[robot37]

Given my experience with the EdgePro I would say that you're probably going to have to redo the edge once you get the bevels flattened out. The reason that I say this is that if you set the stone angle highenough to flatten out most of the bevel but still low enough to clear the edge you're not going to get the full Scandi grind effect. Plus there's always a minute bit of variability in how we hold things up against the blade table, so your chances of the stone hitting the edge are not zero. Additionally you might be tempted to use the coarse stone for gross metal removal because you will ultimately find that the medium grit stone isn't so great when you're trying to grind a new bevel, especially one so wide. So most likely you'll use the coarse stone to get all the way down to where you want it, and then finish up with finer grits. In that process you're probably going to hit the edge with the stone. Granted, the time spent getting the bevels flat and polished is orders of magnitude greater that the time it's going to take to get the edge back to screaming sharp. The edge is gonna come back pretty quick, though specially with the good geometry you achieved with perfectly flat bevels.

-nate

 

[Gary W. Graley]

Thanks Nate, I'll work on that when it comes time to resharpen her up,
right now, that 01 steel seems it has a pretty good heat treatment,
keeping it's edge well. And, she be SHARP friends

The sheath, leather, simple but effective, even with the slight mod to the scales
the knife is still secured in the sheath, and one thing I do like is that they went
the bit extra and installed a plastic pocket inside where the blade goes in,
just a little safer when carrying, nice job Spyderco team!

And of course one of the really nice features of the blade's edge, NO NOTCH before the edge starts !
my favourite thing to not have on a knife, you get as much edge as you can on this knife...
G2

 

[RevDevil]

That is a fantastic knife, I ended up with a pair of them. I love the scales, broken or not. It's beautiful wood no doubt. Those mods look great Gx2, love the pictures.

 

[matt1987]

love the scales!

 

[Gary W. Graley]

Thanks guys, I was worried on how well it would cut, being
thick after the bevel, everyone loves a full flat grind
But this does cut well, even into cardboard and you can
apply a lot of pressure, solid knife here!

One thing about the scandi grind, kind of similar to
a japanese sword I would guess, being that you sharpen
the entire edge bevel, so you don't have that problem of
a normal knife where as you sharpen, you end up with a thicker
edge as you go deeper back up the blade, by sharpening the
entire surface you always keep that same thickness.
That's a cool plus !
G2