The Bears' Den--Shirogorov Showcase

I just got done cracking, cleaning, interior polishing, and relubing my F95R and shot a few pics along the way, so I thought I'd share those and a few thoughts. This was my first R series takedown and it goes just a little differently from the other Shiros I've been through. The major difference is the underlay washers which seemed to somewhat complicate reassembly, the extra component making it a bit likelier the bearing cages will fall out when trying to mate the slabs back together. I was a bit lazy this time and didn't remove the clip so that I could take out the rear post to reassemble that area last, it being much easier to concentrate on the bearings, pivot area, and stop-pin without having to worry about mating the butt of the handle at the same time. It took a couple stabs (figurative only), but with a bit of patience everything went back together nicely.

Anyway, I like to get one side apart, through all the steps, and back together before tackling the other. If I open the knife lock-side down and keep a little pressure on the blade, that side will hang together and I'll just have to account for the bearings one side at a time. Here's all those little culprits from the show side.

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You can see above that the lock-side, off to the left, is still intact with the bearings and cage still in place.

Jumping ahead, here's the show side all put back together and the lock-side cleaned up and ready to put back together.

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Once a slab is stripped down, the BBs set aside and accounted for, I'll clean everything with alcohol, wiping down with wood-handled cotton swabs and paper towels. Here's the field of work with parts cleaned on the left and the slab cleaned and waiting. Also there are my Revlon tweezers for the BBs and my Hedgehog tool for the Pacman screws.

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I'll take the bearing cages, underlay washers, and blade tang and polish those up on an old green-loaded strop I keep for that sort of work.

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Here's the slab with the underlay washer installed with 6 tiny drops of W10 NanoOil applied. There are 4 drops underneath, mostly there just to help the washer stick in place when reassembling.

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The bearing cage goes on next and is rotated a bit to pull some oil up into the cut-outs. BBs go in with the tweezers and maybe get pushed in place with the wood end of a swab as they tend not to go exactly where you want them. Everything gets rotated again to move the oil around and help everything stay put for reassembly.

Going back together, I'll put the blade onto the lockside up against the stop-pin with the lock-bar engaged. This generally keeps everything in place on that side. As I mentioned earlier, if you can install the clip from the exterior it's best to leave the back post out, bring the two halves together on edge with a little pressure against the blade and mate the pivot and stop-pin. Put the aft end back together last. Even with the back post in and clip on, you can usually loosen the pivot enough to slip the standoff in and tighten everything up back there, which is what I ended up doing.

The last little step is a tiny dab of FinishLine or other light grease applied to the detent ball to smooth out the tracking through its arc. All that's left is to open the door and let your free-range bear outside to sit on a rock. :D

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I just ordered a F95NL Gray Micarta with an Elmax Blade. It is on SRB and plan to carry and use it daily!! I sold my CD Hati because I couldn’t bring myself to edc a $2200 knife. I really like the Hati and plan on finding another but I haven’t decided on the scale/blade combination. I would mind finding one on washers so I can see the difference.
 
Nice pics and write up. I have to love these knives thru you guys because I will never get to touch one, but’s okay. Will never own a Veyron but can admire the sh*t out of em.
 
Jhileman79 said:
I just ordered a F95NL Gray Micarta with an Elmax Blade. It is on SRB and plan to carry and use it daily!! I sold my CD Hati because I couldn’t bring myself to edc a $2200 knife. I really like the Hati and plan on finding another but I haven’t decided on the scale/blade combination. I would mind finding one on washers so I can see the difference.
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From all I've heard the NL is a great knife, J. I'll get a chance to handle one in the coming months as I'm on the list for Shiro's NL World Tour pass-around. The knife's been to Singapore (2 stops), South Africa, and Australia (another 2), and should be on its way Stateside to Alaska now.

My SRBS knives are no less enjoyable than my MRBS models, and may actually flip a tad more aggressively, while the latter are a little smoother. My F95T is a work user on SRBS and is a great knife. I like that Shiro is still putting out knives in the One Bear category as those like the NL come at a more affordable price-point and are still top shelf.

I know where you're coming from in regards to EDCing a $2200 knife and I've sold off a couple safe-queens so I could put the $ into less-expensive but still high-end knives that I'll actually carry and use. That's how I came by my F95R.

I like my Hati on washers. The 95T has been called the "Sebenza of flippers" but the Hati with PB washers and a bushing pivot is way more CRK-like. It flips well, though not as aggressively as one on bearings, but has some of that Sebenza-like hydraulic smoothness opening and closing. :thumbsup:

Mrgauth said:
Nice pics and write up. I have to love these knives thru you guys because I will never get to touch one, but’s okay. Will never own a Veyron but can admire the sh*t out of em.
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I didn't know what a Veyron was, M, so I had to Google it. Cool cars for sure, but if I had that kind if money I'd just buy a new pickup and use the rest to make Sergey an offer to purchase Shirogorov Knifeworks. :rolleyes:
 
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With my thanks and gratitude to @coiledwire for always working with me on matters related to our common tastes for certain sharp and pointy objects. I will soon be the recipient of my second Shiro, the coveted 95T albeit in M390 as opposed to the really desired Vananx 37.

Two immediate thoughts spring to mind though:

- Beggars can not be choosers!

- Tony and me won't have to be exactly be identically twinning. Well sorta, till you really look close enough ;)
 
Casinostocks said:
Two immediate thoughts spring to mind though:

- Beggars can not be choosers!
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Several of the serial Shiros are usually available at Recon 1. It seems the shortages are usually in the serial Neon and the HatiOn which sell out rather quickly. Despair not and choose what to beg for
 
Casinostocks said:
With my thanks and gratitude to @coiledwire for always working with me on matters related to our common tastes for certain sharp and pointy objects. I will soon be the recipient of my second Shiro, the coveted 95T albeit in M390 as opposed to the really desired Vananx 37.

Two immediate thoughts spring to mind though:

- Beggars can not be choosers!

- Tony and me won't have to be exactly be identically twinning. Well sorta, till you really look close enough ;)
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CPP said:
Several of the serial Shiros are usually available at Recon 1. It seems the shortages are usually in the serial Neon and the HatiOn which sell out rather quickly. Despair not and choose what to beg for
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I checked out Casinostocks' new Turtle at coliedwire's sales thread (sweet knife, man) and used the Google/cached trick to find the ask. That's an excellent deal on a brand new knife--at that price I'd beg all day! ;)

I think you'll be very pleased with the M390, C-stocks. My Shiros in that steel come up wicked keen easily on the SharpMaker. I also especially like the 5/6ths grind and the cut-outs on the spine at the jimping on the R Turtles. My F95R is 5/6ths, but that model doesn't seem to have cut-outs--just bevels at the jimping. My knife does have the fairly rare 3.5mm blade stock, so I'll settle for that. :D
 
ChazzyP said:
I checked out Casinostocks' new Turtle at coliedwire's sales thread (sweet knife, man) and used the Google/cached trick to find the ask. That's an excellent deal on a brand new knife--at that price I'd beg all day! ;)

I think you'll be very pleased with the M390, C-stocks. My Shiros in that steel come up wicked keen easily on the SharpMaker. I also especially like the 5/6ths grind and the cut-outs on the spine at the jimping on the R Turtles. My F95R is 5/6ths, but that model doesn't seem to have cut-outs--just bevels at the jimping. My knife does have the fairly rare 3.5mm blade stock, so I'll settle for that. :D
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CW and me go a little further back from our days at another subforum. He's always been a gentleman who treats me very fairly. He was gracious to accept my offer on his NIB 95T to make a hoary camper outta this ol' dog ;)

Thank you for enlightening me on those geometric stats on this model :thumbsup:
 
CPP said:
Several of the serial Shiros are usually available at Recon 1. It seems the shortages are usually in the serial Neon and the HatiOn which sell out rather quickly. Despair not and choose what to beg for
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Yes their red CF HatiOn which sold out very fast last week or so seemed to have had a very good retail price attached to it. I see them going for more by a Bill or so here on the Exchange, unless I have my models muddled up!
 
Jeez, Matty. Getting a little Shiro collection started. People will start to talk.

I've been mildly daydreaming about another one myself. I don't know the models, but something with CF in the 95 size.
 
TRfromMT said:
Jeez, Matty. Getting a little Shiro collection started. People will start to talk.

I've been mildly daydreaming about another one myself. I don't know the models, but something with CF in the 95 size.
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As always, safety in numbers! I would hardly call 2-3 a collection but most definitely a very nice head start with these 2 I've gotten :thumbsup:

CPP said:
I see a HatiR or an F3R in your future!
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I would've mostly likely considered an F3R if I could not land the 95T, but that 95T looks just sooo beautiful to me. The 95T was actually the first on the wish list to go after before your beastly 111 CF showed up on my radar, which was going to be my second-to-get Shiro!

Maybe a HatiOn for the hat trick instead of the NeON but TBT, I much prefer the all Ti handles on NeON even though I'm not too wild about the blade size.
 
I disassembled, cleaned, and tuned up another Shiro--my 111--a couple days ago as I spent a good part of my name day tinkering with knives. I took some pics along the way, though some were poor and I didn't get all the steps. The following, then, isn't another how-to or step-by-step like #961 above, but just a bit of a look within, as we seem to have a few new 111 owners lately, along with a couple of observations along the way.

The show side of the 111 is one big piece of CF with no reinforcement. At the pivot it's plowed out to accept an underlay washer, much like the ones in the newer R series knives. You'll see the washer in the bottom of the recess here with a few drops of W10 NanoOil, ready to receive the bearing cage above.

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Here's the bearing cage installed with the ball bearings in place. Note there are 9 sets of 3 for a total of 27 BBs on this side.

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The lock side is not only opposite the show side in location, but in complexity as well. There's a lot going on here, starting with an almost-full, housed liner that fits tightly into its varying-depth and multi-faceted recess in the CF scale. The liner ducks under the backspacer along its top edge and is additionally held in by the clip screw. The tolerances for the body screws and backspacer are so tight through here that I didn't remove those components to see exactly what was going on beneath.

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Of further note is the stop pin, which is one-sided, attached to the blade, travels through its own, deeper cut-out in the CF slab, and engages the liner at each end of its travel. On this side of the knife, the bearing cage sits in a milled recess in the blade, is smaller than its opposite component and encompasses only 7 sets of 3 BBs for 21 here.

You may notice in the pic above that the backspacer has a shoulder along its top edge. I didn't notice it at first, but while cleaning discovered that the largely simple show-side scale has a shallow, corresponding relief cut-out for the backspacer to nestle into. Who does that?

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You've noticed the harsh lighting in these pics, I'm sure, which is a result of using the LED-lighted magnifying stand my lovely wife birthday-gifted me for working on knives. The rig was a welcome addition for these old eyes, but not so much for photography.

Anyway, the 111 looks in hand to be a very simply constructed pice, but you can see that's far from the case after cracking one open. Here's a closing shot of the big boy from another day.

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Today was a maintenance day from hell. First, I damaged my bike in fall earlier in the week and today after trying to repair it myself had to admit defeat and bring it in to the local bike shop. It was fixed without too much trouble and going for a ride I tried to disassemble my Dr. Death and was unable to because apparently there is a healthy dose of Loctite on the pivot. I tried the hairdryer method–several times, in fact–and applied pressure on the pivot area on a Prometheus rubberized work mat thinking that would provide traction on the non-slotted side of the pivot. I'm annoyed although the knife is in perfect working order otherwise and this is hardly as tragic as my rough weekend a few years ago. I'll rethink this and try again tomorrow...
 
I don't know that you can get enough pressure against the female side of the pivot bearing down on a rubber mat, CPP CPP . For my most stubborn, I heated the knife to the point that I couldn't hold it bare-handed. I used a piece of rubber backer material as an insulator and grip aid, holding the knife in a three-point pinch grip with my thumb against the pivot on one side of the knife and my fore- and middle-fingers spanning the pivot on the other. I used a thick-handled, Wiha bit holder with a large common in it. Lots of heat, tight grip with both hands, holding the driver in alignment with the pivot axis did it.

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I had meant to post some photos of my 95T / M390 last week when I received it, but then again a few other to-do-things climbed up the ladder. Anywho, here we go:

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I started running the edge of this one on my Sharpmaker plus also some freehand as I was feeling the the Sharpmaker wasn't hitting the entire edge at 20 dps
which is pretty much the edge angle of this 95T, i.e, 40 degrees inclusive. The tip did not come as needle point as my 111 CF did, so I felt that I must very carefully
remove some meta VERY CAREFULLY!. It has improved by a lot but not quite perfect yet which isn't a big deal as its a CQI project for me at my mediocre sharpening
skills and my own slow tempo!

Been only using the medium and the fine rods plus the pocket size Fallkniven CC4 double sided, so to not alter to damage the factory edge, just to hone and this
cuts better now with the exception of snagging in one place, 3/4 up from the heel. I used the diamond side of the Fallkniven DC4 ever so gently to remove metal
(we're talking maybe 0.5 millimeter) toward the tip. Tricky stuff but it's only $$$ ;) I've already used this to cut cardboard and things anyway and EDC daily. IMHO, this
pattern has the most gorgeous handle scales, but I'm biased. I wish it was in van 37 instead of M390 but then again, if the former, perhaps it would've spent more
time in the drawer than gliding on honing rods :p
 
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Putting a lanyard on these Shiros has now become a must for me, more so on the 111 CF than the 95T as the clip on the 111 seems tighter when in the pocket and I don't get as good a grip on it as I do on the 95F, so it doesn't often come outta pocket with the first yank! therefore I'm mortified in case I accidentally drop it or them on the hard ground!

What reasonable lanyard beads do you aficionados recommend? Any sourcing would be much appreciates, but I'm afraid that the Shiro made / licensed eads are just too cost prohibitive for me.
 
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