THE Hollow Handle Knife Thread

[TAH]

Here's an interesting Mike England knife that was recently posted in the Custom Knife forum. I've never seen this blade style on one of Mike's knives.

 

[TAH]

While we're on the subject of Mike England, thought I would showcase a few of his knives from around the internet. Love these old school designs! :thumbup:

Here's the model that I remember the most...

And a few others...

 

[Mark Knapp]

Those are pretty nice, do you know what the items in the handle are in the first photo? Specifically the four items between the butt cap and the matches.

 

[TAH]

do you know what the items in the handle are in the first photo? Specifically the four items between the butt cap and the matches.

The bars with "V" shaped center and the item with the blue tape create a mini wire saw. The other item looks like a couple of needles.

 

[TAH]

Here's the model that I remember the most...

Here are the specs on the Model 1S from "The Survival Knife Reference Guide" .

 

[TAH]

Not to change the subject, but check out this bad boy from Pat Crawford. It's integral.

 

[Mark Knapp]

The bars with "V" shaped center and the item with the blue tape create a mini wire saw. The other item looks like a couple of needles.

OK, I see it now. Thanks

 

[Mark Knapp]

That's a pretty cool book. Those England knives get quite small don't they?

 

[Gaston444]

I really have to get that book, TAH: It's a treasure trove of information...

There used to be a hollow handle maker frequently featured in "Bernard Levine's guide to knives" that had these knives with incredibly elaborate leather sheaths with extra tools and flashlight pouches on the sides of the main sheath, one of the setups being commented on as a "dentist's nightmare"(!): Would you know from your book what maker this was? A characteristic of his knives was short straight clip points, short belt loops and -I think- a clip-on metal sawback cover on the blade(!!)... I am almost sure that's what it was: It looked a little like the brass spine on old bowies, but removable...

Now that my latest Colin Cox has been refurbished by REK, it is officially my new favourite! Extremely happy I went through the trouble... I'll be posting pics soon...

Gaston

 

[TAH]

There used to be a hollow handle maker frequently featured in "Bernard Levine's guide to knives" that had these knives with incredibly elaborate leather sheaths with extra tools and flashlight pouches on the sides of the main sheath, one of the setups being commented on as a "dentist's nightmare"(!): Would you know from your book what maker this was? A characteristic of his knives was short straight clip points, short belt loops and -I think- a clip-on metal sawback cover on the blade(!!)... I am almost sure that's what it was: It looked a little like the brass spine on old bowies, but removable...

Gaston,

I believe you are thinking of Webster Wood. The early ones had leather sheaths with multiple pockets and loops for additional items.

 

[Gaston444]

That's it!

Aren't they amazing? I would love to come across one of those... Except for one more inch of blade, this is pretty much in line with a design philosophy I'd go for...

Gaston

 

[Gaston444]

Porcupines absolutely climb trees. They eat the bark of trees.

You learn something new every day. Then it certainly was a big porcupine. Sad that it was killed for no gain

Gaston

 

[Mark Knapp]

You learn something new every day. Then it certainly was a big porcupine. Sad that it was killed for no gain

Gaston

It is a shame, the mountain men used to say, "Never kill a porcupine unless you need to, cuz someday you may need to"

 

[TAH]

That's it!

Aren't they amazing? I would love to come across one of those... Except for one more inch of blade, this is pretty much in line with a design philosophy I'd go for...

Gaston

Webster is on Facebook. Maybe he would make one for you.

 

[Gaston444]

It looks as though he is retired...

The last similar one sold on AZCK was in 2012, for only $425(!)...

It seems as though there is quite a drought of old style large hollow handles in general (and this going on for quite a while now, except for the recent brief spate of 4-5 at Mike Welze, that we both bought from); a few Parrish Survivors, one Mike England and a very expensive Andy Wood "First Blood"...

Gaston

 

[Gaston444]

Here's comparison picture of the new knife, re-ground by REK, compared to my current Survival Knife collection, the result of a lot of paring down from testing (the edge on the new knife is still untested):

I also came up with a rough outline of the design I mentioned earlier as to what I think would be an "ideal" Survival Knife (the mechanism depicted on the pommel represents the fixation for the slingshot):

The saw would be similar to the one on the Aitor Jungle King I, which I know is effective, but mounted on a full vertical taper flat grind. The fully curved edge would have the benefit of making a thin 0.020" edge a lot more resilient to side loads, boosting the actual edge-holding: This is because the thin edge being less rigidly supported than a straight edge, it would more readily diffuse the side loads away from the apex, the whole blade bending rather than concentrating the force close to the weaker apex. This is why it is usually much harder to cause chips in the belly rather than on the straights: Always keep any prying to the belly...

For this and other reasons I never understood recurves, where the concave is the opposite of this design, and has only downsides...

While doing this I found two old photos of what my collection used to be two years ago...: Note that the Randall Model 12 below has a similar handle shape to my drawing, a shape I did myself with a grinder out of a "Commando handle" (except for the pommel ground down by REK):

Of the knives in these two pictures above, the only one I still have is the Randall Model 14, this solely because it really saved the day in an actual emergency...: This is where I learned to pry with the curved edge portion, not the straight...

The Model 14's deep finger grooves fit my hand to perfection, and this is probably why it is among the worst choppers in the history of the world... If you try to chop at a finger-sized twig with this, I swear your fingers will feel like glass that will shatter first... Fortunately the Model 18's round handle had none of these issues, and could chop about twice as hard: Sadly, being twice the chopper of the Model 14 still means the 18 is a terrible chopper...

Of all these knives (plus a BK-9 that vibrated painfully), only the Model 12 had absolutely nothing wrong with it: The only reason I did not keep it is because its brown leather sheath soaked in water like a sponge in minutes...: The sheath was still useable, but did not inspire confidence (it is worth noting that black Randall sheaths are totally waterproof in comparison to the brown ones)... Because of this sheath issue the Model 12 had migrated into a Gerber BMF sheath, and in turn this great BMF sheath was adapted to the $180 Oryx Raider II, ousting the CAN $1200 Randall, which still fetched a good price without a sheath... By my testing the Oryx is comparable in performance to the Model 12, but the edge and hollow grind is slightly sharper and more precisely ground (it was made in Japan): A 9.8" blade of course beats 8.9"... The weight of the Oryx is something I got used to, but be warned it is staggering...

The RJ Martin was an unbeatably functional design, but its S30V edge would always micro-roll instantly on Maple, even after a year of cold sharpening, so that was another example of what could go wrong... The SMIII Trailmaster had a handle so thin it would not transmit force well, bucking in the hand instead, and the convex edge was just way too fat to perform (for chopping you want the edge thin and the handle fat, not the other way around!)...

One absolutely excellent knife worth mentioning in these photos is the peculiar 7.8" blade (with a gigantic 6" handle) Al Mar "Special Warfare": The huge wood handle, thin hollow ground edge and outstanding edge holding was perfect to make it perform like a 9.5" knife (incredibly, it sometimes out-chopped narrowly the much heavier Trailmaster, showing just how important the handle is, even compared to blade length...). The only reason I sold it is it was very, very asymmetrically ground, with a fragile point way, way off center: I have noted this before on other truly vintage 80-90s US market Al Mars, as this one was, so it is worth pointing out (I saw a much more recently made Asian market "Special Warfare", from the same factory, and it was straight and much better finished)...

Anyway, this was a fun look back...

Gaston

 

[TAH]

It seems as though there is quite a drought of old style large hollow handles in general (and this going on for quite a while now, except for the recent brief spate of 4-5 at Mike Welze, that we both bought from)...

I think collectors are not selling, because not only are the 1980s custom HH survival knives well built and designed, they are also nostalgic relics from the era.

 

[TAH]

Here's comparison picture of the new knife, re-ground by REK...

I thought you were just going to remove the pointy skull crusher, make the buttcap flat, and save the excellent knurling. A little late now, but another option would have been to have someone make a flat aluminum buttcap to reduce the overall weight, thus shifting the weight forward, since you like to chop. This option would have preserved the original buttcap for the future.

Also, did you take a hit on the Model 18 due to the modification?

 

[Gaston444]

I thought you were just going to remove the pointy skull crusher, make the buttcap flat, and save the excellent knurling. A little late now, but another option would have been to have someone make a flat aluminum buttcap to reduce the overall weight, thus shifting the weight forward, since you like to chop. This option would have preserved the original buttcap for the future.

Also, did you take a hit on the Model 18 due to the modification?

Well the two-tone Cox blade grind is no longer original either... In any case the pommel work REK did was just amazingly precise, I couldn't be happier, all four corners being the original knurling and exactly matching in size: It looks as original as anything: Not awkward or even non-intentional, and all corners are perfectly bevelled... I can't imagine someone making an aluminium pommel from scratch for my limited budget: Even what I did was far from peanuts at around $150 on top of an 850 knife, although Josh is always reasonable....

I gave the 18 away to a friend because of the mod (unusually for me, still with its original brown sheath!: The Model 14 has long been housed in a Spec-Ops). There wasn't much wrong with the 18 after I "fixed" the badly factory-crooked guard (although the handle was still both askew and slightly off-centered to the blade slightly) but the medium size and carbon steel simply wasn't for me...

The Model 12 sold for almost the same without sheath as it did with the sheath(!), which speaks very well for Randall resale value: I think someone liked the modified handle, and whoever that was I'm sure was not disappointed...


Gaston

 

[TAH]

For this and other reasons I never understood recurves, where the concave is the opposite of this design, and has only downsides...

I don't understand how a recurve has only downsides. Recurves are designed to shift the weight forward making them excel at chopping. Different variations of the bolo knife have been used for survival for 100 years. They must be doing something right.


WWI Bolo Knife, 1917

Bark River Bolo Knife, 2017