Interesting notion... I do not like soft grinds myself, but I can see how they can be used to hide some flaws... I don't know what is the cause of the series of "flats" on my hollow grind's left side, but it is interesting to note that they appear on the same side in the same place on two different blades, one polished out to acceptable "ghost" remains (18), the other polished to an even overall grit tone, but with the flats remaining distinct from a true hollow curve... I did note on sharpening that I could feel edge thickness variations as I sharpened the 14 (much more than on the 18), something I have never, never noticed on any other knife... This was more pronounced in the area where the diagonal flats met the edge... According to Gary there was nothing out of the ordinary in the finish, even though the flats were plainly visible, and this despite my attempts to sand them out with rough grit... We'll see how it comes out...
The Model 18 is out to Razoredgeknives today, so we will see how it shapes up compared to the Model 14...
I do find the guard issue is a bit beyond what anyone would expect, but I did find one thing very impressive about Randall guards: The radiusing/polishing of the silver soldering around the base of the blade is exceptionally well done, giving a very high impression of quality: Even though my Seki City Junglee Waterloo is far more precisely ground in the blade (probably the best I have seen in one of my fixed blades), the silver soldering on that is just a thin whitish "filler" at the base of the blade: It does the job but not more...
I just got an Al Mar "Special Warfare" (large), and it is not without flaws itself despite also being from Seki City: The clip grind's lower edges are deliberately done soft, but even so they are not symmetrical, and the point was actually curved to the right side: By hammering it for a while (between a magazine on top and a book below: No damage at all, fffew!), the point was brought back to perfect straightness: It is a bit too thin for my tastes, but useable... I think the error was one at the grinding stage, not an issue of cooling, as I am almost sure I actually had to "bend" the point to make it look straight... It is perfectly straight now, but the clip grinds are not 100% symmetrical, so the point is straight but very slightly off-center: No problem for me, but look at a the clip of a Chris Reeves one-piece to see how unthinkable such an assymetry would be on that (or fixing it with just cold hammering for that matter!)...
Besides that, this Al Mar has the most incredible surface finish I have ever seen on any of my knives, with no scratches at all, and this despite the thing being made in 1993... The handle is overly large, but sound in shape for several grip styles (unlike some of their SOG bowies, with alien finger grooving), and the overall impression this knife gives is just astounding. The blade is a full 1/4" thick all the way down 3/4 of the blade, and so despite the overly thin point, it feels much heftier than the beefier-looking Randall 18... The edge bevel itself is comparable in thinness, or more, to the Randall, but is also not very sharp new. It is pretty clear to me that in most performance aspects, except point strength, the Al Mar would perform much better than the Randall 18 or 14, either for combat or survival, and notably while chopping, despite the design being somewhat comparable to a "regular style" Model 14 in appearance... As I said, the thinned-out blade stock really hurts the Randall's blade heft in my opinion... All this for under $400 US, despite 23 years of out-of production appreciation...
One of the reasons I went for it was the "Eagle" nylon sheath, which proved excellent as usual, but is probably not "transferable" to my Randalls as I hoped... One of the key to Eagle sheath excellence is that they were taylor-made to each specific blade... The only weird thing with this sheath is that, for right-handed people, the Al Mar knife can only be presented edge-up -[EDIT]with a small bit of slicing at the sheath "mouth", the blade fits perfectly "edge down" now: It is tigher and sounder fitting now, and I think I was putting it upside down-... Nice big pouch on the Eagle sheath, so still a survival knife by my definition! Will post pictures soon, even if it is not a hollow handle...
I did put the green bank line on my Boker Apparo, and it really "livened" its appearance... Thanks Dave!
Gaston
The Model 18 is out to Razoredgeknives today, so we will see how it shapes up compared to the Model 14...
I do find the guard issue is a bit beyond what anyone would expect, but I did find one thing very impressive about Randall guards: The radiusing/polishing of the silver soldering around the base of the blade is exceptionally well done, giving a very high impression of quality: Even though my Seki City Junglee Waterloo is far more precisely ground in the blade (probably the best I have seen in one of my fixed blades), the silver soldering on that is just a thin whitish "filler" at the base of the blade: It does the job but not more...
I just got an Al Mar "Special Warfare" (large), and it is not without flaws itself despite also being from Seki City: The clip grind's lower edges are deliberately done soft, but even so they are not symmetrical, and the point was actually curved to the right side: By hammering it for a while (between a magazine on top and a book below: No damage at all, fffew!), the point was brought back to perfect straightness: It is a bit too thin for my tastes, but useable... I think the error was one at the grinding stage, not an issue of cooling, as I am almost sure I actually had to "bend" the point to make it look straight... It is perfectly straight now, but the clip grinds are not 100% symmetrical, so the point is straight but very slightly off-center: No problem for me, but look at a the clip of a Chris Reeves one-piece to see how unthinkable such an assymetry would be on that (or fixing it with just cold hammering for that matter!)...
Besides that, this Al Mar has the most incredible surface finish I have ever seen on any of my knives, with no scratches at all, and this despite the thing being made in 1993... The handle is overly large, but sound in shape for several grip styles (unlike some of their SOG bowies, with alien finger grooving), and the overall impression this knife gives is just astounding. The blade is a full 1/4" thick all the way down 3/4 of the blade, and so despite the overly thin point, it feels much heftier than the beefier-looking Randall 18... The edge bevel itself is comparable in thinness, or more, to the Randall, but is also not very sharp new. It is pretty clear to me that in most performance aspects, except point strength, the Al Mar would perform much better than the Randall 18 or 14, either for combat or survival, and notably while chopping, despite the design being somewhat comparable to a "regular style" Model 14 in appearance... As I said, the thinned-out blade stock really hurts the Randall's blade heft in my opinion... All this for under $400 US, despite 23 years of out-of production appreciation...
One of the reasons I went for it was the "Eagle" nylon sheath, which proved excellent as usual, but is probably not "transferable" to my Randalls as I hoped... One of the key to Eagle sheath excellence is that they were taylor-made to each specific blade... The only weird thing with this sheath is that, for right-handed people, the Al Mar knife can only be presented edge-up -[EDIT]with a small bit of slicing at the sheath "mouth", the blade fits perfectly "edge down" now: It is tigher and sounder fitting now, and I think I was putting it upside down-... Nice big pouch on the Eagle sheath, so still a survival knife by my definition! Will post pictures soon, even if it is not a hollow handle...
I did put the green bank line on my Boker Apparo, and it really "livened" its appearance... Thanks Dave!
Gaston
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