tradeoffs between sabre grind and flat/hollow grind

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I guess just emotionally I like the idea of leaving more rather than less metal on the blade, because it give me more options. Reality check here. most knives appear to be hollow ground or flat ground, is that right? Trying to calculate trade offs and chess moves. If you buy a hollow ground knife, other things being equal, your next move on a regrind is more limited relative to buying a flat grind or sabre grind. Does that sound right, or am I missing something?


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If you buy a hollow ground knife, other things being equal, your next move on a regrind is more limited relative to buying a flat grind or sabre grind. Does that sound right, or am I missing something?


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That sounds about right, but the difference doesn't seem to be that much. Personally, I'd rather buy a knife that's closer to the way I want to use it rather than buy something to regrind it later. Saber grinds are thicker, creating more resistance on deeper slices (if the edge angles compared are the same). Hollow grinds aren't ideal for heavy chopping or batoning, which is mostly irrelevant on folders and small fixed blades.
 
I am doing a spreadsheet of all of my knives and have come across an interesting phenomenon (unless my terminology is wrong)- most of my hollow ground knives are hollow-saber instead of full hollow ground. If I am reading your question well then you are right- full hollow ground is limited in choices for regrind as the blade is already very thin.
 
True enough, but if it already has a full hollow grind, why would you want or need to regrind it?

I suggest you examine how you use your knives. If you use them for cutting tools and nothing else, full flat or full hollow (if you can find one, it doesn't seem to be very common on production knives) will probably be best. If you like to pry, chop or baton your folders, I suggest sticking to saber grinds, with the extra cross-sectional area for strength.

I like thin, flat ground blades myself.
 
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