What does “slicey” really mean, to you?

When some one talks about a slicey knife, I think thin behind the edge and relatively thin blade stock. I spend most of my time here in the traditional section though.
At my old job I had to do a lot of cutting of plastic straps, shrink wrap and cardboard. Most cuts were not deep, so thick stock was not a factor. Just a sharp edge that didn’t dull quickly. So a slicey knife there was completely different.
 
”Slicey” to me means a really thin blade and a mirror polished razor sharp edge. The blade should be able to smoothly and cleanly cut without prying the object open. A filet knife is a good example of a slicey blade.
 
Slicey for me is defined by the carrot and the apple. If it will rapidly slice chunks of carrot without the pieces pinging off the chopping board or slice through an apple without binding. I'd add slicing cleanly and easily through double wall cardboard though I slice food far more often than packaging.
 
Slicey would be an Ontario Cabbage or Hop knife. Relatively thin, full flat grind with a very small bevel. Nice for the price if you like fixed-blade carbon steel knives. Sort of a thin Old Hickory butcher knife.
 
Slicey to me means it cuts stuff.
Everything else gets wedged in the work and tends to rip the work apart from sheer wedginess.
Wedginess that is another highly technical knife term.
Wedgies look good for the catalog photos though so REALLY that is what matters . . . to someone . . . not me.

So here it is.
Rather than hear . . . me bang on and on about thinness.
I recommend everyone or at least the OP go out and buy one or both of these as soon as humanly possible. Use them on everything that you ever cut and pay attention to how they do it.
Sure . . . you might break one. I cracked the larger one trying to split something huge and hard.
IT DID NOT BREAK THOUGH. I used it for years after. I have since retired it just because of a little voice that kept nagging me to. The Chef . . . not the little voice in my head which was saying "Go Man Go".
This first one (top knife in the photo) is a MAC . . . doesn't matter which model just get a largish MAC and use it.
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The second one is a
Azumasyusaku Funayuki 'Kaji Craftsmanmade' Kurouchi, Double Bevel (120mm)
sounds expensive doesn't it ? =$40.
The previous knife is about that.
IMG_3369.JPG

hahahaha . . . problem is they will make all your other knives look silly and then you will cuss me.
I warned you.
PS: yes I tend to grind or buy knives based on what those suckers, shown above, cut like.
Two examples of mod / grinds :
Cold Steel Ti Lite IV 1.9 mm at the spine
IMG_3720.jpg
Cold Steel Pendleton Hunter in 3V 2.2 mm at the spine (hahahaha it was 5mm ! ! ! ! It Suuuuuuuuuuuuuucked.)
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It depends.

If I have a JOB that requires me to open boxes, then being slicy would mean that I had a really great knife blade for breaking down boxes. It might not be a folder, the better tool might be a utility knife. If my job is an electrician, being slicy might mean removing a wire jacket very easily.

For SELF DEFENSE, slicy means something entirely different. I'm in the Upper Midwest, Chicagoland area, and it depends on what time of year it is as to whether or not a particular knife is "slicy" enough for the task, so I choose the best that I can. For example, if it is during the Winter, a perp may be wearing a leather coat, or a heavily insulated Winter coat with a long sleeve shirt on under neath. In that case, a knife that is slicy has to go through all of those layers AND cut through the skin to the bone if he/she attacks.
 
Wowbagger said:
I recommend everyone or at least the OP go out and buy one or both of these as soon as humanly possible.
Click to expand...

No need. The question isn’t, “what is slicey?” It’s, “what is slicey, to you?”

I started this thread because I’ve noticed that it’s fairly common to see references to a knife being-, or not being “slicey”, or to knives being thin or thick behind the edge.

It also seems to be the case that these references frequently have little to no value. A person may ask for a knife recommendation, without context, and get a recommendation against an option on the grounds of it being thick behind the edge and “not slicey”. Without context, the question becomes, too thick for what? It may not matter at all how thick it is behind the edge, or how slicey it is or isn’t, and the person asking for advice may have a completely different view of what “slicey” means.
 
Razor blades are slicey.
My santoku kitchen knife is slicey.

I guess to ME it means thin blade stock and very sharp.
 
A bread knife is slicey...a butter knife is not slicey but it slices butter quite well. I have extremely slicey kitchen knives, my box cutters work well on cardboard and sometimes you need shears, snips or side cutters. I can spread mayo, slice a tomato, cut steak with all of my folders...but I usually use a better tool. My eldest grand daughter says it best:"Grandpa you use a knife to do many things you don't need to use a knife for (example open envelopes). You just like knives." She is quite correct.
 
to me, it means addicted to diminutive internet baby talk, like Remmie, shottie, Barbie, etc.., and am sure readers of this post could supply circa 867,463 other examples.

In an original limited dose, it is appropriate and clever use of wording, but when used internetwide, or at least in the gun and knife side of it, and habitually and massively, in what is traditionally a male bastion of activity, it grates on the nerves after a while as fingernails on a chalk board.

Otherwise, it means cuts thin with extremely little effort.
 
VTuIg3G.jpg
 
Wowbagger said:
...
This first one (top knife in the photo) is a MAC . . . doesn't matter which model just get a largish MAC and use it.
Click to expand...

I got three of the MAC knives at a Goodwill store for just a few bucks. Love them! I have a couple Pilot knives that are similar.
 
For me sharpness is how small the apex is and sliceyness is how much the knife wedges. Sliceyness is a product of both behind the edge thickness as well as blade stock thickness but blade height can come into play as well as that influences the primary grind angle.

Short answer; sliceyness is good blade geometry.

My philosophy on knives is that they should be no thicker than they need to be for their intended application. It can get difficult to determine what that is with folders as they are usually a jack of all trades, master of none kind of tool.
 
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