What Makes a Good, Traditional Barlow?

A couple of Queen DB Barlows and a Western.
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Charlie, not for the Ancient run but maybe a future run of TC's I would like to see this profile of spear blade. It swells out towards the tip, seems it was used mainly on Camillus barlows. First pic is a TC spear and the other 2 are what I'm talking about. I think its a pretty graceful looking blade profile.


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I should not have came to this thread... I wanted a barlow for a good while before I found a nice condition case model that I believe was made in the early to mid 2000s in blue pocket warn bone from an old knife collector at a gun show in memphis. It was worth the 30 bucks I paid for it just to talk to the old man about pocket knives and all the different patterns. He had probably well over 100 knives sitting in cases from basic case models to some that I have never seen or heard of. He had knives that he was asking up to a couple hundred dollars for but the genrous man still let me being a young teenager look and ask all the questions all I want. I ended up gifting it to my uncle as a veterans day gift. Miss the knife a lot but it was for sure worth it seeing how happy the gift made the man that has treated my mom's sister so well, as well as the rest of my family.
It looked just like this, he says he keeps it at his desk and it is still as sharp as ever! (I stole this image from google)
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It was a great little knife. Had the best walk and talk of any case knife I have handled today. The bone was very pretty also and it had pretty tight fit for a case. Though the spring was proud at the half stop, which of course is not a problem for a working knife! Someone had filed down the tang a little too much at the factory though I will say, so it did whack the back spring when closing leading to a chipped blade. I actually remember asking how to fix it on here many years ago on my old account.
Posting this is bringing back a lot of good memories, its funny how such small little objects can draw back very strong and vivid memories. I would say case knives especially do for some reason, I have a story about every case knife I own! I know they are kind of kind of have to sit in GEC's shadow here, but I still believe there is something really special about them. It is probably because they have so much history to them and that after all these years they remain a mainstream idea of a nice, high quality knife.
This thread really makes me regret never buying the case barlow in damascus and stag they had for a short time. If im lucky maybe I will meet that old man again some day and he will have another barlow he is wanting to get rid of, and pf course pass on some knowledge to a youngster. ;)
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Well look at that, I have rambled on again. I think I could make an entire post just about the old man at the gunshow with all the case knives I met all those years ago, maybe I will haha.
 
New to me, Saddle Brown clip. I paid a pretty penny but there is just something special about TC Barlow’s that many of you will understand.. sometimes it’s just worth it : )

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Next to my first run spear, interesting to see the difference in the sawcut

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I know what you mean Drew. Whenever I log on here, I visit the Traditional section of the classifieds, looking for Barlows & occasionally I'll get lucky. I've paid what I consider reasonable prices for all of mine, but there are a few TC & NF Barlows, (Namely saw cut clip blades), that I'd go outside my comfort zone to buy. Thankfully, you guys usually snatch those up before I get to see them. :)
Lynn
 
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