Handmade kitchen knife for sale

Blade is by Bones61, handle is by me. The blade is carbon steel and is already showing signs of patina. There are some odd scratches still here and there from the blade being ground - they won't affect performance. ;)
The handle is tufnol, no liners and three loveless bolts in brass, plus a bit of epoxy. It's not budging!

It's no frills but it'll work and work (possibly like both me and Bones. :D )

 Blade length is just shy of 21cm

Overall length is a bit less than 33cm



£70 will get this to your door in the UK.

You must be at least 18 years old to buy.

Read More..

Vagnino Zipslip / Spyderco UKPK comparison review

This is a review from the end of 2012. I am posting it here as I'm about to post a follow up review on a new version of the Zipslip.

 ------

When Michael Vagnino's Zipslip turned up on a passaround, the natural comparison for me was my Spyderco G10 UKPK. Both are slipjoints, use the forefinger in a choil for added security and have orange scales!




The big thing for a knife for me is the handle. If it's comfy to use, I can compensate for a bad blade but if it has a perfect blade but a poor handle, I can't. I haven't focussed on cutting in this comparison for that very reason - they're both sharp and can cut things. I'm more concerned with the ergonomics and mechanics.

The UKPK sets the bar very high to my mind. I find the ergonomics pretty much spot on for me so it's a great benchmark to compare against. I'm currently carrying it everyday as well.

I had a very positive reaction to the Zipslip initially. It's not surprising that it's construction is superb. It feels solid and it opens with authority with no wobble in the blade. It's a knife that made me smile when I got it in hand.

From pictures, I found the design of the pocket clip a little jarring - I could see how the clip extending past the handle would aid in seating it even deeper than the UKPK in a pocket, but visually I'm not keen and I also wondered if it would stick in the hand.



It proved not to be a problem when gripping. If you look at the picture above, the Zipslip clip angles in quickly whereas the UKPK clip runs parallel to the knife so actually is more noticeable in the hand.
For my hand size, the end of the clip doesn't get in the way.


The Zipslip has gently rounded scales, whereas the UKPK has flat scales with the corners chamfered.
Zipslip:


UKPK:


The rounded makes the Zipslip feel much more comfortable than the UKPK. I asked my wife to do some comparisons and this is something she said straight away and I have to agree. I've never noticed a problem with the UKPK before but having this to compare made me realise it would be nice to have that change in shape.

Unfortunately, a big negative point for me is the choil size. The curve of the Zipslip choil is a noticeably tighter radius than the UKPK.


I don't have large hands but I found that the choil pinched my finger.


The UKPK doesn't.


If I owned this knife, I wouldn't be able to use it in this state. It was just too uncomfortable. I do believe, however, that it could be reshaped without detriment to the rest of the knife. The front of the choil that's part of the blade could stay the same but the rear section in the handle could be flattened out. It would just move the 'point' of the rear part of the choil further toward the butt of the handle and closer to the spine of the handle.
A cheeky little photoshop:


Zipslip original
UKPK original
Rear of the UKPK choil stuck on the Zipslip -
Note, the last picture is not real.

Also on comfort, the handle grooves.
I like them but I think the corners need taking off. the channels have a harsh 90 degree corner that I think would cause rubbing in use. an extra cutting operation when milling them in using an angled cutter to chamfer the top would remove the problem.


My last area of note is the spring.

It's actually my biggest issue with the knife as it's not something I could change or tweak. Opening is fantastic. The 'snap' is very solid.
It's the closing that I'm not happy with.
i have done a little video to highlight what I mean. It's not very exciting but hopefully it shows my point.

The tang has evidently been designed to allow an easy start to the open but on the flip side, it means there's not much pressure from the spring to keep it closed. I would have concerns that it may open slightly in my pocket. I did shake it about at one point and it does open a little. With the correct wrist flick, it can be opened all the way - this is the only slippy that I've had that I can remember being able to do that with.
Personally I think a little more spring tension when closed is needed. If I pull the blade out slightly and let go, I would want it to snap back closed.

On the whole, I like it. The shape and design is pretty inoffensive to NKPs. There are a few ergo tweaks that I would personally want. The spring would be something that's a dealbreaker for me, unfortunately.

Thanks for the look Michael and Tom.
I hope my thoughts are of some use Michael.

Read More..

99 Facebook likes!

Argh, so frustrating!

My Facebook page is at 99 likes. I don't really push the page or mind how many likes there are but I would love it if it just ticked over to 100.

 

It's so close...........

https://www.facebook.com/StewartJLightKnives

Someone put me out of my misery.

Please.

Read More..

A Yew Bench!

In April 2010, a Yew tree was cut down at my work to make way for an expansion of the bin compound. The trunks were unceremoniously dumped at the bottom of a field and unsurprisingly I wanted to find a use for them.


It took me some time to decide what to do with them but eventually I decided to make a bench for my allotment though there may be a different plan now.

---

Early March 2013

If you didn't know what was there, it would be very easy to miss what was hidden:

First job was to trim one log to length so I borrowed a cross-cut saw from my Dad:

and in short order, this beautiful sight

So the next order of business was to section the trunk into two halves. For a short time I considered sawing along the length but I felt it would be too impractical to manage. Instead, I decided to split it. I made some wedges out of wood - lots of wedges. I believe such wedges are called gluts.

Then started the very slow process of hammering the wedges along the trunk. An axe was hit in at one end to make a start then removed and replaced with a wedge. As the wood starts to split, another wedge is put in place.
Slowly the wood splits along it's length. Sometimes a wedge that you think will go right in sticks solid so another one is tapped in to take the pressure off and allow others to be hit in further. I spent three mornings before work tapping away before I got it to split in half.

An annoying break that slowed me down!!

The final bit of hitting:

The end result!

I dragged one half up into a storage area to get it out of the weather but forgot to move the other.

----

March 2014.

I transported the half that had been stored inside home in my car (it only just fit!) and got the other half of the trunk into shelter. The 'dry' half was heavy but the half that had been left outside was noticeably more heavy from the damp.

Sunday 9th March
A lovely sunny day prompted the start of some work to get it into some sort of usable shape.

My two little helpers!

Due to the wood having been split, all the fibres along it's length are rough and torn. These need to cut removed.

I let the kids have a play at removing some wood. The best way for them to understand and learn. A plane isn't the best tool for this job but I couldn't find my spokeshave and wasn't going to trust a two year old and a four year old with a drawknife!

They found the results quite fascinating and it was lovely to have them involved.

Onto more serious effort as it would take a lifetime at the rate they were going so out came my old draw knife.

The finish left straight from the draw knife:

Spending time soaking up the sun's rays while making wood shavings is a lovely thing.

This shows how torn the grain fibres can be

and after some time shaving it down

My son was fascinated by the purple staining on one part of the wood. This is a reaction between the wood and some of the metal used in splitting it apart. I hope I can keep some of the purple in the shaping

I didn't want to commit it all to being flat at this stage. I wanted to have the second half alongside this one before I commit to what's the base and what's the back so I switched to using a gouge to remove the torn fibres in the hollows.

A quick check in by the dog!

Done for the day with plenty more to do!

Read More..