Knife collecting is an extremely rewarding experience for knife enthusiasts. There truly is a knife for everyone. Many increase or hold their value throughout the years, making collecting knives something to pass on to the next generation of knife collectors.
It’s easy to toss around the word epic and difficult to describe Jon Christensen’s recent work any other way. Of course, the subject material for his two-handed sword made it challenging for the results of the project to be anything other than mythical.
The Montana-based ABS master smith captures the ancient Greek myth of Perseus and Medusa in 16 hand-engraved iron panels inset into the 410SS handle and a bulino-engraved bronze shield on the guard of his Guardian Sword. Among other things, the handle features gold, bronze, copper, silver, custom alloy and mother-of-pearl inlay and is punctuated with Medusa’s head on the butt.
Jon Christensen
“The bulino engraving was very challenging as it was my first,” Christensen confessed. “There was a ‘paying my dues’ stage of time spent, which I just had to accept.”
It might be said that the entire project was an exercise in dues-paying. In addition to challenging himself with a new engraving technique, he was also delving into an unfamiliar subject. Christensen gave himself a crash course in the story of Medusa before conceptualizing the panels. But the client who commissioned the sword raised the bar on his retelling of the myth.
“Before starting on the project, the collector requested my interpretation of the story be approved by Tufts University, which is known for a strong program in classical mythology,” he said. “I compiled and submitted a document of the concept showing drawings and descriptions for each scene, as well as the overall sword. They replied saying, ‘It was a masterful interpretation.’”
The Guardian Sword handle, with the panels depicting the Greek myth of Perseus and Medusa.
The sword is reminiscent of the one featured in Benvenuto Cellini’s sculpture of Perseus, showcasing the same unique shape in its 37.5-inch W2 blade, with a hamon. While this aspect of the sword presented challenges, Christensen admits it was the easy part of the Guardian. Much of the 4,000 or so hours he dedicated to the work were focused on the handle, engravings and accurately retelling the ancient myth.
“The time on completing the blade would be measured in weeks, the handle scenes in years working under a microscope,” he said. Epic, indeed.
“Yes, the scope of the project was very intimidating at times. I had to constantly manage my thoughts to the task at hand,” Christensen said. “As the saying goes, ‘How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.’”
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Knife etiquette often overlaps with knife safety, and this is a prime example. The best way to hand someone a knife is also the politest, as nothing is quite as rude as unintentionally cutting open a person’s skin.
The Technique: Make It Muscle Memory
It’s simple: while holding the handle with your fingers, cradle the spine of the blade in the web of your hand between the thumb and index finger.
This allows the recipient to safely grasp the handle. If the blade slides across the giver’s hand, the skin will come in contact with the spine, not the edge. It also forces the recipient into choosing the safest method to release the knife from the giver’s hand, avoiding any meandering edges.
None other than Ray Mears demonstrates what a successful hand off looks like using this technique here:
The dance of two people using any other technique is as awkward as it is unsafe. Committing this technique to muscle memory so it’s second nature will save time and stitches. Plus, you’ll look like a pro.
The Second Best Technique: Setting the Knife Down
The only other technique that’s as safe is setting the knife down for the recipient to then pick up. That’s not always possible, but it’s still better than someone unintentionally shaking hands with an edge.
Placing fingers on the blade to pass or grab a knife is not only not recommended, it’s not how the knife was designed in the first place. The handle is there for a reason.
The Only Exception: Securing the Blade Inside the Handle
If the knife design allows for the blade to be secured inside the handle (folders, autos, etc.), it’s obviously acceptable to secure the blade first before handing the knife off.
In the quick back-and-forths at knife shows, like the BLADE Show, that’s not always convenient. That’s why it’s worth committing the technique in the above picture to muscle memory.
Pass It On!
Don’t keep this information to yourself. Share the image at the top of the page on your social media, blog, website and with anyone who might need it. Feel free to link to this article, too.
BLADE wants you to be safe! Enjoy your knives. Treat them right, and they’ll treat you right, too.
Instead of turning to cotton cloths for wiping down his knives, Carlos Lopez uses microfiber cloths. This beauty made and engraved with a fantasy warrior theme by Bulgaria’s Alex Gev has a special place in the Lopez collection, and is one of Carlos’s favorites.
Custom Knives Require a Special Kind of Tender Loving Maintenance
Most everyone knows what’s needed to care for a utility knife, including maintaining a working edge and wiping it down after use. However, keeping your custom knife as stunning as the day you first laid eyes on it is another matter. BLADE® polled four veteran knife collectors for their input on the subject. After years of collecting, they have more than a few ideas on how to keep knives presentation ready.
It may not be apparent when buying just one knife, but tallied up and considered together, knife collections can add up to a serious investment.
“It’s imperative that you preserve it as a group,” said U.S. Army veteran and long-time knife collector Louis Chow of San Francisco. “And even more so for the people that prefer a certain maker, you can say Loveless collectors or Moran collectors or what not, because it becomes a collection that is actually known to others.”
One knife care product Louis Chow has reached for over the past three decades to keep everything pristine is Renaissance Wax. Chow began using the wax after knifemaker Clay Gault recommended it to him. Gault was known for his natural handle materials. The knife is by Don Lozier. (Kris Kandler image)
For the diverse kinds of knives in his collection, some with stainless steel blades and others with leather grips, Chow has reached for one product over the past three decades to keep things pristine: Renaissance Wax. Chow began using it after maker Clay Gault recommended it. Gault was known for his natural handle materials.
“If it’s good enough for the British Museum, I think it’s good enough for me,” Louis said of Renaissance Wax.
Researchers at the British Museum learned that natural waxes went acidic over time, which was not good for the museum’s relics. In the late 1950s, Dr. A.E.A. Werner reportedly developed Renaissance Wax in the museum’s research laboratory.
With Renaissance Wax, Chow doesn’t have to distinguish between blade and handle. It works equally well protecting carbon blades, stacked leather handles and the sheaths that encompass them.
When knives sit in padded, acid-free cases, the wax doesn’t soak into the fabric of the cases as oils do. After returning from knife shows and to remove the traces of soda, coffee and fingerprints, Chow wipes down his blades with cotton buffing cloths from auto centers or specialty shops. He uses the cotton buffing cloths instead of microfleece because the latter tends to leave fibers everywhere.
Louis Chow uses a polish paste on his carbon steel knives if he notices rust forming. He’s careful to use a mild polish without a lot of grit, such as Simichrome or 3M. Other polishes have a fine grit that, with a mirror polish blade, might change the condition of the finish. (Kris Kandler image)
Chow also uses a polish paste on his carbon steel knives if he notices rust beginning to form. He’s careful to use a mild polish without a lot of grit, such as Simichrome or 3M. Other polishes have a fine grit that, “if you have a mirror polish blade, that might change the condition of the finish.”
See the Light
Folder pivots by top makers don’t need a lot of lubrication because they are often made with tight tolerances. “Bob Terzuola once humorously mentioned to me how often people ‘over oil’ their knives, telling me how he would sometimes get knives back for a refurb that were literally dripping oil,” Chris Schluter recalled. If lint collects in a folder’s hard-to-reach crevices, a blast of compressed air does the trick. The folder is by Tom Ferry and the lube is by Quick Release. (Kris Kandler image)
Paul Kessler not only preserves the finely fitted and oft en engraved knives he collects, but he displays them as well. Of maintaining knives, he said, “It’s like taking care of your eyeglasses.”
The mortgage advisor’s maintenance routine begins when a new knife joins his collection. He cleans the fresh blade with WD-40. Kessler uses WD-40 only to clean blades. It tends to migrate, he says.
To lubricate folder pivots he uses Tuf-Oil or Breakfree.
“It’s a recommendation that I received from knifemaker Tom Overeynder, and they both work extremely well,” Paul noted. “They’re Teflon-bearing oils that won’t coagulate.”
Moisture and light are Kessler’s biggest concern when storing his knives. Just as sunlight changes the cabinetry of a kitchen, it can affect knives, he said.
“What happens with mammoth ivory, sunlight fades the color,” he observed. “When exposed to light, cocobolo gets darker. Elephant ivory, on the other hand, darkens and ‘patinas,’ and actually looks nicer.”
The first line of defense against light is museum glass that deflects the harmful rays. Kessler’s cases are lined with a Ph-neutral cloth and he turns to industrial magnets that hold the knives in place with 100 pounds of force.
He has used cigar boxes and antique picture frames to display his knives. They are French fitted, dustproof and airtight.
He stores fixed blades out of their sheaths and automatic knives with their springs not under pressure.
“I’ll use mineral oil with the 0000-steel wool on something that’s been exposed to the sun to bring the color back a little bit,” he said.
Every three months, Kessler moves his knives’ actions and oils the pivots with Tuf-Coat lubricant. He does not use Renaissance Wax. He finds that it leaves a film, giving the knife less of a luster.
Instead, he turns to RustFree, a product sold by A.G. Russell Knives. Kessler works a little on a cloth, wipes the knives and stores the cloth in a bag.
No Knife Wash Blues
After returning from knife shows and in order to remove the traces of soda, coffee and fingerprints from his knives—such as this vintage Delaware Maid sub-hilt fighter by Bob Loveless—U.S. Army Major veteran Louis Chow wipes down the blades with cotton buffing cloths that he picks up at auto centers or specialty shops. He uses the cotton buffing cloths instead of microfleece because the latter tends to leave fibers everywhere. (Louis Chow image)
Carlos Lopez is a residential builder in Florida. Being a purveyor of high-end custom knives and running the website knifetreasures.com is his “fun job.” He compares the care of a high-end custom knife to that of a car.
“It’s like you drive a car, it gets dirty, you wash it. You gotta maintain it,” he said.
Showtime is maintenance time for Lopez, who will wipe down and open and close each blade. He uses light oil and Renaissance Wax. The cleaning continues throughout the show.
“At a show, anytime anybody picks up a knife, after they see it, you wipe it clean,” Lopez said. “Fingerprints and oils from the fingers can eventually damage and rust a blade or handle.”
However, instead of turning to a cotton cloth, Lopez uses microfiber. When a microfiber cloth gets dirty, he throws it away. The key, he says, is to keep the cloth clean so it doesn’t pick up a piece of dirt that will scratch the blade. He gets multipacks of the microfiber cloths because he has to throw away the many that get dirty.
Living in Florida, Lopez keeps his house air-conditioned. This maintains his home—and the knives within—in a low-humidity environment.
If one of his knives develops rust, Lopez usually sends it to the knife’s maker for a fix up. If the original maker is deceased, he sends the knife to a maker who does similar work. When it comes to specialty materials such as ivory, Lopez recommends two treatments. Applying Renaissance Wax—letting it dry and then buffing it off —or baby oil helps seal the material.
“If you go to dry-weather places with ivory pieces they can crack within a day,” he advised, “so yeah, you need to maintain them and seal them.”
Don’t Over Oil!
A peak inside the knife case of Chris Schluter (inset) reveals, clockwise from top left: a tube applicator of Breakfree pivot lube, a Torx driver from Prometheus Design Werx, the Tanjun by Jonathan Mcnees, Peter Rassenti’s Pebble and a Model 7 by Bob Terzuola, the latter two resting on a True North Knives chamois. (Chris Schluter image)
Unlike bone handles or carbon steel blades, maintenance for tactical knives is a bit easier—or so says Chris Schluter, a stay-at-home dad in Chicago who formerly worked at the German-American Chamber of Commerce.
“I love the utilitarian designs which a maker can dress up or down as desires,” he observed.
“Part of the beauty of tactical folders is that, normally at least, not a lot of care is needed,” Schluter said. “This can depend on materials, of course. However, many materials commonly used on tactical folders are by design robust and maintenance free. G-10, titanium, carbon fiber, zirconium, etc., really don’t need care. That leaves one with the blade to care for. Even then, it’s usually a high-performance”—and thus low-maintenance—“stainless steel.”
When it comes to the care of tactical folders’ pivots, they don’t need a lot of lubrication, Schluter noted, because they are often made with tight tolerances.
“Bob Terzuola once humorously mentioned to me how often people ‘over oil’ their knives, telling me how he would sometimes get knives back for a refurb that were literally dripping oil,” Schluter recalled. If lint collects in a folder’s hard-to-reach crevices, a blast of compressed air does the trick.
“Pivots which become loose over time should be tightened with the proper screwdriver or Torx wrench and a drop of Loctite® added,” Schluter said.
He stores most of his 300 custom folders in a large gun safe in padded pouches, and dozens adorn the walls of his office in display cases. As for care, he tries to wipe down each knife with a high-quality oil like Tuf-Glide a few times a year, or after he handles one.
“Unfortunately—or fortunately, depending on how you look at it—I just have too many knives now to do this all at once,” he writes. “These days I do this in batches or when I happen to be handling a piece.”
The key for him is to avoid the ever-creeping rust. For the knives in his safe, he throws in a few moisture-absorbing desiccant packs and moisture removers.
“As with any treasured belongings, protecting them is a priority,” he stressed. “I would hate to open my safe and find a bunch of rusty knives.”
One thing that humble knifemakers find difficult to do at times is to express pride in their work. It’s the same thing with we knife editors and publishers. But when you look at these eight knife books that F&W Media has put out over the past few years, they’re not only impressive as a whole, but each individual title is clearly an example of quality work.
If you were interested in knifemaking and started with the two books Bladesmithing With Murray Carter and Knifemaking With Bob Loveless, you’d be well ahead of the game and your peers. Add in BLADE’s Guide To Making Knives, 2nd Edition, and suddenly you’re learning the craft from such knifemakers as Don Fogg, John Lewis Jensen, Tim Zowada, Allen Elishewitz, Vince Evans, Rick Dunkerley and Kevin Hoffman. Are you kidding me?! And how many of you have NOT heard of Wayne Goddard? His book The Wonder Of Knifemaking, 2nd Edition is a must-have for any knife book library.
If custom or handmade knives are your thing, the 33rd Edition of the Knives annual book, Knives 2013, will blow you away with full-color photography, feature articles written by the world’s best knife writers and a complete directory of custom knifemakers. Another sweet, full-color, gorgeous coffee-table book is Spirit Of The Sword by Steve Shackleford. It takes you on a trip from historic to modern swords and back again.
For knife collectors, you can’t go wrong with a book devoted entirely to Case Knives, the most collected brand in the world. Check out Collecting Case Knives by long-time collector, expert, accumulator and investor in everything Case, Steve Pfeiffer. And if after all that, you’re ready to design your own knives, or just need inspiration from over 100 classic knife designs, be sure to put in your pre-order for the brand-new, soon to hit bookshelves and stores everywhere 101 Knife Designs by none other than Murray Carter.
Admittedly, that’s one impressive knife book lineup, and would make any knife enthusiast’s library complete!
BLADE Magazine Cutlery Hall-Of-Fame® member Pete Gerber knew he was onto something with the FS1, a knife he remembers as “dandy” and one of three in the Folding Sportsman line that debuted with Gerber Legendary Blades beginning sometime around 1980.
“It was just a little heavy,” Pete recalled. “Blackie Collins was working with us on some projects then, and I asked him for help with it. I said, ‘Blackie, this is a nice knife. How can we take some weight out of it and put some pizzazz into it?’”
The knife engineers at Gerber Legendary Blades had been working with Micarta handle slabs, rather labor intensive at the time since the plastic laminate had to be machined to the appropriate shape.
The Bolt Action folders were among the Blackie Collins designs for Gerber that predated the LST. The original Bolt Action is at bottom and the newer Bolt Action hunter is at top.
“We had to mill it out and used brass washers with rivets to attach the slabs,” Pete said. “The original LST was the FS1 in-house design, and Blackie was first given the assignment to put moxie into it using the existing parts. He worked on the design and then put an injection-molded handle on it with nice checkering. Those were his contributions.”
As fine as it was, as long as the slab handles were involved the LST had trouble fully living up to the attributes that provided its name, “Light, Smooth, and Tough.” Collins already had contributed some well-known designs to Gerber, including the Bolt Action folder and the Touché belt buckle knife, and the wheels began to turn in his head.
The LST, as offered today on Gerber’s website. (Gerber image)
Blackie had a friend in Gastonia, North Carolina, just outside Charlotte, and that friend ran an injection-molding business. Instead of using riveted slabs as handle material, why not try a one-piece injection-molded handle to reduce both the weight and production cost of a knife design that was already selling pretty well? Just to add to the incentive, injection molding would open up the spectrum of handle colors as well.
After some experimentation, the production LST was manufactured with the glass-filled, nylon-reinforced Zytel as the handle material.
“It was the first time a folding knife was made with a one-piece handle, and it worked,” Pete remembered. “The action was so smooth because we went through an operation called ‘match catch,’ where the blade and the catch were kept together until they were assembled and until they were just perfect. When the knife closed, the blade referenced the catch, and it was as smooth as it could be.”
A New Car for a New Knife
Blackie Collins loved fast cars and motorcycles. When it came time for Pete Gerber to compensate him for his input on the LST, Blackie decided he wanted a Corvette—and Pete made it happen. (Meyerco image)
Almost as sweet as the story behind the LST, which has sold in the millions since the early 1980s, is the back-story of Blackie’s compensation for his input that led to the dynamic little knife’s eventual success. Pete asked Blackie what he wanted in the way of payment for services rendered.
“I didn’t think it could be a royalty knife since it was a modified in-house design,” Gerber explained. “I asked what he wanted for payment, and I suggested that maybe a new car would be something he would like.”
The story goes that the new car turned out to be a Corvette and that Pete’s check for $29,000 made it happen.
Blackie, a Cutlery Hall Of Famer who tragically lost his life in a motorcycle accident in 2011, loved cars and motorcycles and just about anything mechanical, and the idea of new wheels appealed to him. His wife, Jane, remembers well the search for just the right vehicle.
“We went from South Carolina to Jacksonville, Florida, to look at Avanti cars,” she recalled. “He didn’t like the way the new ones handled, so we looked at Corvettes, bought one that was two-tone gold, and drove it home. He owned that car for a few years and then traded it in.”
Pete remembers Collins driving around his hometown in South Carolina in that Corvette with a license plate that simply read, “Blackie.”
Offering items other than money for consulting seemed to work well for Pete, who also once paid Cutlery Hall-Of-Famer Bob Loveless with an airplane.
While Blackie burned up the roads in the Corvette, the Gerber-Collins partnership took the knife market by storm with the LST.
“Blackie used to say that the LST revolutionized the knife industry,” Jane recalled. “He did a lot of work for Gerber, and he really reduced the number of parts on that knife and put the plastic handle on it to make it lighter.”
Taking the World By Storm
A box of lockback folders in the Gerber factory in the early 1980s shows the thick nature of the handles. The LST not only was lightweight, it was thin, too, adding even more to its ease of carry.
The new lightweight knife was a sensation, and soon other knife companies were taking notice, working on something similar. It was pure gold in itself—with a grand total of six parts to the whole enterprise. Buyers wanted the light, smooth-action, durable and reasonably priced LST, and competitors scrambled to keep pace with Gerber’s trendsetter.
Soon enough, there were similar offerings rolling off assembly lines and onto store shelves. The introduction of LST energized knife manufacturers in a manner seldom seen.
The LST developed its own legacy among the knives that changed knife history, and it is still being manufactured in Portland, Oregon, and sold under the Gerber banner today.
“It was the first true ultralight knife,” explained Dan Delavan of Plaza Cutlery in Costa Mesa, California, “and Gerber had a high-quality blade in that light handle at a good price. You could throw it in the pocket of your swim trunks and go! Lightweight became attractive, and the LST was thin, too. It didn’t bulge in a suit pocket and the checkering gave it a nice grip, just like an extension of the finger. It was the knife that introduced the ultralight, and we sold a lot of them back in the day.”
Lightweight vs. Airweight
Contemporary to the introduction of the LST, Cutlery Hall-Of-Famer A.G. Russell was producing ultralight knives of his own in the Airweight series. Like other knife manufacturers and designers, Russell also worked with Blackie.
He remembers the concept of the ultralight as the shape of things to come in the 1970s.
“I wanted strength but little weight in a knife, too,” Russell noted, “and my Airweight was using a Micarta handle. Blackie had that great idea of molding the handle instead of shaping it, which would have suited an operation like Gerber perfectly. The LST was extremely lightweight and it sold in the millions.”
LST Materials
Pete Gerber recalls using 440A stainless blade steel in the early LST, and says the knife had a good, husky blade that he never saw break—and it was complemented with a nicely polished tang.
“Many other companies were copying it, trying to figure out what we did and how the LST worked so well,” Pete said. “Many of those companies made knives that were quite similar to the LST long after ours was successful. I don’t believe we had a patent on it at all; I don’t think we could get one. The patent area was out of my expertise, but I told our folks to get one whenever we could.”
An Enduring Legacy
Peter Gerber was the headman at Gerber when the LST debuted in 1981. “It was the first time a folding knife was made with a one-piece handle,” he said, “and it worked.”
After almost 40 years, the staying power of the LST is undisputed, and its place as a milestone in the progressive development of knife design is secure. Along with other innovations attributed to Blackie, it stands out among its peers with a timeless depiction of design sense and simple user friendliness.
During the past four decades, the LST has been manufactured in several variants.
DuPont recently celebrated the 50th anniversary of its nylon plastic with a commemorative run of LSTs handled in the company’s Delrin material.
Not long ago, Pete was in a company store in Lincoln City, Oregon, and one of the clerks showed him a Mini LST with a bright green handle.
“I had never seen that bright green before,” Gerber laughed. “It just goes to show you that things can develop that you don’t even know about.”
When the LST hit the market in 1981, the time was right. Since then, it has given Gerber and the knife industry a continuing boost.
“It has sold in the seven figures,” Pete reflected, “and I think it gave us a hell of a shot in the arm.”
Gerber LST Specs
The standard LST sells today on the Gerber company website for a modest $23. The knife weighs a remarkable 1.2 ounces with a drop-point 420HC stainless steel blade of 2.63 inches and a closed length of 3.61 inches. The handle is described as tactile, textured and made of lightweight, synthetic glass-filled nylon.
Light, smooth, and tough, Gerber’s LST has earned its place among the elite products of the modern knife industry.
What Other Knives Changed the World? Find Out With This Download
Keep your hunting knife sharp and ready to perform in the field with two great sharpeners and a sharpening eBook from ShopBlade.
One of the more unusual and ingenious sharpeners is the Spyderco Duckfoot diamond sharpening system. Sporting various shapes for sharpening different edges, the Duckfoot includes:
•A 1”x 5” flat diamond stone;
•A surface with a large radius for sharpening plain edges and a small radius for serrations;
•Three grooves, including a wide radius channel for de-burring and a narrow radius channel for honing fish hooks, etc.;
•Includes a suede leather carry case and an instructional DVD.
A great pocket sharpener for field touch-ups of plain-edge blades is GATCO’s Military Compact Sharpener (MCS). All it takes is a few strokes on the compact sharpener’s replaceable tungsten carbide blades set for a 40-degree angle and your knife is ready to cut. Size: 2.75” x 1.06” x .30”. Weight: 1.5 ounces.
