Kydex Work for a new Knife

[sween1911]

I've always liked dagger style blades. I remember getting my first cheap one, a Pakistan job with the wooden handle and brass guard and pommel. I thought I was Casey Ryback in Under Siege. I even made a sketchy shoulder-rig sheath for it out of an old belt.

I recently saw a shiny thing on the 'bay and my Paypal heated up... a Gil Hibben double edge boot knife.
$45 bucks later, I had this thing in my hands.



It needed a worthy sheath. I have some very special Kydex from a friend that I'm putting to good use...

Heating it up on the kydex-only griddle...

In the press... and now we wait...


I'll post pics of the sheath once it's done!


Some history on the kydex...

I may have related this before, so my apologies if I'm rehashing, but several years ago, my friend's brother-in-law passed away suddenly. It was a shock to my friend's sister, his wife. He was a big outdoorsman and had a sizeable knife collection. She didn't know what to do, and my friend said "I got a guy". So I helped her catalog and sell most of the collection. What was left, she distributed to his co-workers, who came around and helped out. Turns out, the brother-in-law made his own sheaths and had an old griddle he would use, a foam press that looks homemade, and a bunch of kydex that she gave to me for helping out. Whenever I can, I put it to good use and keep the tradition alive.

 

[Monocrom]

Looking forward to those pics.

 

[sween1911]

Okay kids... I like it overall but I rushed in some spots. Tough to layout the eyelet holes on that busy pattern, so they're not perfectly lined up. But it holds securely and looks pretty cool.





I could use a scroll saw and a belt sander for future kydex projects.

 

[desert.snake]

Are you still making sheaths? I had an idea about kydex after I dulled the knife again, which sharpening I had been fiddling with for a long time - Dozier Hunter. Spyderco Moran and others have the same problem, even those that have a collapsible sheath - sand and fine abrasive dust gets into the gap and dulls the blade, no matter what steel it is made of, everything gets dull. But I don't have anywhere or anything to make a trial copy with yet. The idea is to apply a lead roller along the entire length of the blade when shaping and then delete. The end result will be something like a dirt collector and the cutting edge will have a good distance to the joint, like in a condom. I wonder if this will work to keep the cutting edge intact or will the knife wobble and press against the blade and also become dull in the joint area (red dot)?

 

[sween1911]

That's a neat idea. So you're saying the idea is that the edge itself never touches the sheath?

Did you Dozier come with its own kydex sheath?

You can do all kinds of stuff with kydex. Sometimes they snap in perfectly, sometimes there's a tiny bit of wobble. I've seen some with a drain hole at the tip.

 

[iacchus]

Are you still making sheaths? I had an idea about kydex after I dulled the knife again, which sharpening I had been fiddling with for a long time - Dozier Hunter. Spyderco Moran and others have the same problem, even those that have a collapsible sheath - sand and fine abrasive dust gets into the gap and dulls the blade, no matter what steel it is made of, everything gets dull. But I don't have anywhere or anything to make a trial copy with yet. The idea is to apply a lead roller along the entire length of the blade when shaping and then delete. The end result will be something like a dirt collector and the cutting edge will have a good distance to the joint, like in a condom. I wonder if this will work to keep the cutting edge intact or will the knife wobble and press against the blade and also become dull in the joint area (red dot)?
View attachment 65417

Looks like somebody else had a real similar thought.

 

[desert.snake]

Looks like somebody else had a real similar thought.

Great, that means the idea works

 

[desert.snake]

That's a neat idea. So you're saying the idea is that the edge itself never touches the sheath?

Did you Dozier come with its own kydex sheath?

You can do all kinds of stuff with kydex. Sometimes they snap in perfectly, sometimes there's a tiny bit of wobble. I've seen some with a drain hole at the tip.

Yes, something like a dirt collector and the blade never touches the sheath. I had this problem in 2013-14, when I bought my first knife with a disassemblable kydex sheath. Then I gave it away and didn't use this type of sheath until recently

Dozier has his own original sheath, but it gets dirty just like all the others. Sand gets stuck in the material and it is impossible to remove it completely

 

[sween1911]

Obtained this Fairbairn-Sykes copy recently. The tip appears to have been broken and crudely reshaped and sharpened. I reshaped the tip on the grinder and sharpened it. Has a leather sheath with it. Figured it would benefit from a new spiffy kydex suit. Oddly enough, I had a piece of the Kryptek camo and a piece of dark olive drab both about the same size and they kinda look cool together...

Got it molded and the eyelets drilled and rough shaped.

Trying something different this time. Usually in an attempt to keep both halves the same size, I rivet the sheath together with eyelets first and then cut and shape them as one piece. I end up messing up the edges a bit, chunks of kydex get wedged in there and I can't get them out. So I clamped them together and drilled the holes, then cut each side out individually. Then I'll match them up while clamped together, smooth the edges, and eyelet them together at the end.

 

[sween1911]

Bought a disk sander attachment for my giant old Milwaukee drill (aka, the poor man's lathe/mill/sander) and smoothed the sides together.





After the pics were taken, I secured the halves together with 1/4-20 nuts and bolts to keep them even with each other. Then individually I smoothed the edges with fine sandpaper.