I am in the process of getting to know my first Loveless designed knife, a model 201 apparently, drop point hunter. The engineer in me is trying to figure out why he did certain things in certain ways...knife design theory if you will.

I sort of understand the shallow, wide hollow grind, but find it hard to prefer that over a wide flat grind. I'd think that you could achieve virtually the same effect with thinner stock, but can see the argument going either way. This blade is 3/16" at the spine and the hollow grind thins it out rapidly. With the wide blade, I would expect 1/8" stock to have a similar amount of metal in the cross section for similar bending strength, better edge strength, and give up little or no cutting ability...

The curved shape of the spine is very nice. I can see I'm going to have to try and duplicate this before too long...it feels really REALLY good in the hand.

The tapered tang has me puzzled. Was this just the Loveless trademark? I'd think the same balance could be achieved with less trouble via a few well thought out holes drilled in the tang, leaving it stronger and much easier to fit scaled upon. Yeah it looks cool, but what is the practical aspect? Loveless designs are supposed to be totally practical, right? That means there has to be a reason...

Comments...???

Tapered tang, he most commonly use 3/16" inch metal of 154cm and the tapered tang was for balance~ Accomplished smoothly IMHO!

Tang tapering is very common and is done to improve the balance of the finished knife. A tapered tsng on a blade over 1/8" thick is one mark of good craftmanship.

Personally, I've never seen any advantage to the "drop point" design and prefer a sharper point on my knives, skinning or otherwise, but that's why they have 31 and more flavors of ice cream (make mine Blue Bell White Chocolate Almond, please).

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Personally, I've never seen any advantage to the "drop point" design

The drop point is for folks that can't use a real skinner
without cutting through the hide.

quote:

Originally posted by mstarling:
Tang tapering is very common and is done to improve the balance of the finished knife. A tapered tsng on a blade over 1/8" thick is one mark of good craftmanship.

Got a question, Mike. Why do most modern knifemakers hollow grind. I'm one of the few knife nuts who prefer a flat grind.

I buy fewer custom knives than I would normally as a result! Case in point: I like the design of Caveman Engineering knives very much, but he cannot or willnot flat grind. Close but no cigar! He doesn't understand that I'm not interested in why he thinks hollow grinding is better?

Don,

With a reasonable sized wheel (10-12" for most knives), a knifemaker can do most of the grinding and sanding on the belt grinder. Very little hand work is required. As labor time is very much the largest cost of knifemaking ... the more that can be done with the machine the more knives can be made in a given time. Really good flat grinds require special equipment or more handwork.

As folks have different tastes and some knives really look better in a flat grind I do both. I prefer to create finishes that are free of grinder marks and so I hand sand both anyway.

So far I have 2 opinions on the reason behind the tapered tang.

Balance. Okay, I recognized that but couldn't one achieve the same balance with some extra holes in the tang and skip the extra hassle of getting a flat tang and fitting the scales to a now less than square and flat surface?

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A tapered tsng on a blade over 1/8" thick is one mark of good craftmanship.

Okay, so the knife world expects it? Sounds like good marketing to me. It is fancier, so a good custom should have it... I know, I'm too damn practical for my own good... Good info here. Thanks!

I'm not too sure the knife world expects tapered tangs today. Maybe when Bob Loveless was in his prime, folks did "expect" it, the hunting crowd, and collectors.
But, I just drill lots of 1/4" holes to achieve the balance today. I did do taper tangs on 3/16" and 1/4" blades, but it is a PITA to do so the knife looks good. I quit in favor of drilled holes. For 1/8" stock, I don't drill holes, or for 1/16" stock filet knives.

Don

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Originally posted by D Humbarger:

quote:

Personally, I've never seen any advantage to the "drop point" design

The drop point is for folks that can't use a real skinner
without cutting through the hide.

Doug,
Good looking knife! I have one similar with a slightly different blade shape, with the stacked leather handle. Marbles is located in Gladsone, MI in the Upper Peninsula. I've visited there a couple of times, and have never ever walked away empty handed.. When it comes to knives, I'm like a kid in a candy store.
There is not a thing wrong with the steel Marbles' uses either.

Don

Yep they are nice knives for the money. nothing fancy but they work well.

I'll vote for a knife with a Tapered tang and Distal Taper. It will balance better with the tapered tang, cut better with Distal taper and look better because of both.
Might not be as easy as drilling a bunch of holes in the tang but Finer craftsmanship isn't always easy..........................DJ

If you are really interested in Loveless Knives, I can highly recommend that you invest in two books. Both can be found used quite readily. One is titled "Living on the Edge", and the other is a knifemaking book written by Loveless along with a guy by the name of Richard Barney.

The tapered tang wasn't an original idea by Loveless. He saw it on another knife and decided to use to to balance the weight between the front and the back of the knife.

I think if you were to talk to Loveless and tell him you were dissapointed because his knives was too thin he'd tell you it wasn't designed for chippinig ice and prying nails. He'd say it was designed for skinning deer, etc.

With a hollow grind you don't have such a thick piece of blade right above the cutting edge as you wear the knife down from constant sharpening.

Those of you have ever skinnned out a big brown bear or skinned, caped and quartered a moose will appreciate a balanced light knife. I personally use a drop point with a 3 1/4" hollow ground blade of D2. 4-6 hours of work leaves you with 500+ lbs of deboned knife. The little 3.5" blade has served me well. The only short coming is when it comes to caping the lips, eyes, nose, etc. Then I use single edge razor blades. My knives are ground thin and are easily touched up with a ceramic rod in the field and takes seconds not minutes to dress the edge back to its keeness. Trailing points, clip points are fine. I prefer the drop with a fine sharp tip, it has served me for over 25 years and the Mammoth handle is fuctional and attractive. Too each his own I suppose, I thought I would give my opinion like the others. D. Humbarger the original Marbles Woodcraft's steel was 52100 (ball bearing steel). Currently, 52100 is not used by Marbles and a lot of their kives are made in Pakistan. I have a few of the old marbles and they are great knives. The new Marbles are not in the same class as the old ones, IMO!

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Currently, 52100 is not used by Marbles and a lot of their kives are made in Pakistan. I have a few of the old marbles and they are great knives. The new Marbles are not in the same class as the old ones, IMO!

Yep & it's a damn shame too!