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Svord forge visit and Peasant Knife review
So the other day I had some time on my hands and decided to pop down to Waiuku and pick up a new knife - Waiuku of course is where the Svord Forge is located and about 70 km south of Auckland.
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Svord is created, owned and operated by Bryan Baker, who personally tempers each and every knife that is produced, about 150,000 now according to Bryan, in fact while he employees several engineers, for want of a better term, he is the only one who knows the secret of tempering the blades, the actual furnace is hidden behind heat proof curtains and while I was allowed a glance in the actual mechanics of what goes on in there is known only to Baker, and it is a closely guarded secret.
Bryan does two things very well, he puts a convex grind on most of his knives and he knows and tempers the three steels that he works with amazingly well.
The three steels are a stainless steel (420) that is fairly recently been added and two high carbon steels, 15N20, a Swedish steel used in making band saw blades but can also be turned into good knife blades if tempered properly and L6, which is also a tool steel but is an incredibly tough one, he reserves this for his high end or heavy use blades.
Baker says though that all the talk about which steel is the best for knives is just so much rubbish, and the real secret is in the tempering, something which he learnt from a Czechoslovakian blade master who spent ten years learning how to make knives before coming to New Zealand.
While I was there I had the opportunity to see various blades going through various stages of production from the Sword employees and the very nice old german equipment that Baker has accumulated over the years, in fact the Forge is more of a factory now, with almost all of the components being made in house, from sheaths, to making the polypropylene into handles, to making the brass fasteners for attaching the handles to the full tang blades of some of his knives to cutting out the shape, putting on the grind, in fact the only truly hand made but is what Baker does, place the blades into the furnace to be tempered and then taking them out when the alarm on his iPhone tells him its time to do so.
Svord produces a wide range of knives from one off bespoke custom pieces, to machetes, hunting knives, skinners, pocket knives, kitchen knives and several different period pieces, most famously perhaps the von Tempskey bowies which is a faithful reproduction on one of those blades that a historian had brought into the forge and Bryan copied, albeit now made with modern steel. And its one heck of a knife with a blade thats eleven inches long, in the bowie shape, made from thick tempered L6 with a convex edge, its made to be able to do everything the original blades were asked to do but made stronger and better.
Baker tries to keep the cost of his knives down to the point where ordinary people, hunters and fishermen like you and I can afford them whilst still making enough money to employee several staff and maintain his equipment and forge, and as such there is one aspect that tends to suffer slightly and thats the attention to detail of the more common knives, I have four Swords know and all of them needed a slight touch up to be made into users for me, usually a little sanding of the handle or cleaning of the thong holes, not biggie things but noticeable, but then I have bought users and so lets get on to discussing those.
The peasant knife is what may have put Baker onto the map for a lot of people, is a very simple one bladed pocket knife with an excellent 15N20 steel blade that has been tempered by Baker but unfortunately does not have a convex edge, but then it comes in at about $40 dollars and can be had with either a 3 inch or 2.5 inch blade, wooden handles or plastic or aluminium and there is one special model with a blade almost two foot long...but is mainly a display model, although it does come sharp and ready for action.
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I opted for the 3 inch wooden handles one, which is the original one Baker started making, whats unique about these knives is the opening method, the blade, unlike most pocket knives has a tang that, when closed extends out the front of the blade and is opened by swing the tang in which allows the blade to swing out, then the and is secured by a pin to stop it over extending and your hand to stop in closing, its slightly uncomfortable at first, but you quickly get used to it and its a very simple and stone design, and one thats thousands of years old.
The knife is made from a few simple components, the blade, two handle slabs, a washer, a pin and two chicago screws. The blade is a simple drop point design, and is nice and sharp.
I opted for the wooden handle in part because I wanted to modify it, I have sanded off the finish, a simple stain, and have chopped off the end which was pointed and have taken a dremel to the end to smooth it out - I will stress that it needed none of this, I just wanted to do it, its my knife and I can modify it if I want to, I expect I will do a few other but and pieces to it before I am fully satisfied, but then for a knifes that costs a mere $45 its no biggies if I screw it up.
Out of the box though it came sharp enough to slice hanging paper, made short work of onions and potatoes and is light in the hand and pocket (and wallet), and is made here in New Zealand by a great bunch of kiwis, at the price you could easily afford to stick one in the tackle box (oiled because the high carbon blade will rust), back pack, glove box and anywhere else one might need a small handy sharp and strong pocket knife, perhaps best of all it certainly does not look tactical so will not offend the sheeple if used to peel an orange.
All in all its great little knife.
(my computer is playing up at the moment and won't let me load any pictures so I will post this then try and edit it to insert the pictures)
