Yog
18-01-04, 04:22 PM
The Bobs in question are the Spyderco Bob Lum Folding Tanto and the Spyderco Bob Terzuola Starmate. Both of these have interested me for quite some time for different reasons, but as seems to happen all too often these days I waited too late to try them out, both were discontinued and I had heck of a job tracking one of each down.
Both are about the same size, 3.75” blade, 8.75” OAL, black G-10 handles with liner locks. The main difference between them if that the Lum Tanto has dual full length steel liners, whilst the Terzuola Starmate has a single half length nested steel liner. The upshot is that the Lum is considerably heavier.
This is a debate that has wondered back and forth across a number of forums, which is better, light or heavy ? Even though I have always sided with heavier (especially when compared to ultra-lightweight FRN), I thought this would make a good test, being two very similar knives in other respects.
First some observations of each.
The Bob Lum Folding Tanto
http://www.meshmonkey.eclipse.co.uk/knives/Lum_folding_tanto.jpg
First off, I really dislike the Americanised tanto’s, those with very angular tips, to me they look like the designer forgot his french curves that day and made do with his straight edge, the Lum on the other hand has the much more pleasing Japanese style tip. The Lum has dual grinds, the main length has a very slight belly and is hollow ground, the tip has a very broad hamaguri (apple-seed) grind, so broad you could mistake it for not being sharpened, although it is.
I once saw a program on American customs officials, and at one point the customs officer was explaining why she used a tanto to open packages. The thinking went that when she stabbed the knife into a package she didn’t really know what was inside, so if whatever it was was very hard it might snap the tip off of a knife with a finer point. Now regardless of what I thought about customs officers stabbing other peoples packages, this reasoning (about the tip) did make some sense. And sure enough, this looks to be the reasoning behind the Spyderco/Lum knife, definitely a tip for hard piercing.
The Lum Folding Tanto is an all screw construction with an ATS-55 steel blade. A very nice steel unless you happen to be a sweaty welsh man :wink:
Like most of my new knives, the first stop was a session on the Edge Pro where I took the main edge through every stone down to the polishing tapes, then gave it a light stropping for good measure. Now I have a knife of contrasts, a very tough tip and an edge a housefly could shave with.
The Bob Terzuola Starmate
http://www.meshmonkey.eclipse.co.uk/knives/Starmate.jpg
This is the combo edged version, in fact it is the first combo edge I’ve owned. Whilst I’m not a big fan of serrations, I do think they have some specialist uses, and so a combo edge has some interesting possibilities, although now I have experienced it I certainly wouldn’t contemplate a combo edge on anything smaller than this.
The Bob T, is also an all screw construction and has a CPM-440V blade, one of my favourite steels.
The Starmate also took a ride on the Edge Pro. Because of the combo edge I decided to make the Starmate the best slicer I could, so this time the plain portion of the blade had quite a coarse (but very, very sharp) edge applied, the serrations were finished off on my Sharpmaker all the way down to the ultra-fine ceramics. This has given me a blade that can tackle a wide variety of tough slicing jobs.
I’m not sure if it was Bob Terzuola’s intent, but the Starmate seems ideally suited to self defence if that were one of your requirements. It’s light, has a very strong tip thanks to a substantial swedge which almost makes it a spear point, and as well as being very comfortable the handle shape gives it a type of semi-guard.
As of now I will be actively looking out for the plain edged version of the Starmate, it’s a very nice piece.
Back to the heavy verses light handle debate. I have had both knives for a couple of weeks now and have tried a variety of cutting tasks with them.
If both were lying on a table and you picked each up in turn to examine them and then put them down, I would still say the much heavier Lum Tanto feels more substantial and for me gives off a sense of bullet proof construction and quality. However, if the cutting task were a long one, then the lighter Starmate did soon become more comfortable.
In the pocket I really couldn’t tell the difference because the clip does such a good job of spreading the load. I couldn’t even tell the difference when wearing light trousers.
The result ? ….. Who cares, they are both great knives :biggthump
Both are about the same size, 3.75” blade, 8.75” OAL, black G-10 handles with liner locks. The main difference between them if that the Lum Tanto has dual full length steel liners, whilst the Terzuola Starmate has a single half length nested steel liner. The upshot is that the Lum is considerably heavier.
This is a debate that has wondered back and forth across a number of forums, which is better, light or heavy ? Even though I have always sided with heavier (especially when compared to ultra-lightweight FRN), I thought this would make a good test, being two very similar knives in other respects.
First some observations of each.
The Bob Lum Folding Tanto
http://www.meshmonkey.eclipse.co.uk/knives/Lum_folding_tanto.jpg
First off, I really dislike the Americanised tanto’s, those with very angular tips, to me they look like the designer forgot his french curves that day and made do with his straight edge, the Lum on the other hand has the much more pleasing Japanese style tip. The Lum has dual grinds, the main length has a very slight belly and is hollow ground, the tip has a very broad hamaguri (apple-seed) grind, so broad you could mistake it for not being sharpened, although it is.
I once saw a program on American customs officials, and at one point the customs officer was explaining why she used a tanto to open packages. The thinking went that when she stabbed the knife into a package she didn’t really know what was inside, so if whatever it was was very hard it might snap the tip off of a knife with a finer point. Now regardless of what I thought about customs officers stabbing other peoples packages, this reasoning (about the tip) did make some sense. And sure enough, this looks to be the reasoning behind the Spyderco/Lum knife, definitely a tip for hard piercing.
The Lum Folding Tanto is an all screw construction with an ATS-55 steel blade. A very nice steel unless you happen to be a sweaty welsh man :wink:
Like most of my new knives, the first stop was a session on the Edge Pro where I took the main edge through every stone down to the polishing tapes, then gave it a light stropping for good measure. Now I have a knife of contrasts, a very tough tip and an edge a housefly could shave with.
The Bob Terzuola Starmate
http://www.meshmonkey.eclipse.co.uk/knives/Starmate.jpg
This is the combo edged version, in fact it is the first combo edge I’ve owned. Whilst I’m not a big fan of serrations, I do think they have some specialist uses, and so a combo edge has some interesting possibilities, although now I have experienced it I certainly wouldn’t contemplate a combo edge on anything smaller than this.
The Bob T, is also an all screw construction and has a CPM-440V blade, one of my favourite steels.
The Starmate also took a ride on the Edge Pro. Because of the combo edge I decided to make the Starmate the best slicer I could, so this time the plain portion of the blade had quite a coarse (but very, very sharp) edge applied, the serrations were finished off on my Sharpmaker all the way down to the ultra-fine ceramics. This has given me a blade that can tackle a wide variety of tough slicing jobs.
I’m not sure if it was Bob Terzuola’s intent, but the Starmate seems ideally suited to self defence if that were one of your requirements. It’s light, has a very strong tip thanks to a substantial swedge which almost makes it a spear point, and as well as being very comfortable the handle shape gives it a type of semi-guard.
As of now I will be actively looking out for the plain edged version of the Starmate, it’s a very nice piece.
Back to the heavy verses light handle debate. I have had both knives for a couple of weeks now and have tried a variety of cutting tasks with them.
If both were lying on a table and you picked each up in turn to examine them and then put them down, I would still say the much heavier Lum Tanto feels more substantial and for me gives off a sense of bullet proof construction and quality. However, if the cutting task were a long one, then the lighter Starmate did soon become more comfortable.
In the pocket I really couldn’t tell the difference because the clip does such a good job of spreading the load. I couldn’t even tell the difference when wearing light trousers.
The result ? ….. Who cares, they are both great knives :biggthump