Serrata use?

[Team Sick]

Is Spyderco discontinuing the Serrata? I don't see it listed in the 2022 catalog.

[Bemo]

Yes that's my understanding. Start watching vendors in January for clearance.

[Wandering_About]

Had one for a while. A very interesting knife. The cast 440C was toothy, and an interesting thing to experience. The shape/pattern is excellent. Very comfortable in hand, and a very useful blade shape. I just thought it was far too thick and heavy, and ended up getting rid of it somewhere along the line.

It has been excellent to read Stuart Ackerman's thoughts and inputs in this thread. Thanks for contributing, Stuart.

Sounds like when made to his personal specs, this would be an excellent knife. It's interesting to hear a bit of how the back and forth between designer and manufacturer works.

[Kevinim82]

My ones are 0.2mm behind the edge, on average...

In American that would be 0.0078 BTE.

[skeeg11]

All Serrata owners and future owners of discontinued Serratas should be inquiring if Stuart does regrinds as an option and the cost.........seriously. .2mm Yowza!

I tip my hat to you, Stuart. All this time it must have been incredibly frustrating.

[rev_jch]

Thank you everyone for your responses. I believe I have a decent understanding now. It's pretty much a do a little of everything and should last for years within the constraints of it's abilities. I think I will try it as a light duty camp knife.

[Wandering_About]

The Serrata is certainly worth a try! You may like it. Stuart's own grind would be really something to experience, though, from what I read here.

[Team Sick]

I was interested in the re-grind info, but someone mentioned re-introducing the Serrata in another steel like K390, 3V, CruWear, etc... That would be very intriguing.

[yablanowitz]

...but the makers battled to replicate my grind.

I'd say they lost that battle, and that's a shame. I think the Taichung maker could have pulled it off, but I'm sure there were a lot of factors involved. It seems a lot of folks see "440C", yawn and move on. They have no idea how good it can be, they just know it's an old steel and they want something new. Their loss.

As far as regrinding them goes, that international shipping both ways would make that an expensive proposition.

[skeeg11]

Silly me. Spaced it on the Stuart's Country.

[Stuart Ackerman]

As yablanowitz says, both ways shipping would be a killer, with the possibility of "loss"...

The Serrata will always only be 440C, as it works...

I have done two stock removed VG10 for a customer, called the VerGratta, and he loves them and uses them, but they are NOT dendritic edges.

I should have never revealed the steel type, and let the overall package do the talking. Snowflake TM was considered... :)

The makers did battle, but I had one thing they did not...time at hand, creating one by one.
I was keen to go to Taichung and help them, but even I do not know who made them, and that is how it should be... :)

I am considering doing a couple of Seconds, scales removed and everything ground to "match" my profile, but that would also be expensive... ah well.

i will always be greatful to Sal, Eric, and Spyderco for doing this collab.

Salute !

[yablanowitz]

Judging by the first run of Nilakkas, the Taichung maker could have pulled off the correct grind, but mine just says "Taiwan", indicating to me that they used another maker. Perhaps Taichung didn't have room in their schedule, perhaps it would have kicked the price up too high, or they just didn't want to work with that steel...who knows. It is an interesting knife, and I for one am still field testing it with my amateur regrind.

[rev_jch]

I don't think it would be as much to do with the ability or time as being set up to mold the steel. There are so many variables that you can imagine that there are some that have to be rejected. Molten steel like anything else (even more so) is susceptible to defect (air pockets, imperfections, etc.).

[Stuart Ackerman]

I have tested the ones that have mini holes, pits etc, and all can take a beating, and when etched in Aqua Regia, the mini holes are barely seen.
I take images of everything that I make, and the dendritic pattern is so unique to each one, that I can identify all the Serrata that I have evermade since 2006... :)

Any that have pits near the edge, around 1/8th inch, I anneal, regrind into Anorexias, and narrow and thin the blade profile...
And re-heat treat...

And some bad ones, I just snap in a vice to see how much bend they can take before breaking...
The shorter pieces make great workshop cloth, leather and wood cutters.
And sometimes seaweed at the beach for making salt.

[David R]

Commenting on an old thread with some recent Serratta experience. Mine has been reprofiled to about 17 degrees per side on the edge.

I had to do a lot of work around my house to get it ready to sell: deck building, yard work, sprinklers, drip system, some drywall fixing and other interior work as well. It was also raining most of the time I was outside, usually heavily. I was moving fast, had limited hours to work on the house each day, and could not baby my tools.

I chose the Seratta in this case because it cuts well for a long time, is very stainless, and I don't worry about having it get damaged or scratched. I also had a utility knife available. The Serratta did well overall, but when doing "real" work you find out quickly that a knife is usually not the right tool. Saw blades and shears for cutting hard rubber pipe were used a lot. For more flexible pipe the Serratta did fine. For the harder stuff it's too thick to slice through it well.

It cut a lot of yard stuff, including some small branches. Clippers were on the other side of the house and rust in the rain. The Serratta did pretty well cutting plant stuff. I also did terrible things with it, like scored drywall. Why, because I had it on me and didn't want to stop to go get a utility knife.

Also did a little batoning. I am putting a deck up against a rock wall. The deck boards need to be cut to very irregular shapes where they meet the rocks. Jig saw and sawzall did most of the material removal. For the fine tuning the Serratta was extremely helpful. I whittled, I batoned it, I did whatever it took got get the wood shaped the way I needed it.

Conclusion: overall it's a great fixed blade. It's thicker than I prefer, but it's a favorite of my despite that. It's durable. It cuts well but does not slice well. It's tough, has good edge retention, and importantly in this case, it gets back to sharp very easily. A few passes on a 400 stone and it's screaming sharp. I also used a smoother concrete surface once. It worked, but not as well as a sharpening stone.

[wrdwrght]

My Serratas have 5mm spines and very thin edges, but the makers battled to replicate my grind.

The thicker versions are what you folks see in the Spyderco collab.

If I could afford to do it, i would buy up all the unsold Serrata seconds and regrind the profiles my way...and sell them on...

Whoa. Thin-edge to 5mm spine by way of a high hollow grind?

[skeeg11]

Regrind emphatically recommended by designer.

[Bemo]

Hmmmm.... interesting. I remember the Bucks that used 440C as a kid and really lusted after them....

[David R]

My Serratas have 5mm spines and very thin edges, but the makers battled to replicate my grind.

The thicker versions are what you folks see in the Spyderco collab.

If I could afford to do it, i would buy up all the unsold Serrata seconds and regrind the profiles my way...and sell them on...

Whoa. Thin-edge to 5mm spine by way of a high hollow grind?

Stuart's Serrattas have a flat grind as well. No doubt a hollow grind would cut much better on the Spyderco version. I'm not sure the cast 440C has enough tensile strength to support a hollow grind.

[David R]

Hmmmm.... interesting. I remember the Bucks that used 440C as a kid and really lusted after them....

The Serratta uses cast 440C. You can't compare it to rolled 440C. The two are very different steels in terms of cutting performance.