Wharncliffe benefits

[sethwm]

Looking to get my millionth (or thereabouts) dragonfly. K390. I have other knives in the steel but am debating between a whale cliffs v normal edge.

Is the wharncliffe easier to sharpen? What are the other benefits people see. This is an edc. I don’t hunt. Just cardboard and plastic ties.

I also sharpen with a kme but a wharncliffe seems like a good shape to start on a stone (though k390 might be the wrong choice)

[JSumm]

The Rock Jumper was my introduction to Wharncliffes. I will say in most cuts, it cuts better than anything else I have. The downside would be cutting against something like a cutting board for example. I find a slight belly to be advantageous for an all-arounder.

With a Dragonfly, I don't think you would be cutting too much food on a cutting board. In that size, I would prefer a wharncliffe. Anything Endela or larger, I prefer a little belly for the versatility.

That being said. On a cutting board, it depends on what you are cutting. Fruit and vegetables, I prefer a little belly. Earlier this year, I was cutting up thin slices of steak for a salad and wanted to try out the wharncliffe. Drag cuts on soft material like steak, the tip just flies through it. I almost lost the tip of my thumb it was so fast.

[sal]

Hi Sethwm,

There are quite a few blade shapes and all of them have some advantages and disadvantages as a cutting tool depending on what you are cutting.

A Warncliffe would be a good blade to become familiar with hand sharpening on a flat stone. I would also recommend a 10X - 12X magnifying loupe so you see what you are doing and watch the edge develop/grow.

sal

[zhyla]

They’re a little easier to free hand. Benefit… they can be more ergonomic for things you might use a utility knife for.

I don’t have any wharncliffe spydies but I’ve been carrying a Kizer mini Sheepdog lately and in that blade size and shape I think it works well.

[Danke]

Do it!

[Zive]

I’ve had my K390 wharncliffe Dragonfly for about four weeks now. I’ve used the standard Dragonfly in various steels for years but now find myself preferring the wharncliffe for most tasks.

The knife I received had an unusually uneven grind (even by Seki standards) so I re-profiled it freehand immediately. Even someone who doesn’t have the steadiest hands, but understands the basics about burr formation and management will find this design easy to sharpen.

Just today I used it for breaking down two large corrugated cardboard boxes (roughly 40 feet of total cutting), a 3 gallon HDPE water jug, and popping zip ties off extension cords I took out of storage.

The two aspects I find most remarkable about wharncliffe designs are the enhanced cutting power at the tip of the blade and the linearity of the cuts it makes. The belly-less form allows the tip to be used for scoring cuts without having to hold the knife at a sharp negative angle like you might with a leaf-shaped blade. This ergonomic feature gives more control during a cut. I also find the lack of belly makes for more predictable cutting when slicing through material quickly. Unlike some other blade shapes which can wander during a cut as you pass from the flat to belly to tip, the wharncliffe shape doesn’t move around as much when slicing through material. Cutting with it is like drawing a line through the material and ¡voila! you’ve made a clean separation.

All this is to say that this design lends itself to many everyday cutting tasks and the Dragonfly (esp. with K390) is a great platform for trying it out. I hope you enjoy it.

[Wartstein]

.....
Is the wharncliffe easier to sharpen? What are the other benefits people see. This is an edc. I don’t hunt. Just cardboard and plastic ties.
...

No better source than this vid https://youtu.be/hnPhVIFZTb0&t=278s where Michael Janich tells everything and more about wharncliffes...

Actually, I think IF you were a hunter, this is an application where a wharnie would be not a good choice, but some belly preferable (to be clear: I am not a hunter myself)

[Araignee]

FYI the Byrd Robin 2 Wharncliffe is about to be released, if you'd like to try this blade configuration on the cheap

[sethwm]

Great video and recommendations, all.

I’m going to try that Byrd so I can try my hand at hand sharpening without risking too much

[sethwm]

Duplicate

[Araignee]

That's what it's going to look like :



It will be available in PE and SE, and should certainly be useful to trial the Wharncliffe variants before settling on a specific Dragonfly model (well, I'm not even sure the Dfly Wharncliffe is available in SE yet ?).

[olywa]

Thanks for the link to the Janich interview. Most excellent and informative. I've been enjoying small Wharnies and their EDC utility enough that I picked up a Rock Jumper when it was released. Now I'm considering an Endura Wharncliffe.

[Bolster]

While we are on the topic, can someone enlighten me on the difference between wharncliffe & sheepsfoot?

[JRinFL]

While we are on the topic, can someone enlighten me on the difference between wharncliffe & sheepsfoot?

Sheepsfoot has almost no point, or at least a very obtuse point.

[bearfacedkiller]

Wharncliffes are meant to have a usable tip. Sheep’s foot blades are meant to be safer.

There is an old story that the sheep’s foot was invented for drunken sailors so they couldn’t stab each other. It was probably more about safely using a knife on a rocking ship in rough waters. Like the Enuff Salt or the Rescue knives.

The wharncliffe is named after the guy who come up with the idea, Lord Wharncliffe. It was basically a blade with the spine sharpened instead of the normal side. He wanted a sturdy blade with an acute tip for use in slipjoints. I think a true wharncliffe has an acute tip for detail work. The Kiwi is a good example.

There is also a lambs foot which is in between the two. Most straight edge knives probably fall into this middle ground like the Swayback and all the seki wharncliffes. Not quite blunt enough to eliminate puncturing abilities but also not acute enough for fine detail work.

[JRinFL]

This article on the AG Russell site has good pictures of various blade types. It is skewed toward traditional knives, however. Modern interpretations are more varied and can really blur the lines. https://agrussell.com/encyclopedia/blade-shapes

[Ramonade]

It really is an interesting blade shape. Before Spyderco I mainly used a London, a sheepfsoot slipjoint design with a straigth edge. This is really good IMHO for all that is detail cuts on a cutting board or any plane surface.

[bearfacedkiller]

In the last 10+ years the definition of a wharncliffe has really changed from the old slipjoint definition. It now means any knife with a straight edge and a usable tip. It reminds me of how the term Bowie has been watered down and used to describe so many blades that now it is hard to define as well.

[wrdwrght]

Wharncliffes are meant to have a usable tip. Sheep’s foot blades are meant to be safer.

Quite right.

I’d failed to remember this when I asked the Forum how my Manbug Salt differed from the new Manbug Wharncliffe.

[FK]

When I was active duty in the Navy,,,,, many years ago,,, the only knife allowed on board most of the USN ships was the sailors knife,,,, a folding knife with sheepsfoot blade and small 3" marlin spike for rope work. These were carried mainly by Bosuns Mates who did work with ropes on occasion. The story we learned was in the sailing days, men were in the rigging and a sheepsfoot blade knife dropped onto the main deck would do less damage wrt conventional pointed blade.

Most of us on shore stations carried a medium traditional folder like a stockman.
It all depended upon commander of the ship or shore station. Some even allowed a Buck 110 folder in belt pouch.

Regards,
FK