Bonjour,
this is a copy of a draft of article we made with Fred but were enable to push on our old site. Since the SPyderfly is coming I thought you will found his thoughts on the subject of great value.
BTW I have pictured all his babys...
But I need time to reduce theirside.
Fred Perrin uses and makes a lot of Balisongs. It's a locking folder of quality. Easy to clean and with simple mechanism.
Now in France a lot of fishermen has adopted balisongs (actually cheap german bali's) as their EDF (every day fishing) knife.
Balisongs or Couteaux Papillon in France are used since a very long time.
Now it's current to say they are Filipino knives…
And some even say it's antique knives.
We would like to understand how people who could have and a carry fixed blades have invented folders instead
We think the Butterfly knives have not been invented in the Philipinnes !
In fact you can find Balisong in the Philipinnes since the 1920.
Because Manilla is a harbour. And the sailor used Butterfly knives made in Germany, France and the US.
Then Filipinos people has developped technics and made their own.
The utility of that knife is to be concealed. And the Boom was during WW2 when knives were prohibited.
There is three big production center in the Philipines Manilla Batanga and Balisong.
Balisong come from broken horn, but again, there is many books around that nmae (Imada or Coco Hernandez)
In 1904 in US Billing and Spencer has patented the Butterfly knife but it was allready patented since 1872 !!!
This is the first trace of Balisong in the USA.
You see how old is it !
In Europe… In France and Germany many brend were allready making Balisong.
The first trace has been found in 1780 in France with a knife called "Le Pied DU Roy". (The King's foot)
Circa 1800 the butterfly knives were common.
It's easy to find some butterflies from that time. They were made in Paris and Thier (Center of France). There is a beautiful collection of that old Butterfly Knives in the Thiers Museum.
You will notice in Thier Museum, "Le Pied Du Roy" like many old Butterfly got gradued handles à la Leatherman !!
French Army troop have been provided with a Butterfly Knife but after WW2 there is no more traces of Butterflies made by brend.
It was a question of fashion in Europe.
Fashion…
Now what you need to see in Butterfly design:
It's a folder with reliability.
You can have double edge blade… the combinaison are infinite.
The Butterfly is reallly solid and if you know isostatism, the three points of locking are centered.
Also the easy one hand openings and closing made it a great tool.
Easy maintenance: no springs !
Closed it's a yawara. Half opened it's a flail.
And it's really fun to play with and you make auto training and develop your feeling.
The more you play with it the more you develop a close relation ship with your tool.
Fred got very old Balisong in his collection like
this two tools who has been displayed for the Universal Exposition at the end of the 19th century.
The inventor is mr Gadget (that where the name come from…<img src="wink.gif" width=15 height=15 align=middle border=0>
We think the butterfly knives has been a real hype in 1900 after the Exposition
Another balisong is a 19th century knife (circa 1880) made in Germany by BOTENGEN and SABIN.
3 inches carbon steel blade of course. The handle are in silver nickel and wood.
Its really well made! Excellent ! We don't know modern balisong made with that excellence unless expensive customs.
We find in their catalog these knives called "Springless Marvel) also Yatagan Blades.
In that time the Balisong were produced in good quantity and also exported because of their quality.
Looking at the quality at the pins at the axes. No glue were used !
Another one is a Butterfly knife from WWI. It was a reglementary and regular knife in the french forces .
It has been made in Thier (by Deluc Ets) the handles are folded steel and the blade is carbon steel.
There is an hard chrom finish. You can notice there is a guard on the blade. And when closed the tang is a screwdriver…
My own knife made by Fred Perrin.
The blade is 4 inches CPMT440V chisel ground tanto bowie.
The handle in titanium sandwich construction.
We have made a flip flap sheath in leather with low profile look.
It's look like a speed loader for gun.
I use it since 1996 and it is one of the rare folder I got which has always performed perfectly while working in the mud.
cheers
JM
Balisongs Demystified by Fred Perrin
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danzomekahiro
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