Boker Solingen mosaic damask Swiss dagger
A real extravagence for me and my first purchase of a top end blade. The blade is a mosaic damask and is topped with an Ebony handle which alltogether looks stunning. It feels well balanced and the handle is a comfortable fit in my large hand. Holding the knife though for me reveals the pointed edges of the "hand guard" and if I was using the knife for a time I may find the grip uncomfortable. Overall though I love this piece. It comes in a wooden box with foam padding, the knife sits on foam above a compartment where the scabbard resides. The Scabbard too is a lovely piece of work in leather, for me though the execution had a couple of shortfalls which considering the money I paid should not have been present. First off is the fit to the blade. When I had removed blade and scabbard from the presentation box and attempted to fit the blade in the scabbard, no matter how much force I applied I could not get the blade fully home, best I could do was within 5mm of fully home, Getting the blade out again was similarly problematic. Looking at the leather work showed the very top part of the sheath to appear pinched where a finishing band had been sewn on. The distance involved would be fractions of a mm but enough to cause a problem. (Poor quality control, I would guess the blade had never been inserted into the Scabbard). I have sort of corrected the problem by using a round file and filing the leather in the vicinity of the blade edges beneath where the leather finishing strip lies. It's still a tight fit but it now seats fully home. My own knife is number 236 so I wonder how previous purchasers got on with their scabbard?
