Hand Forged D2 Steel Balisong Snake Blade Knife| Stag & Brass Engraved Bolsters Handle | Premium Butterfly Knife with Snake Shape Leather Sheath BF-149

The BF-149 has a snake blade: a wavy, serpentine edge rather than a straight one. It is the most distinctive shape on this bench and it comes with one genuine practical consequence that nobody selling these usually mentions.

What a wavy edge does when it cuts

A straight edge meets material along its whole length at once. A wavy edge meets it at the crests first, concentrating force into small areas, then draws the troughs through as you pull.

On fibrous material, rope, cardboard, webbing, that is genuinely effective. The wave grabs instead of sliding, and the effective cutting length is longer than the blade because the edge takes a winding path. On a flat push cut into something firm, it is worse than a straight edge, because you are only contacting at the crests.

• Good at: sawing, drawing cuts, anything fibrous, anything that tends to slip away from a straight blade.
• Poor at: push cutting, fine slicing, anything where you want a clean straight line.
• Excellent at: being looked at, which is the honest reason most of these sell.

The part nobody tells you: sharpening

This is the real trade and it is worth knowing before you own one.

You cannot sharpen a snake blade on a flat stone. A flat stone contacts the crests and never reaches the troughs, so you end up with a blade that is sharp in the bulges and blunt in the curves, which is worse than blunt everywhere.

What you need is a round abrasive. A tapered ceramic rod, a small round diamond file, or a rolled piece of wet and dry paper around a dowel. You work the curve of the edge section by section, following the wave, keeping the angle consistent, then strop the whole thing to remove the burr.

It takes longer than a straight blade. It is not difficult, it is just fiddly, and if you were hoping to run this across a pull-through sharpener the answer is no, and a pull-through will actively damage it.

D2 butterfly knife steel, and why it suits this shape

D2 at 58-60 HRC holds an edge for a long time. On a blade that is more effort to sharpen, long edge retention is worth more than it would be on a plain drop point. You sharpen it less often, which is exactly what you want here.

D2 is high carbon and high chromium. It resists rust well without being stainless, so dry it and oil it occasionally and it will be fine.

Stag horn and engraved brass on a balisong handle

Shed antler panels between hand engraved brass bolsters. The stag grips well and needs no maintenance. The brass will dull to a warm brown over the first year and the engraved lines will darken faster than the polished faces, which makes the cut pattern clearer with age.

Who this is for

Somebody who wants a knife nobody else at the table is carrying, and who is willing to buy a round file. It is the most expensive D2 knife in this block, and the money is in the profile work: every curve on that edge was cut and matched by hand on both sides.

Specifications

Included with this stag horn balisong

The knife itself, hand sharpened and hand tuned. A fitted leather sheath made for this frame. A gift box, included as standard.

And a trainer version if you choose it above Add to Cart, matched to this knife in size and weight but with no edge on it. Take it. Learning on a sharp knife is how people end up in the emergency room with a story.

Engraving, if you want it: $19 for initials or short text, $29 for a custom logo. Choose before you add to cart. Free shipping in the United States, flat $49 worldwide.