Ladybug Handmade High Carbon Steel Original Filipino Balisong Butterfly Knife with Brass and Kamagong Wood Handle | 24cm EDC Flipper Gift for Him | BF-68

The BF-68 Ladybug is a 24cm Filipino balisong with a 12cm high carbon steel blade, brass handles with kamagong wood inserts, and a working weight of 180 grams. It is a full-size live-blade knife despite the name, and it is the one people most often buy as a first balisong or as a present for somebody else. The unsharpened trainer costs the same and is selected above Add to Cart.

Yes, it is called Ladybug

We are not going to write four paragraphs explaining how the ladybug is a fierce apex predator of the aphid world. It is a small bright beetle that lands on people and everyone likes it. That is the whole reference.

The knife it is attached to is a 180 gram brass and ironwood balisong with a 12cm high carbon blade, which is a serious object. The name being cheerful does not make the knife a toy, and the knife being serious does not oblige us to pretend the name is menacing. Both things are allowed to be true.

What the name does do is make this one of the two or three knives in the range that people buy for someone else, which is worth talking about properly.

Buying this for somebody else

A balisong is an awkward gift to get right, so here is what actually matters, in order.

• Buy the trainer, not the live blade. Unless you know for certain the recipient already flips, the trainer is the correct choice. Same knife, same weight, same price, no edge. They can buy a sharp one when they have earned it.
• Check where they live. Balisong law varies by country and by US state, and it is a rotten present if it cannot legally arrive at their address. Five minutes of reading, done before you order rather than after.
• Check their age. Age restrictions apply and we enforce them.
• Do not buy this for a child. We would rather lose the sale than be part of that particular story.

Get those four right and it is one of the better gifts available at this price, because it is a handmade object that the recipient will still be handling in ten years rather than a thing that lives in a drawer.

What high carbon steel on a butterfly knife means for a new owner

High carbon steel takes the sharpest edge of anything we make and it sharpens back on a plain stone in a few minutes. For someone learning to maintain a knife, that fast feedback loop is genuinely the best teacher available. You do a thing, the edge improves, you learn what you did.

The blade is hardened to 58-60 HRC. On a first knife that number is the quiet reason the edge behaves itself: soft enough that a beginner can bring it back without wrecking the bevel, hard enough that bringing it back is worth the trouble.

It also spots with rust if it is left wet, and a new owner is exactly the person who will leave it wet. So say this to them when you hand it over, or read it yourself if the knife is for you: wipe the blade dry every time you finish with it. That is the entire maintenance requirement. A drop of oil once a month is a bonus, not a duty.

Neglected badly, high carbon pits orange and that is permanent. Wiped casually, it darkens into a grey patina that protects the steel and looks better every year. The gap between those two futures is a cloth and eight seconds.

If none of that appeals, the D2 knives in this series shrug off moisture far more readily. They also need a diamond plate when they finally do go dull, so the maintenance never disappears, it just moves.

The brass, the wood, and the 180 grams

Brass frame, kamagong wood inserts, 180g on a 24cm frame. The brass carries the mass, and mass on a balisong is what carries the handle through a rotation when your technique is still forming. A light knife stalls mid-flip and demands a correction. This one finishes the movement.

Kamagong is Philippine ironwood, dense enough that it feels closer to stone than timber, and stable enough not to move against the pivot when the weather does. It also keeps your hand off cold brass, which matters more after twenty minutes of practice than it sounds like it should.

The brass will darken with handling. That is not wear, it is brass being brass, and the knife will look less like the photograph and more like yours as the months go by.

The trainer option for this balisong, and why it is the same price

People assume the edgeless version should be cheaper and get suspicious when it is not. Grinding an edge is one operation in a long build. Removing it saves us almost nothing, so charging less for it would be theatre.

What it saves you is a month of learning rollovers while a live 12cm blade passes your knuckles. That is a much better deal than a discount.

A fitted leather sheath is included. If this is a gift, that matters more than it reads on a spec list, because it means the thing arrives looking like a considered object instead of a knife in a padded bag.

US shipping is free. Anywhere else is flat $49 for the whole order, so international buyers do better ordering more than one knife at a time.