OK , so I've been waiting to chime in as I thought Mick would do the same and defend his work , but it seems this isn't going to happen.
I'm disappointed as I really rated his work and appreciated his reasonable price tag for us that can't afford the very best.
As seen on this thread , over on Natural Bushcraft UK forum , his knife was given to me as a result of a knife naming competition...
https://www.naturalbushcraft.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=9823
As I was so grateful , I couldn't just not pay the man for his efforts, so I slipped him £30 through PayPal , just to pay for his postage and get him a few pints as a token of my appreciation.
A good few weeks ago I stupidly dropped it on a concrete floor and got a "ding" on the edge .
No real problem as it was still scary sharp , but it annoyed the hell out of me and my slightly OCD for all things sharp.
Being a carpenter I'm obsessed with keeping my tools as sharp and true as humanly possible.
So I got my diamond stones out to get the ding out and then the Japanese water stones to get the scratches out and the mirror polish that I obssess with...😊
So after quite a few hours of work and a lot of swearing 😁, I managed to get the ding out!
I thought this was the hardest steel I ever worked with ... As it was really hard to get the bleeding thing straight again.
I got it spot on again and ready for last weeks outing , overnight in the woods.
The sheath I bought for it (just a cheap one off the evilbay) has a brass or similar button popper to secure the Knife in , so after using it a few times I realised the blade was "dinged" again!!!😵
So in the back of my mind , I was thinking " what a load of bull excrement, this RWL34 steel is!" I mean surely it should be harder than a "soft" button popper, but also thought that maybe I ruined the temper by getting the ding out with the diamond stones?!
I kept it cool and used water to avoid the blueing of the blade, but thought maybe I wrecked it somehow?
Well , now reading this thread , I looked at HH and must admit the similarities between my blade and the £10.95 blank sold on there are uncanny.
I'm starting to come to terms with the fact that it's obviously a cheap steel and soft as a length of boiled spaghetti...😒
All those weeks ago Mick did offer to reprofile the knife and get it back to what it was , but now I'm having second thoughts about that.
So...
Is there a way to re-harden the steel again? Considering it has got the scales on , I'd imagine a high temperature oven treatment would probably crack the Yew ,but then again I maybe wrong...
Any help would be very appreciated!
In the meantime , I'll keep using my Mora and stop fretting about the dings on the buzzard...
I also PM 'd him just yesterday to question and make him aware of this thread but have not received a reply .
What a shame it is, as he seemed like a genuine bloke just doing these tools for folk that can't afford the big price tags on quality knives , and it seemed he did it for the love! 😒
As a chippie I've always heard ,"if you buy cheap , you buy twice!" But Mora disproves this theory. Shame that same can't be said for Mick's work.
It's disappointing indeed.
So even though I haven't paid top dollar for the buzzard , I still feel a bit cheated and can only hope that Mick comes out and clarifies these concerns and "allegations".
Hopefully he will as he was always a pleasure to communicate with and very helpful indeed.
Come on Dr. Mick ! Come out and explain ? 👍😁