Mora 105 vs 106

[bb07]

Which do you prefer? Identical blades, same price, just different handles. I've been using the 105 and actually prefer it to the 106 as it just seems more comfortable to me. The drawback is the lack of a sheath with the 105 but I can live with that.
I see the 106 is hugely popular but never hear of anyone using the 105. Wonder why? Definitely great knives for the price.

 

[robin wood]

I gues there are a few of us recommending 106, myself, Wille Sundqvist, Jogge. The 105 is every bit as good but I find the handle less aesthetically pleasing and you don't need the swelling at the front, with correct grips there is no chance of your hand slipping on to the blade. That swelling can get in the way on a few grips but it is still an excellent knife. They used to be ridiculous bargains but the price has nearly doubled in 3 years. Still good value but I think since Erikson bought Frost out there is no competition perhaps.

 

[bb07]

No wonder the 106 is so popular
I heard somewhere that the reason the 105 has an oversize handle was so the user could shape it to their liking, but have no idea if there's any truth to that or not, although there's certainly enough material to do so should anyone wish to modify it.

 

[robin wood]

There are lots of other good and overlooked knives out there too. My friend Sean Hellman likes the Mora craftline punch, a lovely thin stainless blade in a plastic handle. My personal knife is a slightly reground Polar 95 blade which sell for less than £10. Many folk prefer the mora 120 and it's slightly shorter blade can be less intimidating for beginners, I prefer the 106 because the length allows good slicing action in cuts, I run out of edge when cutting with a 120 though Fritiof Runhall one of the best carvers I have worked with uses the 120. If it works for you it is all good.

 

[brancho]

I have a 106 and 120 and enjoy using both.
I did buy a 105 cheap and rehandled it as I t didnt like it but I did buy it thinking I would rehandled it.

 

[ToneWood]

I like the Mora knives, I now have the 120, 106 and 105. The 106 is the workhorse, being the most useful but I find it rather long - but that length is handy for somethings. I got the 120 first, however, that was through ignorance. The 120 is a less useful/more specialised knife than the 106 to my mind but it does complement the 106 quite well, for detail work when you really don't want to cut too much off. I bought the 105 expecting it to be a little shorter than the 106 but to my eye it appears exactly the same length/blade. It's a fine knife though, I prefer the handle used on the 120/106 but that may simply be because I used those first.

However, to me, the 106 often feels too long (at 82mm, the 105 is supposed to be 79mm). The tip sometimes gets in the way (time to bring out the 120) and presents a potential hazard. The 120 seems a bit short (at 59mm) for normal use, I've cut myself more with this knife than any other tool - usually when handling it rather than using it; I'm over that now, I handle it with extreme care.

My ideal sloyd knife would therefore have a 7cm blade. I thought I might one day buy a custom blade and make my own but today came across the post by Robin above that mentioned this knife, Mora Craftline Punch

It doesn't have the wooden 106/120 handle, I don't like purple and I'm generally not a big fan of stainless steel for sharpening - but it does have the excellent and familiar Clipper handle, the steel is presumably some Swedish lamination/concoction and the blade is 68mm long. I also find it reassuring that Sean Hellman likes it.

 

[brancho]

Tonewood
The 105 could be modded easily to give it the same hadnle shape as the 106 and shortened to your preferred length

Here is a 105 in bits

 

[ToneWood]

I didn't realise you could do that but I had noticed the "C-clip" in the bottom of the handle - hadn't expected a full tang. And what an odd-shaped tang it is, I wonder how/why they came up with that? Yes, I guess that makes it easier to make your own handle, or modify the existing one - good thinking. Perhaps that is the reason for the existence of the 105 alongside the v. similar 106. I don't dislike the 105 handle, just have a mild preference for the other one - which actually I didn't care for on first glance but now find "homely"/familiar, the unfussy aesthetic of the rather podgy looking handle has grown on me too, once I realised that it worked well in my hands.

How would you shorten the blade - embed more of the blade in the handle? I don't fancy re-grinding the entire blade by hand.

BTW in my "review" above I missed one thing - the 106 has a good, slim plastic sheath; the 120 a different, rather poorly fitting & voluminous plastic sheath and the 105 has a pathetically thin plastic..."envelope" - it needs something better, that blade is sharp. But I keep all of mine in a leather chisel roll (recommended & somewhat self limiting ).

I also got (at least) one thing wrong, although many/most (but not all) on-line knife sellers list the Mora 120 blade as 49mm. It's not, mine is 59mm and I found another site that quotes this figure. In light of that, I guess my ideal sloyd knife blade would likely be 70mm, and perhaps not quite as deep as the 120. Perhaps it is the 105 with modded handle/blade?

 

[brancho]

To shorten the 105 I would grind down the shoulders to have the tang further into the handle its not a fulltang but a stick tang.

Here is blade I shortened in the way described it should be obvious what I did


Reground blade by alf.branch, on Flickr