Pacific Salt 2

brj said:
FFG with more acute sharpening angle makes a world of difference. I have one bought sometime in 2007 I think and once reground close to a zero grind (middle in the pic below) it's been really awesome
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So that is your knife is it? You were my inspiration to regrind my Pac Salt!
 
Thanks :)
I like a lot the acute tip on your regrind, I've actually toyed with the idea myself (at the time) but these being pure EDCs I went for a more stout tip.
Anyway, to me thin H1 PE (and when I say thin I mean Victorinox kind of thin) is king.
 
I wish I had the skills and an extra Pac Salt laying around. I do love the factory design, but would love a pointy tip also. It looks fantastic.
 
Rather than regrind a PAC Salt, I’d think it cheaper to just buy a Caribbean. Not only is the tip pointier, but the pivot and lock are much stronger. It oozes quality with titanium clip, nested LC200 liners, beautifully chamfered scales. About 0.018 behind the edge is the secret to its cutting ability. The only downside is you have to resharpen it quite a bit before it gives good edge retention. Once you get down to good steel, look out. Mine seems to hold an edge like M4 but resharpen like 8Cr13MoV. Amazing.
 
Mark Spark said:
Rather than regrind a PAC Salt, I’d think it cheaper to just buy a Caribbean.
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I guess it depends on who you are and what you want.

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This knife is pointer than any Caribbean, .008" behind the edge (.020" at the tip), and is not plagued by the annoying decision between either smooth and free closing action or solid lock up with no blade play. Because that was the decision I had to make with the Caribbean. Oh and this knife cost me 56% of a Caribbean's pricetag, and less than an hour of work. It screams "use me", with its grippy, no nonsense, tough and comfortable FRN handles, strong titanium clip (even though I added a deep carry after market clip), its budget friendly price point, and H1 at this thinness holds its cutting ability as well as any other knife steel I have owned and strops or hones back to shaving sharp in seconds. Amazing.
 
I just carried mine for a quick hike up in the cloud forest. I’m glad I chose the Pacific Salt 2 over my new Manix 2 XL M4 because it started raining about half way through the hike.

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Here’s a quick shot from the lanai(porch) at sunset. The fishing line keeps birds off of it.
 
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Hawaii doing? And that's a beautiful shot!
 
David Mary said:
I guess it depends on who you are and what you want.

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This knife is pointer than any Caribbean, .008" behind the edge (.020" at the tip), and is not plagued by the annoying decision between either smooth and free closing action or solid lock up with no blade play. Because that was the decision I had to make with the Caribbean. Oh and this knife cost me 56% of a Caribbean's pricetag, and less than an hour of work. It screams "use me", with its grippy, no nonsense, tough and comfortable FRN handles, strong titanium clip (even though I added a deep carry after market clip), its budget friendly price point, and H1 at this thinness holds its cutting ability as well as any other knife steel I have owned and strops or hones back to shaving sharp in seconds. Amazing.
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I should have read the part where it says you are a knife maker. I assumed you had to send it out for the regrind. Congratulations on a great knife. I bought my son a pac salt 1 for fishing and even stock it is very nice.
 
Mark Spark said:
Rather than regrind a PAC Salt, I’d think it cheaper to just buy a Caribbean. Not only is the tip pointier, but the pivot and lock are much stronger. It oozes quality with titanium clip, nested LC200 liners, beautifully chamfered scales. About 0.018 behind the edge is the secret to its cutting ability. The only downside is you have to resharpen it quite a bit before it gives good edge retention. Once you get down to good steel, look out. Mine seems to hold an edge like M4 but resharpen like 8Cr13MoV. Amazing.
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I agree with David. The knives are totally different. For example, while I love the compression lock, I don't trust the closing detent as much as a back lock, just like I don't trust the closing detent on a liner/frame lock, axis lock, or button lock as much as I do a back lock. A better comparison to the pacific salt would be the Siren. Now there we have a real competition IMO.
 
Mark Spark said:
I should have read the part where it says you are a knife maker. I assumed you had to send it out for the regrind. Congratulations on a great knife. I bought my son a pac salt 1 for fishing and even stock it is very nice.
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That's fair enough. My response was somewhat influenced by my experience with the Caribbean, and trying to like it more than I did. If the Caribbean had it's middle stand-off maybe half an inch or so further forward, I think that would resolve the biggest issue with the knife, which is the sticky close. Next, they need to strengthen the detent a touch or two. Had those two issues not been present, I probably would still own my Caribbean today. Of course, I'm pretty sure I'd own the Pac Salt 2 also. ;)
 
Today I used my Pac Salt 2 to cut up worn belts for my grinder. I did over a dozen cuts to reduce the belts to smaller strips that will fit into my little shop trashcan. The belts were worn zirconia 36 grit belts and some 150 grit aluminum oxide belts. The Pac Salt 2's edge was ragged afterwards, but about 15 seconds on the coarse SM rods followed by a few strops on each side had it back to screaming sharp.
 
I have never heard of a Spyderco PE H1 blade that exhibited any reasonable edge retention under any circumstances. Is it just usage and sharpening and/or a regrind to get to the good stuff?
 
on_the_edge said:
I have never heard of a Spyderco PE H1 blade that exhibited any reasonable edge retention under any circumstances. Is it just usage and sharpening and/or a regrind to get to the good stuff?
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I reground all my plainedge H1. I think it comes down to cutting ability. A thin chef knife can do a lot of cutting, even when it's edge is dull, because it has great geometry. My Pac Salt 2 now has great geometry. From the factory, it had ... not great geometry. But I'm the kind of guy that considers a Military or a Manix 2 thick behind the edge. I feel that folders should have a maximum thickness behind the edge of .020" and that is absolute max, and I would rather see somewhere between .005" and .012".

So a reground Pac Salt 2 will still cut fairly well when it's dull because it has better geometry than a factory pac salt 2, and it will probably even cut better than a sharp one from the factory, because initial sharpness is not all there is to cutting ability. For slicing paper, sure a sharp one from the factory will do better than a reground dull one, but if I have to cuts lots of cardboard, or plastic, or potatoes, I'd rather have a dull reground one than a sharp factory one.

I know I'm kind of dancing around the question, because I think there are two or more sides to it, depending on what you are cutting.
 
I should add that it is pretty commonly believed that with any steel, a more acute edge leads to better edge retention because it requires less actual force required to make cuts. Rather than the edge absorbing the force, it transfers more of it into the cutting medium. I have always found once I sharpen to a finer than factory edge (I usually go with 15° per side and 20° micro) I get better performance and longevity of cutting ability before I need to resharpen. Anecdotally speaking.
 
on_the_edge said:
I have never heard of a Spyderco PE H1 blade that exhibited any reasonable edge retention under any circumstances. Is it just usage and sharpening and/or a regrind to get to the good stuff?
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H1 PE has pretty good edge retention, definitely better than 420HC/AUS6 and probably on par with good AUS8 or 440c. I've posted this before but this is regular H1, cut through around 200 feet of gritty industrical grade cardboard and would still shave with moderate pressure. Touch-up to slice newsprint took a little less than two minutes. I do this much cutting 3-4 times a year and this performance is normal. H1 might not approach more recent higher end steels but by itself it works just fine in PE. I think most users just don't have a lot of experience IIRC the PE H1 models sell at a small fraction of the SE models.

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Thanks for posting that. PE doesn't really sell for cheaper than SE, but it is very good in it's own right, and often underrated.
 
cabfrank said:
Thanks for posting that. PE doesn't really sell for cheaper than SE, but it is very good in it's own right, and often underrated.
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spoonrobot means serrated most likely makes up the majority of H1 sales.

I have a plain edge Tasman Salt 2, and I wouldn't say its edge retention is as terrible as it's said to be.
 
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