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- Apr 13, 2004
- Messages
- 16,124
Any one else here have any longtime Spyderco traditions? (Besides the annual pilgrimage to the SFO seconds sale. 
)
One of mine has been giving all three of my kids their first pocket knife on Christmas morning, with all of them being Spyderco Ladybugs (which was my first Spyderco when I was younger, the year they first came out). Through some luck, some help from Sal, and a little modification, all three of my kids got their favorite colors.
My youngest just got her knife this year. Problem was, Spyderco doesn't currently make a pink Ladybug. They did make one in the past, and I had one (it's still around somewhere), but it was quite some time ago and that particular knife has seen better days. So instead, I made a pink one!
The 2020 distributor-exclusive, glow-in-the-dark, special edition to the rescue!!! And some RIT dye for the win!
The GITD FRN material takes dye quite well, I barely had the handle in the dye for a minute. It actually looked a bit too dark initially, but I used the RIT dye "fixative", which removed some of the dye from the surface and lightened it up perfectly (the fixative removes excess dye to prevent it from transferring to you, your clothes, etc).
Process went really well, and was pretty easy. Heat some water in a pan, add some dye, and dunk the handle. In this case, I used the RIT dye that's specifically meant for synthetic materials, their "DyeMore". To dunk it and swirl the handle around, I used a piece of stainless steel wire, tied loosely through the lanyard hole. Checking the color often, once I had the color close, I rinsed in cool water, then repeated the process with the fixative. The slightly yellowish water/fixative liquid mixture was pretty pink after about a minute or two of swirling the knife handle around. Once it didn't appear to be getting any pinker, I removed the handle and again rinsed in cool running water. Once dried off, I had the part you see in the first photo.
All three of their knives. Yep, this all started 8 years ago.
Thank you
Sal Glesser
and the Spyderco crew!!!
)One of mine has been giving all three of my kids their first pocket knife on Christmas morning, with all of them being Spyderco Ladybugs (which was my first Spyderco when I was younger, the year they first came out). Through some luck, some help from Sal, and a little modification, all three of my kids got their favorite colors.
My youngest just got her knife this year. Problem was, Spyderco doesn't currently make a pink Ladybug.
They did make one in the past, and I had one (it's still around somewhere), but it was quite some time ago and that particular knife has seen better days. So instead, I made a pink one! The 2020 distributor-exclusive, glow-in-the-dark, special edition to the rescue!!! And some RIT dye for the win!
The GITD FRN material takes dye quite well, I barely had the handle in the dye for a minute. It actually looked a bit too dark initially, but I used the RIT dye "fixative", which removed some of the dye from the surface and lightened it up perfectly (the fixative removes excess dye to prevent it from transferring to you, your clothes, etc).
Process went really well, and was pretty easy. Heat some water in a pan, add some dye, and dunk the handle. In this case, I used the RIT dye that's specifically meant for synthetic materials, their "DyeMore". To dunk it and swirl the handle around, I used a piece of stainless steel wire, tied loosely through the lanyard hole. Checking the color often, once I had the color close, I rinsed in cool water, then repeated the process with the fixative. The slightly yellowish water/fixative liquid mixture was pretty pink after about a minute or two of swirling the knife handle around. Once it didn't appear to be getting any pinker, I removed the handle and again rinsed in cool running water. Once dried off, I had the part you see in the first photo.
All three of their knives. Yep, this all started 8 years ago.
Thank you
Sal Glesser
and the Spyderco crew!!! 
