There Are Pandas, and Then There Are Pandas.
And this isn't either of them! The Pandas we're talking about here, are watches, not bears. And what got me thinking about them (again) was a link posted this morning by @cm.rook who pointed a few of us to the very attractive (and not terribly priced) Yema "Rallygraph" Panda which, in it's most traditional arrangement, looks like the one on the left, but can also be had in the version on the right: The model on the left is a true Panda, while the model on the right is called a reverse Panda. The reason for that distinction is clear--Panda bears, only come in the first arrangement. Now at this point, everyone should be thinking about the most well-know Panda, The Rolex Panda, which is actually a Daytona, and among Rolex Daytonas, the most famous of which is the Paul Newman Daytona, which was famous first, because it was Paul's, and second because it sold at auction for $17.8 million (US Dollars). The story of that auction is well-known so I'll only...
Nov 8, 2019
Couldn't agree with you more about the marbled carbon; in fact, I think it's the very best presentation of that medium. Most times, C seems like a rip-off: a knife maker glues one small, razor-thin insert to a handle, calls it the "carbon fiber model" and charges a 25% premium, despite the fact that C provides no structural benefit and has the same old boring greyscale woven pattern that can be easily achieved by other means.
But the marbled C look great, which is why I bought BladeOps' other exclusive with it, another Boker/Lucas Burnley collaboration, the Kihon. Though it might not be quite so visually striking as the kwaiken, it's more functional, I think, and half its body marbled C. I've attached pics taken in natural light to try to capture how good it looks (sign you're WAY too into knives: your daughter see you on hands and knees on the kitchen floor shooting pics of a knife and finds nothing unusual about the scene).
The fact that half the Kihon's body is C affects the function, whether for good or ill depemds on which hand holds the knife. The stainless steel side weighs more so the knife always wants to list a bit that direction. If held in the right hand, the knife leans into the palm, and it consequently only the lightest grip is needed to hold on; it almost feels like it's defying gravity, and it facilitators detailed cutting.
Conversely, the knife feels like it's trying to jump out of the left hand because the heavier side is away from the palm in that case. Makes the knife hard enough to control that Id say this Kihon model is a right-hander's knife only. So if you're not a southpaw, check it out on bladeops.com--D2 steel, Burnley design and that marbled carbon--lots of it--for the regular price of $99, I think. Oh, and Hinderer overtravel stop on the lock-bar. A nice extra feature.