Might be a little more than you want to spend but custom knives are not cheep. Kikuo $218 comes with Kydex sheath with neck hanging strap. Great size for field dressing.
I would suggest getting something like a Gerber LMF knife and have something special message or their names laser engraved on the blades. Just a suggestion
Thanks guys, Im in the process of reviewing closely each site you suggested. Wow some very cool knives.
I was talking about this custom knive thing/idea with aunts and uncles and the niece’s over heard the conversation.
They now want a custom knife aswell.
What I found very interesting is the fact that the girls recognize the value and length of ownership a quality blade would represent. All these young men and women spend a great deal of time in the out doors. All are in college or the military. The girls are at Florida State " Marine Biology" and Cal Poly “Biology”.
Anyway I’d like to gift each with a very special custom knife which ties all the cousins together at some level as they move off to build and live their lives.
A side note, I had gifted my daughter with an AK-47 and 6 loaded mags and training before she went off to college 5 years ago. I didn’t want her taking any shit or not have the ability to protect herself.
At break time she would come home and actively shot to maintain her skill level.
All the cousins were very aware of the unusual gift for a girl and they all tell me often how much they would like to have an AK or an M4 and the skills to run it at their schools. Just in case!
I think I have learned that their are gifts, AND then their are gifts that give for the rest of ones life.
Those are the gifts I want to share with my young nieces and nephews. Custom matching knives seem to me to be a good value and life long.
Bark River Knife and Tool makes beautiful knives in that price range. Their site sucks but you can look at kniveshipfree.com, they have a great selection.
if you want a “good knife” I would look to Bladesmith Bill Harsey, a master knife smith. Im not sure if he how much work he is accepting, or how close it is to your price range, but you can buy some baseline models of his from Gerber, as he works with them to produce some product lines, and do something with the grips for a budgeting custom knife perhaps.
You’re getting good suggestions. Take a look at Sandown Forge Knives…the Melville EDC goes for $135 shipped with either a leather or kydex sheath and the Bronson goes for $165 shipped with either sheath.
Someone mentioned Bark River. The http://www.knivesshipfree.com/Gunny is in my opinion the one of their best and seems like it would have great utility. The micarta scaled versions are around 175 it looks like. I’ve dealt with this company and got great service.
Brad Southard is a friend and talented local knife maker here in Colorado. I asked him about this, his response was, “He could probably find someone to make a nice basic small fixed blade for that price range.”
Brad’s stuff is A+ I am unsure of his wait list though. The fun part about making custom stuff is you can get anyway you want it.
I would like to at least look at your friends line of knives. Since to origional post, ive spent40 hours reviewing custom knives. It’s amazing the amount and the quality available to folks.
I had origionally came to M4 carbine.net to learn more about the gun specific. I was one of those who purchased a STAG arms M4, and then learned the right way to do it here. " Per the list everything is now upgraded to the best I could find for it"
I don’t want to make that mistake again.
I can see that my price range is low for what I want to get the kids. Im going to bump that price range up to 200.00/250.00 and get a couple of knives at a time.
The single most important component is that these knifes be quality blades, not really concerned who’s name is on them.
Thanks again to all of you for sharing your info. The quality of all these knives is awesome.
