The Spearpoint blade is single-edged, but the spine is taken about as close to 
sharpened as the law will allow.

The blade is ground from Devin Thomas Raindrop-style Damascus Steel.

Devin Thomas is one of the acknowledged masters of Damascus Steel.

Damascus Steel such as this is made from two steel alloys.  One is typically a 
high-carbon steel.  The other is a high-nickel steel.  When etched in a weak 
acid solution, the carbon steel turns dark, almost black, and the nickel steel
turns bright silver.  

Classically, Damascus is made by stacking up alternating layers of the 
two types of steel, heating them in a forge, and then pounding them to forge-
weld them together.  This joins the layers into a single piece without "mixing" 
them.  Very often, this forged sheet is then folded over, re-heated, and 
pounded again.  This process is repeated many times until hundreds of 
layers result.  It sounds easy... but, in practice, it's not.

The raindrop pattern you see on this blade is much more sophisticated 
than the simple wavy lines that result from such a folding process.  Devin 
Thomas uses more complex techniques to form this and his many other
outstanding Damascus patterns.

The important thing to realize is that the pattern you see on Damascus
steel is not a surface finish.  It's not painted on or something.  It's part of
the material.  It goes all the way through.

Each piece of Devin Thomas Damascus Steel is a handmade master piece
and each is unique.  On the particular BM46DM blade exhibited here,
the Benchmade Butterfly logo is exactly centered in one of the concentric
circle patterns within the steel.



One almost gets the impression of a butterfly caught in a spider's web... which 
is quite interesting considering that Benchmade's major competitor is Spyderco
which uses a spider as their logo.