I didn't thin this one, just cleaned up the blade, reprofiled, and sharpened. The tang was converted to accept a wa handle. This was my very first octagonal wa handle I've made and I'm 75% happy with it. *Note - I'm no Stefan. The wood used is Mediterranean Briar Burl with an Oregon Maple Burl spacer. I went with a wood spacer to keep it simple (to match the knife) but I paired up the woods because the blue maple spacer has orange flakes that match up perfectly with the main handle wood. It worked for me anyways. The reason why I did this octagonal handle was that I owed Dave (ecchef) a handle because of a previously broken one and I wanted to replace with as close to what he sent as possible. I also figured that Dave would cut me some slack if it didn't turn out so great. I do hope you like it though Dave, I gave it my best shot.