A (hopefully) non-controversial thread about knives...

Thread Starter

Ya’akov

Joined Jan 27, 2019
9,071
I carry a knife every day. Over the years I've carried various knives, and when I am doing particular jobs I might carry a specialist knife. But, my EDC (EveryDay Carry) knife has settled on one particular knife from my small collection. I can't seem to carry any of the others despite them all being very good knives.

That knife is the Benchmade Osborne 940-1. Something about it makes carrying anything else seem lacking. It's a bit of a fixation I suppose but I really don't want to carry two knives and with some specific exceptions, that 940 needs to be in my pocket. I use it several times every day even though I am retired.

1631531304012.png

The knife is a wonderful blend of excellent ergonomics, enjoyable handling, and top notch materials. The scales (handle parts) are high end carbon fiber machined beautifully. The blade is S90V steel which is a high tech, super edge retention steel. Hard to sharpen but concomitantly hard to dull. The locking system is called Axis and is in my opinion the best locking for folding knives, period. It's super safe and super easy to operate.

All in all, as much as I love knives, I can't see buying knives I won't actually use. I "collect" tools but only those I know how and will use. So, for now at least (and frankly for the foreseeable future) no more pocket knives for me

How about you? Do you carry a knife? What is it? Do you have a good knife or a beater? Do you carry more than one (serially or concurrently)?
 

BobTPH

Joined Jun 5, 2013
8,813
Never saw the need to carry a knife. Yes, it might have been useful a couple of times a year, but a combination screwdriver would have been useful 10 times as often and I don’t carry one or those either.

Bob
 

Thread Starter

Ya’akov

Joined Jan 27, 2019
9,071
Never saw the need to carry a knife. Yes, it might have been useful a couple of times a year, but a combination screwdriver would have been useful 10 times as often and I don’t carry one or those either.

Bob
I have a small screwdriver/pry bar thingy that goes with my keys, but usually I can grab a screwdriver from nearby. I have a really cool little pair of pliers from Knipex, the 100mm Cobra. Incredibly strong and small. I keep that in my pocket when I have room. Not used as much as the knife but really handy when needed.

1631532171070.png
 

MrSalts

Joined Apr 2, 2020
2,767
Back when I carried a pocket knife, it was rarely used as a knife. Instead it became a Phillips screwdriver, a straight blade screw driver, a prying tool, a scraping tool any anything else I need to do (can do) with it so I don't have to walk back to my toolbox. If I paid more than $300 for a pocket knife (like the MSRP of the thing in post #1), I would feel somehow limited to using it to cut things. And as said before, I rarely do that with a pocket knife. I usually know when I'll need to cut something so I bring the proper knife, saw, deburring tool.

Even for deer hunting or bird hunting a pocket knife just doesn't cut it (ha).

Speaking of deer hunting, the best cutting tool ever (game changer) is an 18v Sawzall with a 12" stainless steel blade. No more butcher shops and perfect cuts.
 

Thread Starter

Ya’akov

Joined Jan 27, 2019
9,071
Yes, the UK knife laws are pretty restrictive. I have one UK legal knife in my EDC selection. It's a Spyderco Squeak slip joint knife with a 2" Elmax blade and titanium scales. It's a smaller version of the "UK Penknife" model.

Not cheap.I carry it when I am dressed for something upscale.

1631537723030.png
 

Thread Starter

Ya’akov

Joined Jan 27, 2019
9,071
Yaakov, do you fly much? If I carried a knife by habit, I would have been arrested during screening by now.

Bob
I *used* to fly. About 80 flights a year. In the last decades, since just before 9/11, I haven't flown much at all. When I did fly my knife and multitool went into my checked baggage.

Before, there were limits on knives, not bans. It wasn't really a problem.

Also, they just confiscate they don't arrest.
 

strantor

Joined Oct 3, 2010
6,782
In your parlance, my "EDC" is also a Benchmade. "Griptilian" model I believe. I've carried it every day (excepting those days it spent lost, more on that later) since it was given to me in 2006. It was given to me by the Torpedoman Chief on my submarine the day he retired. He had a box full of them, and gave one to each member of the weapons department, not just the Torpedomen. I think he must have gotten a good surplus deal on them because they all had a Marine Corps logo etched on.

View attachment 247849

It's been sharpened enough times that the serrations are just a memory. It's missing the thumb screw (recent development, this year). I've managed to break the tip off a couple of times using it as a screwdriver or a pry bar, and re-ground it, so the tip is now more blunt than it was originally, and more suited for use as a screw driver/pry bar that doesn't break.

View attachment 247851

This is my "lucky knife." I'm not superstitious but the number of times I've lost this knife and the circumstances under which I've found it, are beyond uncanny. Once as a field service tech I unknowingly left it in a customer's electrical panel. Over a year later, still a field service tech but working for a different employer, I visited this same customer and found my knife sitting in the panel. Once I left it under the seat of a friend's car while helping him work on it. Months later that car was flooded in Harvey and he let the insurance company's wrecker haul it off. I, convinced the car could be salvaged, bought the car from the wrecker and in the process of removing the flooded interior to sun-dry, found my knife. There's two stories but there are many; I could fill a whole thread with them. I think this knife has chosen me as its person, and is determined to be passed down to my kids.

When borrowing someone else's knife or using a substitute during the time this one spends lost, I must consciously keep reminding myself that's it's not my Benchmade and I must be careful with it. Ordinary pocket knives won't abide the abuse that I'm accustomed to subjecting my own knife to. Very good knife, 10/10 stars, I wouldn't trade it for anything else.

Also on the subject of knives, I used to entertain a hobby of knifemaking. And I might add, before it was cool (before the "Forged in Fire" series, and the ensuing public interest in knifemaking). In fact I suspect that videos like mine created and/or revealed public interest that led to the show.

 

DickCappels

Joined Aug 21, 2008
10,152
I used to carry a knife and a pair of grooming scissors at all time, then the airlines became scared of anything with a blade. One time in Osaka, they took away a tiny pair of scissors with rounded blades that I used to trim my beard. When I got seated in the airplane, they brought an amenity kit including a razor : -)

Soon after that I stopped carrying blades of all types, but now that I can't get on air flights and there is not place to which I can fly, maybe I will start carrying again.
 

Thread Starter

Ya’akov

Joined Jan 27, 2019
9,071
I don't carry a knife. I carry a Leatherman Micra multi-tool. It comes in useful so many times.

View attachment 247852
I like the Micro. I used to carry one, and also the one with pliers. But lately I have found multitools less useful in my pocket.

I do have several Leatherman options. My pocket tool is either the slightly largish Skeletool:

1631538729062.png\

or the smaller and more streamlined Leatherman Juice S2 which is discontinued and I just discovered is now a very pricey collectors item. I paid about $30 and to replace it would now cost $200+!

1631539030995.png
 

Thread Starter

Ya’akov

Joined Jan 27, 2019
9,071
In your parlance, my "EDC" is also a Benchmade. "Griptilian" model I believe. I've carried it every day (excepting those days it spent lost, more on that later) since it was given to me in 2006. It was given to me by the Torpedoman Chief on my submarine the day he retired. He had a box full of them, and gave one to each member of the weapons department, not just the Torpedomen. I think he must have gotten a good surplus deal on them because they all had a Marine Corps logo etched on.

View attachment 247849

It's been sharpened enough times that the serrations are just a memory. It's missing the thumb screw (recent development, this year). I've managed to break the tip off a couple of times using it as a screwdriver or a pry bar, and re-ground it, so the tip is now more blunt than it was originally, and more suited for use as a screw driver/pry bar that doesn't break.

View attachment 247851

This is my "lucky knife." I'm not superstitious but the number of times I've lost this knife and the circumstances under which I've found it, are beyond uncanny. Once as a field service tech I unknowingly left it in a customer's electrical panel. Over a year later, still a field service tech but working for a different employer, I visited this same customer and found my knife sitting in the panel. Once I left it under the seat of a friend's car while helping him work on it. Months later that car was flooded in Harvey and he let the insurance company's wrecker haul it off. I, convinced the car could be salvaged, bought the car from the wrecker and in the process of removing the flooded interior to sun-dry, found my knife. There's two stories but there are many; I could fill a whole thread with them. I think this knife has chosen me as its person, and is determined to be passed down to my kids.

When borrowing someone else's knife or using a substitute during the time this one spends lost, I must consciously keep reminding myself that's it's not my Benchmade and I must be careful with it. Ordinary pocket knives won't abide the abuse that I'm accustomed to subjecting my own knife to. Very good knife, 10/10 stars, I wouldn't trade it for anything else.

Also on the subject of knives, I used to entertain a hobby of knifemaking. And I might add, before it was cool (before the "Forged in Fire" series, and the ensuing public interest in knifemaking). In fact I suspect that videos like mine created and/or revealed public interest that led to the show.

The Griptilian is a great knife! I have one and it is my "trades" knife. It's what I carry when I am doing electrical, plumbing, carpentry, etc. work. Did you know that if you send the knife to benchmade they will replace the blade cheap. There is a lifetime warranty.
 

Thread Starter

Ya’akov

Joined Jan 27, 2019
9,071
Also on the subject of knives, I used to entertain a hobby of knifemaking. And I might add, before it was cool (before the "Forged in Fire" series, and the ensuing public interest in knifemaking). In fact I suspect that videos like mine created and/or revealed public interest that led to the show.

I didn't have the space to make knives when I was interested in doing it so I got into sharpening knives and learned how to properly use stones to make an edge.
 

Thread Starter

Ya’akov

Joined Jan 27, 2019
9,071
Hi Dick,
Your scissors reminded me of a event in Johannesburg airport, security took away a small pair of electronic side cutters, said they could used as weapon.!

E
When I was 13 years old I flew from NY to FL to visit my grandparents both sets of which lived in the same retirement community. Their theatre group was making a production of Damn Yankees and I was very much into sound systems and the like. They had hired some company to install a reinforcement system and they'd installed mikes by hanging Shure SM57s as pendants from the ceiling over the small stage. It was really dumb.

I complained and they asked me to fix it, so with help from the retirees we moved the mikes fo the foot of the stage and wired them up. In the process, I was donated a nice set of tools and a soldering iron. I made a tool bucket from a coffee can by attaching a bail. I really loved the setup, it was great.

When I went to fly home, the flight attendants got nervous about it. The pilots said they would keep it in the cockpit so I could get it when we landed, which is what happened. I hadn't thought about this in decades.

Thanks Dick and Eric for knocking it loose!
 

MaxHeadRoom

Joined Jul 18, 2013
28,619
I still have my old Electricians-specific knife, has a lockable blade screw driver as well as the main blade. But keep it in my tool case now, don't see any need to carry it on me.
 
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