Hello all, I have acquired a rather strange Cold Steel Ti-Lite VI (used from ebay). I have been a fan of Cold Steel since the early 2000s, and have owned many of their knives. In fact, my first Cold Steel was a Ti-Lite, and I have become very familiar with these models. The knife in question here is actually an assisted-opener (you can imagine my surprise when I first opened it). I have attempted to include links to several images below. I would point out a few things: the spring, the special indentation within the handle scale that's meant to hold it, and the fact that the handle scales only have 5 large "holes" each (instead of 7, or two rows of 8) - presumably this was done to accommodate the space needed for the spring. My first thought was that the knife is a fake, but after disassembling it and comparing the parts with my other Ti-Lites, I think it's genuine. Can anyone provide some historical insight into this? At this point, I suspect it's either a prototype (probably picked up at one of Cold Steels "parking lot sales," where they have been known to get rid of prototypes), or an unusually impressive knock-off. I also entertained the idea that it's just a modified Ti-Lite, but the subtle changes in the handle design indicate the knife was built from the ground-up to accommodate that spring-assist mechanism. My apologies if this has been covered already, I have been unable to find anything about this knife online. I didn't think Cold Steel ever produced assisted-openers.
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An unusual Cold Steel Ti-Lite find - spring assist
- Thread starter TheFallen
- Start date
By the way, if anyone is wondering how well it works: It's not great. The blade is a little too long for the spring to kick it open, but if the spring were much stronger, the knife would likely be too dangerous to carry. The spring clicks when the blade opens & closes, and there's a tiny rattle if you shake the knife when the blade is open. There is one benefit: If you are familiar with these knives, you may have learned to use a bit of centrifugal force when opening its 6" blade - the spring assist reduces the amount of force you need to apply by approximately 50%.
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cold steel never made an assisted ti-lite as far as i know, they did make an assisted opener called the Swift though
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the real one doesnt cost too much brand new, return this one if you can and order a real one from one of the well known online knife stores
Thanks! That does look like the same knife. I own the genuine/unmodified version as well, I'm just surprised at the decent quality of the blade - I wonder if a Chinese company acquired a bunch of factory second blades from Cold Steel, and incorporated them into this design?
I've owned several, maybe 5-6 Ti-Lites over the years from the Japan made Aus8 to VG1 Titaniums to the Taiwan Zytel. They are great knives.
But Ti-Lites are also one of the heaviest counterfeited knives out there, both as exact copies or slightly different. I would never buy a CS Ti-Lite
(or a Benchmade Bugout/Grip) off of Ebay.
No one can determine the authenticity of a knife from the visual and perceived quality. Counterfeiters today don't make shoddy copies of the original, they can make copies that can sometimes stump even the original manufacturer.
As for a counterfeit being "built well", it simply looks like it is built well. One would need the machinery and tools to test each component to see if they
are the same as the original in terms of material and standards.
Great info, thanks. I haven't come across a counterfeit of this quality before, but that doesn't mean it will hold up. I'm in the process of returning it, thanks for the help everyone!
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Welcome to BladeForums
T
TheFallen
Congratulations on a very nice first thread posting, you wrote and engaged great.
Too bad about your Ti-Lite spring assist, that would have been a cool possible prototype if it had been a real CS.
Make sure you try and stick around here and keep joining in, it’s a lot of fun, great members with a seemingly endless supply of knowledge, and more eye candy pictures than the Smithsonian.
Again, welcome to BladeForums.
Congratulations on a very nice first thread posting, you wrote and engaged great.
Too bad about your Ti-Lite spring assist, that would have been a cool possible prototype if it had been a real CS.
Make sure you try and stick around here and keep joining in, it’s a lot of fun, great members with a seemingly endless supply of knowledge, and more eye candy pictures than the Smithsonian.
Again, welcome to BladeForums.