Best Folding Knife Action You've Ever Felt

The Benchmade 761 to monolock.

Hands down.

Back when Knivesshipfree was in Oregon, I stopped by the shop and got my hands on every knife in the store.
CRK sebenzas
ZTs
Spydercos
Benchmades
Etc

The 761 left the biggest impression with its action.
Even with a direct comparison with a crk Sebenza 21 and 25.
 
My top three; Medford Praetorian T, Emerson Sheepdog, Benchmade Nakamura, in that order. Honorable mention to Grayman Dua.
 
My ZT 562 is the best flipper I have ever seen. The detent is perfect, nice and still to build up warp speed to open it, but not quite strong enough to be uncomfortable. My 801 was the same way before I (stupidly) got rid of it. Runner up in smoothness is my Kizer Ki405. Action literally could not be more smooth, smoother than most of my bearing folders, but the detent isn't quite strong enough to are full advantage of the perfect washers and pivot. Smooth as glass, though.

The best flipper balisong I have had was shockingly the Benchmade 53. The bearing pivot coupled with the low price and good tolerances made this arguably the best balisong I have seen. A little small, a little light, and the handles took a lot of getting used to, but even not being able to do any fancy tricks it was the knife I had the most fun idly flipping.

Best action I had on a non flipper (and non balisong) would be either the RAT 1 or ZT 550. Both had excellent detents, buttery action, easily released locks, and we're just all around great.
 
dkb45 said:
My ZT 562 is the best flipper I have ever seen. The detent is perfect, nice and still to build up warp speed to open it, but not quite strong enough to be uncomfortable. My 801 was the same way before I (stupidly) got rid of it. Runner up in smoothness is my Kizer Ki405. Action literally could not be more smooth, smoother than most of my bearing folders, but the detent isn't quite strong enough to are full advantage of the perfect washers and pivot. Smooth as glass, though.

The best flipper balisong I have had was shockingly the Benchmade 53. The bearing pivot coupled with the low price and good tolerances made this arguably the best balisong I have seen. A little small, a little light, and the handles took a lot of getting used to, but even not being able to do any fancy tricks it was the knife I had the most fun idly flipping.

Best action I had on a non flipper (and non balisong) would be either the RAT 1 or ZT 550. Both had excellent detents, buttery action, easily released locks, and we're just all around great.
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Yea man that RAT 1 action is awesome. If I sell all my knives I'd probably be satisflied with a humble RAT 1.

I had a Mangus 53, man was it smooth. In fact, too smooth, I could never keep it in my fingers while doing roll overs and chaplains.
But man was the action nice.
 
Zemapeli said:
The one with the cross shape? I love the look of the Darrel Ralph knives, I might have to give one a try sometime. I still have the Cutters Knife and Tool Karambit on my to buy list. Thanks for sharing CM.:thumbup:
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Yup, a Maltese Cross on the pivot and pocket clip.

 
Microtech DOC (once that insane detent is broken in, of course! :P )
ZT 0200
Spyderco PPT, Titanium Military, and Paramilitary 2
Benchmade 810 Contego from Knifeworks in M390 :D
 
DeadboxHero said:
Yea man that RAT 1 action is awesome. If I sell all my knives I'd probably be satisflied with a humble RAT 1.

I had a Mangus 53, man was it smooth. In fact, too smooth, I could never keep it in my fingers while doing roll overs and chaplains.
But man was the action nice.
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I will never trust my hands to do any kinds of balisong tricks. I've almost lost a toe simply pulling a normal manual folder out, my hands are not to be trusted with whirling sharpened metal blades!
 
dkb45 said:
I will never trust my hands to do any kinds of balisong tricks. I've almost lost a toe simply pulling a normal manual folder out, my hands are not to be trusted with whirling sharpened metal blades!
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Hahahaha fair enough.

I had a moment where I was sharpening my balisong and realized the only thing it cuts is me.
I don't sharpen Balis anymore haha
 
Southard Tolk is quite smooth.
I only had a assisted flipper before it and used to it, but could open Tolk really effortlessly.
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Miso
 
I don't see a lot of difference in them. They all Hinderer, ZT, Microtech, Galyean Pro, Reate, Kershaw Tilts etc. open smoothly and easy. It's not that hard to get a knife to do that. Even a cheap CRKT I have is smooth. It's really hard to see a big enough difference for me to say just one is the absolute smoothest. The Sebenza while being very smooth, is not fast because it has more resistance, but it wasn't designed to be a fast opener.
 
Here's a almost unbelievably smooth knife. With a very poor liner lock. Costs about 50 bucks. Has plastic washers.

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for me personally, i like the way spyderco g10 backlocks feel the most. knives like the spyderco police 3, chinook, civilian etc.....i love to hear that crisp clicking sound and the way you feel the backlock snap into place after the knife smoothly opens. i prefer it over all else. after that i think i like the way emersons feel. i like the way the chunky g10 feels in my hand and i like to manually open the knife and hear and feel the click of the liner lock.
 
Smoothest flicker by far is my Shirogorov Tabargan 100ns and it's on washers. Flippers is a toss up, Shiro 111 on MRBS or my Curtis F3.
 
Flipper:
Kershaw RAM has one of the smoothest, most unique actions I've ever felt.
ZT 0801
ZT 0562
Hinderer XM-18

Non-flipper:
Spyderco Manix 2
ZT 0550
ZT 0630
CRK Umnumzaan
All very smooth for riding on washers.
 
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