Clips...use 'em and lose 'em (your knife that is)

M

mjolnir

Joined
Nov 8, 2002
Messages
65
Is anyone else as disgusted with clips? They need to be renamed to 'slips' because their main function in life is to separate you from your knife; that is when they're not scratching anything you bump into, or getting caught under a seat belt and bending.

I'm removing all clips immediately and going to belt sheath carry.

When did they start putting these infernal things on pocketknives anyway?
 
Nice handle, mind if I call you "hammer"?

I believe the blame for that innovation lies at the feet of Mr. Sal Glesser of Spyderco who introduced the CLIPIT line in 1981. Of course, everybody and their dog proceeded to follow suit and add clips to pocket knives. One solution you might try is to clip it to your waistband instead of in your pocket.
 
I like clips. The CRK clip is the best designed clip out there in my opinion. Makes the knife easy to get to. I hate having things clipped to my belt.
 
Never lost a knife yet due to a clip. And I carry one in each pocket. You just have to wear the right pants and snug it up against the back side of the pocket. Of course, I always run a finger along my pocket to feel the clip once in a while, too.
 
Although I think the clip is one of the most important knife innovations to date, I recently starting carrying my Sebbie in one of Gary G's Leather sheaths and I love it. It frees up room in my pocket, holds the knife very securely, I can draw it faster(The one I have is canted for cross draw), the knife feels better in my hand without the clip on it and I don't even realize I have it on most of the time. I plan to have one made for a few more of my EDCs. I do like having a knife or two around for clip carry for when I don't wear a belt though.
 
I've never had a clipped knife come out of my pocket, ever. I've never had a clip scratch anything. Maybe I just pay attention to what I'm doing.

Chris
 
Originally posted by mtnbkr
I've never had a clipped knife come out of my pocket, ever. I've never had a clip scratch anything. Maybe I just pay attention to what I'm doing.

Chris
Click to expand...

You may, in fact, be superior, And maybe you're just lucky. :p
 
I have never lost a knife, but I have scratched the hell out of the paint job on my vehicles before :o
 
The only knife I ever lost was a Cold Steel Voyager with a plastic clip, caught on the lifeline of my sailboat and right into the drink. Get a spydie with a metal clip and you won't be losing it. Good habits go a long way towards preserving one's knife as well; the unconscious pat down of oneself 50 times a day helps a lot. I am always checking if my knife's on board and I've never lost one that had a good clip in the first place...
 
Well the good news is, almost all of the clips I've seen so far are removable, so if you hate 'em, they are fairly easy to get rid of while, on the other hand, it would be a pretty hard job to add one to a knife that came without it.

As a general rule I don't like them and have removed them from all of my knives that came with one. Only exception is my latest acqusition, a Spyderco Jesse Horn, but I intend to carry it clipped to the inside pocket of a suit jacket, so there's not much chance of losing it or scratching things with it.
 
Originally posted by numberthree
The only knife I ever lost was a Cold Steel Voyager with a plastic clip, caught on the lifeline of my sailboat and right into the drink. Get a spydie with a metal clip and you won't be losing it. Good habits go a long way towards preserving one's knife as well; the unconscious pat down of oneself 50 times a day helps a lot. I am always checking if my knife's on board and I've never lost one that had a good clip in the first place...
Click to expand...

I think that any clip, Spydie or not, would have ended up in the drink if caught on a lifeline in the same way. I have owned a CS Sea and Land Rescue for over 5 years. Yeah, it has that hokey clip, molded right into the plastic handle. I have worn it in every situation from whitewater to the two hundred miles a week that I bicycle (carfree for two years). In every conceivable type of pants/pocket. It is always so secure that I never worry about it (tho' being the type of personality that I am, I check it frequently. It's always a secure as the last time I checked it). One experience is, IMHO, not enough to condemn one type of clip and recommend another. Just my 2 cents.
 
Never lost a clipped knife yet. YOu can remove the clips from the CS FRN handled knives, but thing just looks weird then(and as the clip is part of the overall grip of the knife(ie the grip area/design is designed with the clip as part of it) handle seems to thin then in area where you removed clip. Least, did to me.

But yeah, I do the pat downs without thinking too.
 
Originally posted by TheBadGuy
I have never lost a knife, but I have scratched the hell out of the paint job on my vehicles before :o
Click to expand...

YUP. I just put a nice 3 inch gash in the side of my truck today as I filled it up with gas :mad:
 
I love clips! I think they are one of the best things to happen to modern tactical folders. Does a knife handle feel better without them? Yes. Would I carry a larger folder without one? No. I have never lost a knife clipped to my pocket. I HAVE scratched stuff up with the clip (vehicles, walls, trees, etc.).

That being said, there are good clips and absolutely crappy ones. If you don't like clips on your knives, by all means take 'em off!
 
I don't think I'd be carrying many of the folders I do today if they didn't have a pocket clip. It's just so convenient, to pull it out whenever there's a small job at hand.

Benchmade makes excellent clips. I haven't lost a knife by its clip, and have rarely scratched anything with it.
 
I've never lost a clipped knife before, but I can't even count the number of times that a clip has saved my knife from being lost.

Have I damaged objects before with protruding clips? I think so, maybe about three or four times in years and years of carrying clipped knives.
 
Hey, if you lost a knife or two I'm sorry. I sympathize. But in no way do I agree that clips are bad or useless. Today I carried a Vapor and a Mini-Griptilian, and both stayed safely in my pockets (front right and back right, respectively). Some knives' clips are tighter and stronger than others, but in general they tend to work rather well for me.

Funny story:
Some clip designs are better than others. The clip on the Spyderco Walker Linerlock is terribly loose -- the only one of my knives that is so. I lost it once into the crevice of a chair in our office at work. The chairs got moved over time, and I had not thought to check in them anyway. By the time it was suggested, it was months later and the chairs I checked could not be assured to have been the ones that had been around at the time.

Over 2 years went by...

I finally decided to go to Knifecenter.com and get myself a new Walker Linerlock. THE DAY AFTER I ORDERED, my manager, who had known about the loss of the knife, called me into an adjoining room on our floor. He told me to dig down into a particular chair, between the back and the seat. There, covered in two years' worth of dust, was my knife. IT HAD SAT THERE TWO YEARS UNDETECTED UNTIL THE DAY AFTER I ORDERED ITS REPLACEMENT. Talk about weird coincidences.

I sold the replacement that came a week later to my brother. I think he has since lost it, but I'm not sure.

---Jeffrey
 
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