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That's easily the most work ever done just to hide a lanyard.
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Does this make you worry?
- Thread starter Marcelo Cantu
- Start date
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It doesn't make me worry.....but it does make me laugh.
Mistwalker
Gold Member
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- Dec 22, 2007
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- 19,051
Well...maybe those crazy thumb notches are to facilitate a pinch grip on the blade for detail work.....maybe? But seems like they would be really rough on the thumb in "normal" thumb ramp use. Also maybe...maybe if they made the choil shallower and therefore the "lanyard hiding notch" shallower...them maybe it would be fairly serviceable. As is it looks pretty weak and uncomfortable.
- Joined
- Mar 29, 2006
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It's not that bad
With a little tweaking. There, I fixed it, you're welcome Kershaw.
With a little tweaking. There, I fixed it, you're welcome Kershaw.
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- Mar 5, 2005
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- 5,069
I have to agree, that is just plain silly cool. That knife on the other hand is just mall ninja.
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- Oct 8, 1998
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I don't like that knife.
But, I think that it is a Gavin Hawk design (http://www.g-hawkknives.com/index.html), or at the very least, inspired by his work. And I have to say, that Gavin's designs are pretty brilliant, and he has a very definite style, I recognized this knife as being of that design lineage immediately.
And, I have some understand of the fine line that each knife company tries to tread between selling things that people will buy(mostly because they look cool), and selling useful knives.
Because, useful knives are sometimes pretty boring looking, until you start to see with your hands and with your skills....
We all want new/different/cool/innovative knives, but the price of that is that some knives go a little too far.
On the flip side, let's imagine who will actually buy this knife.
He is 22 years of age, finally has a job that allows him some spending money, and he is going rafting with his family, but he heard somewhere that he needed a good knife. So he goes into an Excalibur, and the clerk is 25 years old, and overly impressed with his knowledge of cutlery. He will be turned on my Kershaw, because he loves the almost automatic knife quality of their Speed Safe. He will then proceed to sell this knife to the soon to be one time rafter as a knife that has a lanyard for safety over water, and very secure thumb purchase. Also our 22 year old will hold it, and the index indentation will make him feel very secure, and while holding it, he will have a 30 second mini fantasy that includes being a Navy Seal, killing 'evil-doers' and rescuing small animals from imminent harm. Money will change hands, and both parties will be extremely pleased. And here is the important part..... He will never go rafting, he will never really use the knife except to show it off to his friends, who will universally probably say the exact same thing.... "Wow dude, that is really cool."
So, while it is not my part of the market, nor my kind of knife.... Oh well.
Because at the very least, this young man may someday be a middle aged man in the voting booth, remembering that he had that knife for years, and never killed anyone. Which, in a rare flash of brilliance, will inform him that the law outlawing knives is a bit draconian, and he will vote 'No'.
Or he will use it hard, break it, and be on his way to buying one of my knives.
Or he will have a soft spot in his heart, when his son says, "I want a knife."
Marion
But, I think that it is a Gavin Hawk design (http://www.g-hawkknives.com/index.html), or at the very least, inspired by his work. And I have to say, that Gavin's designs are pretty brilliant, and he has a very definite style, I recognized this knife as being of that design lineage immediately.
And, I have some understand of the fine line that each knife company tries to tread between selling things that people will buy(mostly because they look cool), and selling useful knives.
Because, useful knives are sometimes pretty boring looking, until you start to see with your hands and with your skills....
We all want new/different/cool/innovative knives, but the price of that is that some knives go a little too far.
On the flip side, let's imagine who will actually buy this knife.
He is 22 years of age, finally has a job that allows him some spending money, and he is going rafting with his family, but he heard somewhere that he needed a good knife. So he goes into an Excalibur, and the clerk is 25 years old, and overly impressed with his knowledge of cutlery. He will be turned on my Kershaw, because he loves the almost automatic knife quality of their Speed Safe. He will then proceed to sell this knife to the soon to be one time rafter as a knife that has a lanyard for safety over water, and very secure thumb purchase. Also our 22 year old will hold it, and the index indentation will make him feel very secure, and while holding it, he will have a 30 second mini fantasy that includes being a Navy Seal, killing 'evil-doers' and rescuing small animals from imminent harm. Money will change hands, and both parties will be extremely pleased. And here is the important part..... He will never go rafting, he will never really use the knife except to show it off to his friends, who will universally probably say the exact same thing.... "Wow dude, that is really cool."
So, while it is not my part of the market, nor my kind of knife.... Oh well.
Because at the very least, this young man may someday be a middle aged man in the voting booth, remembering that he had that knife for years, and never killed anyone. Which, in a rare flash of brilliance, will inform him that the law outlawing knives is a bit draconian, and he will vote 'No'.
Or he will use it hard, break it, and be on his way to buying one of my knives.
Or he will have a soft spot in his heart, when his son says, "I want a knife."
Marion
- Joined
- Feb 28, 2006
- Messages
- 4,012
Interesting link to the Hawk stuff. Still, I don't like the look of any of that either.
I don't have an engineering type mind and I marvel at the brilliance of engineers. However, over engineering and building a different kind of mouse trap exclusively for the hell of making something complicated looking, just because that plays on your strengths and can be foisted on to a week public is something that has no appeal to me. That bit of piano wire made the Buck 110 a legend, nothing else. In fact the knife itself is quite crap. That simple solution made history. And what of Walker and the locking liner, a simple elegant solution. But there's nothing here for me to buy into.
...
I find everything behind the cutting edge on this knife objectionable -
.
A step in a truly useful direction would be to turn that cut out into a shackle wrench to punt at mariners. Even then there's some fairly obvious reasons why you'd do that to the arse end and not have it where it is.
My attention span also wilts quite quickly when I see pseudo-military jargon -
K-AT, pronounced K-ĂT, (not cat)* is an acronym for Knife-All Terrain,
quick to deploy
Then in reference to the lanyard hole; The K-AT design distinguishes itself from all others, not by its basic function, but by the means in which it fulfills that function. ...yada yada ... The K-AT design solves this dilemma in a remarkably simple way.
Mmm, been around miltary personnel in some shape or form my entire life and I've yet to hear of that dilemma. And it doesn't mention the cost of that remarkably simple way being to make a piggin uncomfortable looking handle and to estrange the blade from it. That isn't a simple solution, that's an expensive solution...to a problem that never really existed.
Your hypothetical scenario is entertaining and quite plausible but so is this:
Nerk saves up his pocket money and drifts off Wallyworld and bags one of those 'cos he's heard good things about Kershaw. He doesn't realize Kershaw doesn't make knives and is just as much a front end as Sog, Cold Steel, .etc [perhaps even more so, look what Kai owns], and that amidst the great there is truly ugly. Off he toddles and for a couple of weekends or so he is happy. He cuts dandelions in the woods and posts pictures of fuzz sticks he's made within a mile of his home from some genuine store bought softwood. 5Yrs later he finds himself outside earshot of his mother calling him for dinner, he's gone bold, he's going to have to make his own. Out comes the trusty POS and he realizes it isn't so good. The blade bit is all sharp but steering it is proving a nightmare, and he can't get much power into his cuts. He half remembers something about hitting a disobedient knife that doesn't function well. His hands are sore from the handle and the excessive amount of power he's had to put into holding it. He hates it. Now he's onto kicking it. He's battoned it into a twig and it's stuck. He stamps down on the tip end and his weedy flimsy plimsole contorts and arches and his foot slips off. His knife is bent and he's run the back of the point up the inside of his calf. He's had enough, he gives up. Two years later he rocks up on a forum somewhere as a hater. His mantra, all modern stainless knives are rubbish. Great uncle Bloodclot gave him a new knife. It's a bit of broom handle with a bit of kitchen knife blade poked up it. He loves it. If only all knives were made this way and not like those newfangled things he muses.
The good that came from this from my perspective is the sheath materials on that Hawk site. One to keep an eye on.
|-P
I don't have an engineering type mind and I marvel at the brilliance of engineers. However, over engineering and building a different kind of mouse trap exclusively for the hell of making something complicated looking, just because that plays on your strengths and can be foisted on to a week public is something that has no appeal to me. That bit of piano wire made the Buck 110 a legend, nothing else. In fact the knife itself is quite crap. That simple solution made history. And what of Walker and the locking liner, a simple elegant solution. But there's nothing here for me to buy into.
...
I find everything behind the cutting edge on this knife objectionable -
.
A step in a truly useful direction would be to turn that cut out into a shackle wrench to punt at mariners. Even then there's some fairly obvious reasons why you'd do that to the arse end and not have it where it is.
My attention span also wilts quite quickly when I see pseudo-military jargon -
K-AT, pronounced K-ĂT, (not cat)* is an acronym for Knife-All Terrain,
quick to deploy
Then in reference to the lanyard hole; The K-AT design distinguishes itself from all others, not by its basic function, but by the means in which it fulfills that function. ...yada yada ... The K-AT design solves this dilemma in a remarkably simple way.
Mmm, been around miltary personnel in some shape or form my entire life and I've yet to hear of that dilemma. And it doesn't mention the cost of that remarkably simple way being to make a piggin uncomfortable looking handle and to estrange the blade from it. That isn't a simple solution, that's an expensive solution...to a problem that never really existed.
Your hypothetical scenario is entertaining and quite plausible but so is this:
Nerk saves up his pocket money and drifts off Wallyworld and bags one of those 'cos he's heard good things about Kershaw. He doesn't realize Kershaw doesn't make knives and is just as much a front end as Sog, Cold Steel, .etc [perhaps even more so, look what Kai owns], and that amidst the great there is truly ugly. Off he toddles and for a couple of weekends or so he is happy. He cuts dandelions in the woods and posts pictures of fuzz sticks he's made within a mile of his home from some genuine store bought softwood. 5Yrs later he finds himself outside earshot of his mother calling him for dinner, he's gone bold, he's going to have to make his own. Out comes the trusty POS and he realizes it isn't so good. The blade bit is all sharp but steering it is proving a nightmare, and he can't get much power into his cuts. He half remembers something about hitting a disobedient knife that doesn't function well. His hands are sore from the handle and the excessive amount of power he's had to put into holding it. He hates it. Now he's onto kicking it. He's battoned it into a twig and it's stuck. He stamps down on the tip end and his weedy flimsy plimsole contorts and arches and his foot slips off. His knife is bent and he's run the back of the point up the inside of his calf. He's had enough, he gives up. Two years later he rocks up on a forum somewhere as a hater. His mantra, all modern stainless knives are rubbish. Great uncle Bloodclot gave him a new knife. It's a bit of broom handle with a bit of kitchen knife blade poked up it. He loves it. If only all knives were made this way and not like those newfangled things he muses.
The good that came from this from my perspective is the sheath materials on that Hawk site. One to keep an eye on.
|-P
- Joined
- Oct 8, 1998
- Messages
- 8,917
It's a sick joke from Kershaw. The cutout looks like the knife is giving the potential buyer and/or the owner the middle finger. The way companies are now making crap like this, it wouldn't surprise me to find out it was an inside joke.
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- Joined
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I never really expected the "Kershaw mafia" to dislike the knife. Did you?
No, but I'm willing to challenge any knife I don't like. Even if it has a round hole in the blade.
Most of their new designs were unveiled at BLADE show this year, and there was some pretty cool stuff. I don't like to be referred to as anybody's "fanboy", but you have to look at Kershaw as a brand - they like to try new things. Composite steel blades weren't a new idea (Michael Walker did it a while ago), but Kershaw has brought that concept into mass production. Is it a viable idea? That's up to perosnal interpretation, but at least they're trying to innnovate. They've also made a lot of complex CNC machined products with Titanium handles at affordable prices, and their quality is very good. Their newly unveiled Speedform Folder won an award at blade and features a new framelock that is cut at a bias so that it can;t be unsprung and doesn't need a Hinderer lockbar stabilizer.
As for the design that we are currently discussing - this design was actually created by Grant and Gavin Hawk. As far as I know, the cutaway in the handle is only there to accomodate stowage of the wrist lanyard. You may not like the idea, but they're just trying to bring a little innovation to the concept of a fixed blade. Again, this is all subject to personal opinion.
No, it's not a Busse. But as to the narrowness of the tang where the cutout is, apparently no one here remebers the concept of a stick tang. Stick tang construction is used in many knives such as the venerable KA-Bar Marine Fighting knife, many Randalls, the Buck 119 (and others), and Marbles style knives. Stick tangs are rarely more than 3/8" wide, and are often much narrower. These knives may not be the strongest pieces out there, but many of them have held up to quite a bit of abuse.
My point? No, this knife is not a Busse. If you want a knife that sacrifices fine work cutting ability but allow you to use it as a crowbar, buy a Busse. This knife is a different piece, but I think you'd be surprised how well it would hold up to regular use. Would it make a prefect survival knife? Perhaps not, but I have not tested one myself.