How did you acquire the taste for Spyderco

BenchCo Spydermade

BenchCo Spydermade

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Feb 10, 2014
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OK, so spyderco seems to be a bit of an acquired taste as they look a bit different than other knives. I collected knives for 5+ years before getting a spyderco because I hated them at first. Now I am a full convert, and Spyderco is my favorite knife brand, hands down.

So what is your story? Did you get into Spyderco right away, or need time to warm up to them? If you are like me and disliked them at first, what converted you?
 
OK, so for me I hated them at first. Didn't like the looks and thought frn was cheap crap. Between those two I never even gave them a sideways glance for years.

Then my father got a centofante 3. Still didn't respect it. I remember thinking he wasted his money but being too polite to tell him. Then he got a sage (the carbon fiber one). I liked it and recognized its quality, but I didn't find their designs attractive.

When they came out w the manix 2 I needed in. I actually loved how it looked and it had a lock I didn't have yet that seemed great.

I got the s30v saber ground g10 version. I loved it and was learning about the benefits of ffg blades and eventually lead me to the lightweight bd1 version. This is the knife that finished completely converting me to a spyderco fan.

I loved the ffg blade and surprisingly loved the lightweight scales too. I soon after got a dragonfly and many more spydercos!

Now I love their designs and have a hard time remembering there was ever a time I didn't!
 
Since I found one-hand locks 20+ years ago that is all that I have bought. I bought an original Delica for a friend back then but I didn't want one because it was a lockback, similarly with the Dragonfly that I bought for my wife. I did have one of the original micarta Goddards but it got pushed out by my liner lock Benchmades. Fast forward to a few years ago when I started buying new folders again and I bought a PM2 after reading so much about it. That lead to the Military, Manix, Bradley and even Vallotton, so now my EDC rotation is dominated by Spyderco.
 
Pretty much same as you, BCSM. I hated the Spyderhole and avoided Spyderco knives for a long time. At a certain point in time, I decided that I needed to have a Spyderco in my collection in order to call the collection complete. I bought an Endura 3, fell in love with its ease of opening, and haven't looked back since. But I still have a love/hate relationship with the Spyderhole. I love its ergos but hate the additional blade width needed to incorporate it into most Spyderco designs. It should come as no surprise that my favorite Spyderco knife is the Southard. ;)
 
Ha, it's kinda a funny story.

I was dinking around on Bladeforums in a thread entitled something along the lines of "What popular knives do you hate?" Easily every fourth post bashed on Spyderco, and I completely agreed with them. The huge bump on the spine to accommodate the spydie hole and the near-universal big bellies made the knives look unnecessarily weird to me.

Then someone made the comment that all Spydies are flimsy-pointed, weird-looking knives, and Jill Jackson jumped in with some pictures of the Vallotton and Tuff. I hadn't wanted to purchase any knives at that point, but the Vallotton called to me. Oh did it call to me.

So I picked that one up, and threw a FRN Native 5 into the order. I liked the look of the leaf-blade and the fact that the spydie hole in the N5 wasn't incongruous with the rest of the blade.

Well, after that, it was all down hill. I began to see that forum follows function with Spydies, and that completely flipped my perspective of the knives.

The ergos on the Native convinced me to try the PM2, and the blade on the Native made me want the Manix 2 XL. And the organic-looking lines of all of them made the Southard irresistible...

So yeah. How did I acquire a taste for Spyderco? I saw a picture of a Vallotton sitting upside down on a log. ;)
 
I also found them weird looking at first. The look of the Endura eventually grew on me, so I picked one up. The ergonomics and quality blew me away and I've been a fan ever since.

Also, the owner of the company just exudes class and actually communicates with fans/users on discussion forums - how cool is that? :thumbup:
 
The Spydie hole was the cats ass in 1988. Before that I was carrying a Buck 110 with "the stud" installed an a SAK. The clip an Spydie hole made deploying a knife fast as hell. For a young SPC take couldn't afford an auto that was enough. I'm faster with the Spydie then any auto I've been issued or bought. Others have come an gone, but Spyderco has been in my pocket since 26 Apr 1988.
 
im a new convert, bought my first one this month.

i always disliked the looks of the vast majority of spyderco knives, to me they just looked cheap, i knew they werent but they reminded of the $0.99 keychain lockback knives you see at the checkout stand in a bucket. I did really like all the different steel types they offered, most knife companies only have two or three types of steel they use on their production knives (not counting limited edition versions) but with spyderco you have tons of choices.

on my higher end knives I have ones in elmax (ZT0801) M390 (ZT0770-M390) and D2 (kershaw composite blade Rake) S30V (benchmade hunt 15008). I had been wanting to get a knife in either s90v or s110v for a while but i didnt have much luck finding a decent priced folder in either of those steels. That is until i came across the manix 2 lightweight which i found for $112. Well at that price i just could pass it up regardless of my feelings towards the looks. i figured it was worth a try, and dispite the looks i had wanted to try a spyderco knife just to see what all the fuss was about...i mean hey they would have to be really good knives in order for people to be able to get past their looks :-) haha

I am very happy i desided to give them a try, so far im very happy with my manix 2, im even starting to like the looks of it! which was something i never thought would happen, i figured at best i would learn to put up with the looks. The only problem is now that i like them i have just added a bunch of knives to my wish list that weren't previously on it. i think my next one is going to be a black southard in CTS 204P or a different spyderco flipper since flippers are my preferred method of blade deployment. I would also like to try ZDP-189

For those that dont like the looks of spydercos i highly reccomend you barrow or buy one to try out....thats the only way to give it a fair chance. I am probably going to buy a tenacious that i can lend to others (friends and co-workers or forum members that dont know anyone they can barrow one from) I really wish someone had done that for me years ago which would have prevented me from turning my back on an awesome company. I think spyderco should do as many pass-around knives for people who dont like spyderco as they can. I bet a minimum of 25%(probably a lot more but i figured i should be conservative) would end up buying one after trying it out for a week.
 
303_enfield said:
The Spydie hole was the cats ass in 1988. Before that I was carrying a Buck 110 with "the stud" installed an a SAK. The clip an Spydie hole made deploying a knife fast as hell. For a young SPC take couldn't afford an auto that was enough. I'm faster with the Spydie then any auto I've been issued or bought. Others have come an gone, but Spyderco has been in my pocket since 26 Apr 1988.
Click to expand...

how on earth do you remember the exact date? i would be lucky if i could narrow it down to the correct year :-) lol
 
BenchCo Spydermade said:
OK, so for me I hated them at first. Didn't like the looks and thought frn was cheap crap. Between those two I never even gave them a sideways glance for years.

Then my father got a centofante 3. Still didn't respect it. I remember thinking he wasted his money but being too polite to tell him. Then he got a sage (the carbon fiber one). I liked it and recognized its quality, but I didn't find their designs attractive.

When they came out w the manix 2 I needed in. I actually loved how it looked and it had a lock I didn't have yet that seemed great.

I got the s30v saber ground g10 version. I loved it and was learning about the benefits of ffg blades and eventually lead me to the lightweight bd1 version. This is the knife that finished completely converting me to a spyderco fan.

I loved the ffg blade and surprisingly loved the lightweight scales too. I soon after got a dragonfly and many more spydercos!

Now I love their designs and have a hard time remembering there was ever a time I didn't!
Click to expand...


have you gotten the S110V version? i think that knife is the best value of all my high-end knives. It is just a tremendous deal, you get a ton of knife for the money
 
my introduction to knives came on youtube while watching gun reviews. stumbled across a few guys doing knife review videos. my previous exposure to knives pretty much came from SAKs and kitchen knives, so to be honest Spydercos didn't seem any weirder looking to me than ZTs, Benchmades, Kershaws, or Bucks. I have pretty large hands (motorcycle and work glove size XL) and heard great things about the PM2 and Manix 2, and lots of good things about S30V steel, so I went ahead and got them both, and have never looked back since.

not to say that I automatically like all of the Spyderco knives, there are some goofy looking ones out there, but the brand definitely has my respect for putting out excellently designed, excellently manufactured products at fair prices.
 
I've carried a SAK since before I was in middle school- as the son of a farmer, it comes with the territory. I started looking at other knives last year, starting with Kershaw and Zero Tolerance. Tried out a few designs, liked a few, but with a few minor exceptions I could never escape the nagging feeling that they just didn't slice as well as my SAK. It wasn't a huge deal, and pocket clips, longer edge retention, and a comfortable grip more than made up for the lack of slicey-ness. I played around with a friend's Delica and Squeak last year and while I was not impressed by the grip (still not a huge Delica fan), I really liked the thin flat-ground blades as they were very reminiscent of the slicing power of a SAK or Opinel and while I still thought they were ugly as sin, I could really appreciate them for their utilitarian design. My favorite knives at the time were Kershaws and ZTs, but with a few minor exceptions, they were all compromises between aesthetics and ergonomics- which is largely (IMO) what Ken Onion does best. However, much as I enjoyed the hobby aspect of knife collecting, my farmer's roots are still prevalent- when I think knife I think tool, and when I want a tool, I want the most functional and ergonomic option available. So I traded for a Manix LW in S110v. To be honest I'm trying to get rid of it now (it's just too wide for easy carrying despite the light weight) but it opened my eyes to the functional design and cutting capabilities of many of Spyderco's products. The handles may not always be the "nicest" materials, but they're textured enough for a proper grip, the pocket clips are always functional, there's jimping in the right places, and they easily open in one hand. Simple construction is good too, especially on the farm, where enough dirt and gunk builds up that I usually have to wash my tools daily.

The short version? When I pick up a Spyderco, I tend to think about how it would perform as a tool. When I pick up a Kershaw or Benchmade, I think about the abstract elements- design, appearance, coloration, etc. Doesn't mean they can't perform similarly, it's just what I've grown used to.
 
Great thread!
Much of it echoes exactly what I've been saying for some time now. Definitely an aquired taste for many.
Once you use a Spyderco you realize first-hand the brilliance in ergos and function.
Fits very well with the Japanese outlook of Kinoubi.
 
It all started with a Red FRN Endura with the integral pocket clip. I wish I still had that knife.
 
I went to the gun store, and saw a plain edged Spyderco Police.
I picked it up, opened it, and said "Neat!"
Then I bought it. :)
 
Since the '70's I have owned Schrade, Camillus, Ka-Bar, Imperial, Buck, Gerber (pre-Fiskars) , Cold Steel ( Camillus made) , Case, Benchmade ,Kerhaw, ZT, and a few others I probably can't remember. The only Spyderco I had owned was a s30v Native I bought at Walmart years back. Didn't like it, gave it away.

After getting bored with my ZT ti framelocks I decided to change things up a bit. So last November I picked up a PM2 to try out. I now have 5 Spydercos with one more on the way.
 
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For me it was reading everyone on here saying how great they were. I bought a Manix 2lw to see what all the fuss was about. Didn't really care for it much so I got the tenacious, this felt better, but still couldn't see what was so special. Then I got a delica 4. WOW, I finally understood. Next came the native. Now looking to get a sage or a chaparral.
 
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