How I got into the knife hobby

Lord_Balkan

Lord_Balkan

Joined
Aug 25, 2016
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How did you guys get into the knife hobby? Share your experiences! I imagine most people started out young.

I wasn't into knives until recently (about a year ago).

I am a software engineer in the video game industry. I mostly work with designers on gameplay and gameplay systems. I am also an avid gamer. I think Counter Strike GO skins was a gateway drug to knife collecting for me. I was going through some things (305 pounds, depressed, lonely etc). I got through my day with overeating myself into a sleep coma every day. It wasn't healthy.

I started going on a diet and counting calories about a year ago. An unintended side effect was not really knowing how to deal with my stress, since the way I dealt with it was by eating. I couldn't do that anymore because of the diet. Drinking was a no-go as well since alcohol has quite a few calories. I didn't know how to deal with things.

I randomly asked my friend about a pocket knife, for a couple of reasons.. I liked gadgets because I am an engineer at heart, and I liked the idea of preparedness. I am also the type to do research on the products I buy. As soon as I stumbled upon youtubers like ApostleP, NickShabazz and bladeforums... I was hooked. The community reminded me of the gaming communities I was apart of in the early 2000s. Small, passionate, eccentric. I found a new niche I could sink my time in, learn all the lingo, and be a part of a hobby that brings me joy (I picked up this phrase thanks to NickShabazz).

Anyway, this along with couple of other hobbies and niches I was able to pick up, I have completely turned my life around. I have lost over 100 pounds since last year, and am in a much better place. I don't know if I can say it is because of the knife hobby, but it sure helped.
 
Glad to hear that you snapped out of it and congratulations on the weight loss.

Back in maybe 2006 or 2007 my wife was giving me some suggestions on what to get her for Christmas. One of her suggestions was a Swiss Army Knife. I had started a small collection about 25 years earlier but I lost all of them in a house fire, including my EDC. I bought one more knife to carry and gave up on collecting.

It wasn't my wife who got me into knives back then but it was her gift suggestion that got me interested in them again 25 years later. Shopping for that SAK was fun and I decided that she wasn't the only one who was going to get a new knife. I've been on a roll ever since.
 
Great job on the weight loss!

Both my father and mother owned farms. I basically grew up on a farm and had to use edged implements as a child. Tarzan movies and the boy scouts basically planted the knife hobby seed in me. I had a few knives as a child like fake SAK's and locally made hunting knives. I basically carried a bali everyday when I was in college.

A few years ago(during an election weapons ban), I couldn't bring my belt blade to the farm and started looking online for a good pocket knife. I found BF and Spyderco forums.

The rest is(spending)history. ;)
 
Lord_Balkan said:
Anyway, this along with couple of other hobbies and niches I was able to pick up, I have completely turned my life around. I have lost over 100 pounds since last year, and am in a much better place. I don't know if I can say it is because of the knife hobby, but it sure helped.
Click to expand...

Congrats on the weight loss! That's not easy. :thumbsup:

What was the first knife you picked up? What's your favorite knife? Any photos to share? :D
 
Awesome life change LB.

I have been plumbing since 2001,
I've always had a mt on me and I always bought those cheap Walmart "special sale" knives.
My wife gave me a kershaw blur as my first Father's Day gift in 07. And had that for 9 years until last year when I was watching Forged in fire and decided to look into knives and discovered BF. I have learned so much since then and have also started a small knife collection (my wife hates me).
It's addicting, enjoyable and somewhat de stressing.

Andy
 
Practically born into it. :) Watched my grandfather whittle, he started helping me whittle at about 3-4 and at five I had my own knife. My mom still says she's "never been madder than coming to pick you up and you were sitting on the curb by yourself whittling a stick at five years old with no one watching you."
Got my first Swiss Army Knife at seven and a new one every few years after that. Paddled in 5th grade for a buck folder, suspended in High School a few times, always carried a knife even the day after.

Never stopped.
 
I saw my first pocket knife when I was playing in my grandfather's cellar. It was an old scout knife. Even though I was only 5, I knew I had to have it. I asked him for it and he gave it to me. From that time on I have always collected, carried, and used knives. I don't have any of the knives I had as a kid but still have most of what I bought since high school. No one I knew was a "knife guy" so all of my preferences and everything I've learned about knives was from trial and error.
 
Congratulations on losing 100lbs! That's absolutely amazing! Buy that man a custom!

I remember my dad receiving some weird mail order 'box o stuff' for like $20 way back in the early 80s. I must have been around 8. Among many other random household items, all made in China, was a POS "Rambo" knife complete with all the survival gear in the handle. You could access the handle by screwing off that, yes you guessed it, crappy compass cap. There were waterproof matches, fishing hooks, some line, couple other items I'm forgetting. What I DO remember is spending hours upon hours attempting to sharpen it with the sharpening stone that fits in the sheath. I'm not sure my sharpening skills have improved much since then, but I sure am choosier about which knives I spend my time with. This planted the seed. Sure wish I knew where it was right now...

Then my uncle gave my dad this sweet Boker folder. I didn't realize until then that some knives are better than others. So I learned about Kershaw and Gerber. SAK, of course.

Well enter SOG.That's special operations gear... right? Well as teenager, I wanted THE BEST! And anything the Navy SEALS use must be good enough for me! So I bought a SOG Pentagon Elite. Years later, I was heartbroken to learn that they didn't actually use that knife. But whatever... it's still a sweet knife and to this day has spent the most time in my pocket.

Since then, it's been a steady increase in interest and acquisition of knowledge. And knives. I like some of my knives more than I like some of my friends. There's definitely an acknowledgment that I seem to like knives more than is reasonable. But I don't really care. Knives are endlessly cool. Practically. Physically. Historically. Culturally. Etc. Joining Bladeforums has shown me the depth of this craft. It's provided me with a social outlet with people who are just as unreasonably infatuated with knives as I am!

I would have missed out on tons of quality life moments if my dad hadn't bought that 'box o' junk' way back in the 80s.

It's about the knives. But for me it's more about the people. Well, the knife people anyway!

;)
 
Lord_Balkan said:
How did you guys get into the knife hobby? Share your experiences! I imagine most people started out young.

I wasn't into knives until recently (about a year ago).

I am a software engineer in the video game industry. I mostly work with designers on gameplay and gameplay systems. I am also an avid gamer. I think Counter Strike GO skins was a gateway drug to knife collecting for me. I was going through some things (305 pounds, depressed, lonely etc). I got through my day with overeating myself into a sleep coma every day. It wasn't healthy.

I started going on a diet and counting calories about a year ago. An unintended side effect was not really knowing how to deal with my stress, since the way I dealt with it was by eating. I couldn't do that anymore because of the diet. Drinking was a no-go as well since alcohol has quite a few calories. I didn't know how to deal with things.

I randomly asked my friend about a pocket knife, for a couple of reasons.. I liked gadgets because I am an engineer at heart, and I liked the idea of preparedness. I am also the type to do research on the products I buy. As soon as I stumbled upon youtubers like ApostleP, NickShabazz and bladeforums... I was hooked. The community reminded me of the gaming communities I was apart of in the early 2000s. Small, passionate, eccentric. I found a new niche I could sink my time in, learn all the lingo, and be a part of a hobby that brings me joy (I picked up this phrase thanks to NickShabazz).

Anyway, this along with couple of other hobbies and niches I was able to pick up, I have completely turned my life around. I have lost over 100 pounds since last year, and am in a much better place. I don't know if I can say it is because of the knife hobby, but it sure helped.
Click to expand...
Congrats on turning over a new leaf. As long as filling the old void isn't making you broke.....its a progressive disease. Then enjoy and welcome to the life! I drink and I knife.....I'm screwed:confused:
 
Wan't a hobby when I started, I'm a mechanic/machinist/tradesman so I've carried a knife as a room for a good part of my life. As early as about 7 or 8 when I got my first gun and first motorcycle.

It turned into a hobby when people started giving me knives they'd found and I started to fill boxes up with old knives.
 
extrastout said:
Congrats on turning over a new leaf. As long as filling the old void isn't making you broke.....its a progressive disease. Then enjoy and welcome to the life! I drink and I knife.....I'm screwed:confused:
Click to expand...

I haven't been the greatest with this... It doesn't help that I am single, no kids, no responsibilities and a well-enough paying job. I am looking for a relationship so my purchases can be tamed, haha. I started getting some decent pens and watches too.
 
I think I got my first pocket knife when I was a Cub Scout. I also learned about non-locking slip joints when I was a Cub Scout, carving a Jack-O-Lantern. I've had a knife in my pocket, on my belt, or clipped to a pocket ever since.
 
Lord_Balkan said:
I haven't been the greatest with this... It doesn't help that I am single, no kids, no responsibilities and a well-enough paying job. I am looking for a relationship so my purchases can be tamed, haha. I started getting some decent pens and watches too.
Click to expand...

There are women that like guns and knives too my friend!
 
Ninja craze 80s when Benchmade was still Bali-Song and a number of local shops were selling nunchaku, shuriken and butterfly knives. Was too young to buy, so I snipped a bunch of hira shuriken (throwing stars) out of spare sheet metal and walked around town with a handful of 16d common nails in place of bo shuriken (throwing darts). Nunchaku were easy to obtain from one of the many kung-fu/karate dojos operating in the area. But no one would sell me a knife until I came across a mail-order catalog featuring the Benchmade Leopard Cub. No age verification was required short of marking off a checkbox confirming that I was indeed 18 years of age or older (I was not). The Leopard Cub was over $100 at the time and constituted my initial foray into the world of knives.
 
I have no idea what attracted me to knives but I was into them early. When I was 3 or 4 years old I found a broken toenail clipper that had lost the lever but still had the little swing-out nail file. I told everyone that it was my pocket knife. My mom eventually let me have my first folder when I was in elementary school as long as I agreed to join the cub scouts (presumably to learn how to use the damn thing safely). I only agreed in order to get the knife. I've carried a folding knife of one kind or another ever since. (I grew up in the 80s when kids were actually allowed to carry knives to school!)
 
Congradulations on dropping that weight! I know how tempting those ice creams can be at the worst of times!

I had always been interested in knives, swords (especially Japanese swords, I was born in the late 80s after all) or any type of weapons like firearms. I was interested and I wanted them, and my mom did not want me to have them. I had no means to afford them anyway really.

My first real knife that wasn't a cheapo I got in a souvenier shop was a Buck 110 I got for my Bar Mitzvah. My father promptly stole that from me.

When I was abit older and now had a job I bought a SoG Flash Tanto II (which I thought was frickin' awesome at the time) then a Kershaw Blur, then a green Spyderco Endura.

So begins the story of a knife addict.
 
Although I had other micro knives when I was younger, it wasn't until I took my first job at 15 that I started really using a knife. It was actually a Sog Paratool. Although I used that MT for just about everything, I ended up replacing it with a regular Stanley box cutter for work. I was working both in the vegetable section at the grocery store and at a speaker manufacturer throughout most of high school. I used that box cutter on crates the size of a VW Bug, and would use the Sog MT for some hobbies at home. Even though I carried it while working for the speaker manufacturer I would always use the tools they supplied.

I spent a summer in CA for summer school before my regular college started. Walking around Palo Alto and Berkely, I picked up a few things from the local shops. They had some unique knives in local stores there (back then). I picked up a few fantasy knives and an inexpensive butterfly knife. A student from Korea taught me the basics of opening and closing the butterfly knife, and I was hooked. Unfortunately, after moving around so many times for college over the years, most of my knives were lost (kind of a stupid story).

While living in certain states, I started shooting as a hobby. At the time, ammo wasn't so expensive, and there were a couple outdoor ranges I could go to and bring friends. After a time, I moved back to IL, ammo prices went through the roof, no close outdoor ranges, and I made that an opportunity to get back into knives (and MT's) again.
 
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