Recommendation? Italian type manual stilettos

[MTHall720]

I just recently acquired a large CS Tilite from a forum brother and love it!! Now I'm wondering what brands offer a fairly lower priced (street value of around 75.00 ish) with the following characteristics:
1) Classic Italian styling/looks
2) Manual, yet easy opening
3) Large 11 inches OAL or even 13 inch
4) Scales of wood or synthetic but not really cheap plastic
5) Looking for used from the 70's through the 9O's

Thanks in advance for any thoughts on this.

 

[Sosa]

Oj Simpson likes kissing krane

 

[MTHall720]

Thanks. Good to know.

 

[JPD1998]

Falcon Knives makes nice manual stilettos.
They're still made in a small shop in Italy. But don't expect perfection.

IMO their 9" stiletto with stag scales are the nicest, but they make an 11" too.

 

[sam eib]

BudK usually has the kissingcrane stilettos in stock.

 

[MTHall720]

Thanks very much everyone.

 

[Charlie Mike]

Burn Knives makes them.

 

[Sosa]

Ok the budk thing threw some red flags. Me and OJ’s kissing cranes are made in Germany. Seems likely the brand got sold to frost or Smokey mountain. No recommend the China made

 

[SpySmasher]

Burn Knives makes them.

They look interesting! (The knives, I mean, not the MySpace-esqe website. ) Have you handled any, CM?

 

[Charlie Mike]

Yes, I've owned a couple of his custom autos.

 

[SpySmasher]

Yes, I've owned a couple of his custom autos.

Nice. I suddenly have more knives I want.

 

[tltt]

The Kissing Cranes of the 80's - early 2000's were made by Falcon for them. They were really just cleaned up a bit, and shipped out from Germany. Sometimes if you pull them apart, they're stamped Italy on the liner(s). I guess it got too expensive to do that, so they moved everything to China.

Falcon is still the big name in them, unless you wade through Ebay for a vintage Rosco, GC Co, or similar.

 

[brownshoe]

Ok the budk thing threw some red flags. Me and OJ’s kissing cranes are made in Germany. Seems likely the brand got sold to frost or Smokey mountain. No recommend the China made

A lot, if not all, of Kissing Crane knives marked Stilleto with the traditional look are actually Italian in origin. I have an OJ era one and its still in use. Not the hardest steel but sufficient. I agree the older knives are a lot better than the current ones, but they were more expensive.

 

[Sidehill Gouger]

Ok the budk thing threw some red flags. Me and OJ’s kissing cranes are made in Germany. Seems likely the brand got sold to frost or Smokey mountain. No recommend the China made

They were never made in Germany despite what the blade stamp might say. Europeans have different standards for country of origin. They all came from Italy.

 

[Sosa]

Thanks for the info. Who woulda thunk

 

[surfer]

Kissing Crane / Klaas Stilettos are made by Frank Beltrame from Maniago Italy.
At least the ones sold in germany in die early 90ies.
A knifemaker family with a long history.