A fixed blade. Plain and simple. The rest of this nonsense is exactly that. Nonsense. Any folding knife is simply a convenience tool, and you have to make concessions somewhere. You can change the goal post all you like (originally it was for armed defense, now weve decided its a survival tool), but the facts remain. If your mindset is such, you're better served with a fixed blade.
I do.
whatever you say. I guess Ernest Emerson, Michael Janovich, Lynn Thompson and others have no clue what they’re doing huh?
Lots of people cannot , or simply will not, carry a fixed blade most of the time .
I have several tools called "hammers," which do not (usually) unlock when striking an object. I don't use my KNIVES as hammers.Hi guys, I have recently acquired 2 of newer Microtechs - Amphibian and MSI, both features RAM lock. It works fine, locks good, fidget friendly, etc, but I have some doubts, which I want to discuss:
1. There are some videos posted already on Youtube, when lock fails if you hit a desk with blade's spine couple times - basically RAM lock disengages.
2. Thoughts on why RAM head does not go for the whole blade, when locked, only like a 5-6 mm, when it appeared to be able to move another 5-6 mm, so engagement would be like half an inch.
I see this on all videos, so it is not only on my knifes. I see one folk on Youtube even used to modify an engagement part of a blade to force RAM head lock further:
3. What is you experience with RAM lock comparing with others of same type. I still think, that Demko is king here with his Shark lock.
Cheers
It's designed for longevity, if it goes all the way forward, as soon as you put some wear on the lock it will develop vertical play. This gives it room to self adjust, you'll find this on all cross-bar locks or Axis locks. Most locks don't fully engage for the same reason, most framelocks are at 50% or under linerlocks too, it's all intended to allow for self adjustment as the blade and lock surfaces wear out.
I just bought this from my LKS, and I LOVE it. I'm a big Axis lock fan, but I do prefer the ram over it so far. The action is smoother, the need to "balance" the wear on spring isn't an issue, and it way it wedges onto the tang gives me a pretty good idea of how I can expect it to wear in over time.
I haven't used it hard, but after reading this thread, I wanted to give it a good once over. As it came out of the box, the lock up is tight with no blade play. It has not failed a spine whack test of 6 or 7 medium/hard smacks at various points along the spine (tip to just north of the thumb tab as well in kind of in the middle of the two). So, basically I hit it against a wood desk covered with a thin blanket about 20-ish times without failure. I wouldn't say they were HARD, but I would say that it held up to more strikes than any of the ZT framelocks that I had that slipped off their face being tested in a similar way.
I did try to keep the tests consistent. When I tested the lock up, I did so by gently thumbing the blade out instead of giving it a flick. I figured the flicking action may cause the ram to drive in a bit deeper. I wanted this knife to be locked up as little as possible. I also did a few strikes on the spine after engaging the the lock and really cranking it forward to see if it moved after I hit it on the desk. I experienced no failures, but the lock did walk back from the "super engaged" position to the "just locked as if thumbed open position" on the tang, so take that as you will.
I have not adjusted the pivot at all, but I may crank it slightly tighter. I tend to like my Adamas knives more solid than fidgety, and while this knife does not seem to fail spine whacks, its does swing out with a bit of a wrist flick. Still, the lock up even this loose is incredible for a $300 folder.
The pocket clip says that it was produced December of 2023.
Ooooohh, he said spine whack test...No issues to report here, about 20 spine whacks against the kitchen counter only resulted in odd glances from my wife.. Feels solid to me, awesome knife!
Borka Stitch Fluted Natural Clear Apocalyptic finish, build date 5/24
