Pacific Salt Passaround

[johnniet]

I've never owned an Endura, so some of my observations will be old news to most of you. I was amazed how light the Pacific Salt is. My kitchen scale says 3 oz. I barely felt it in my back pocket, even sitting down.

I'm not used to 4" blades or to tip-up carry, so opening it was a little awkward at first. After a couple of days they were second nature. On EDC duty, it got to cut some string, paper and tape--nice and sharp. I like the 1/2" of plain edge near the point on an otherwise serrated knife.

The Pacific Salt has an H1 blade, which is supposed to be immune to rust. I hoped to go sea kayaking with it, but that didn't work out. But I did go swimming with it this weekend. Just clipped it IWB into my suit. Even against skin, I hardly noticed it. It was also comfortable IWB while I practiced kayak rolls in the pool.

To keep the test honest, I had an old Cricket (ATS-55) in my suit pocket, also getting soaked. Neither one showed any signs of rust after an hour in the water. Apparently I didn't really test H1's remarkable properties.

I hope some of the other passaround members will get to test the Salt's corrosion resistance more thoroughly. But I can confirm that basic function, comfort, ergonomics and sharpness are up to Spyderco standards. In particular, if you ever wished you could take a knife with you in your swimming suit, this one will work beautifully.

 

[frank k]

Thanks for the excellent review!


The Pacific Salt is very much like the Endura except for the blade shape and steel. The Pacific Salt dose have a larger Spyder hole, which I like, long with some traction grooves behind the hump which is another nice touch. The Pacific Salt’s handle is virtually the same as the Endura’s.


I have to complement Spyderco on their factory edges, they seem to be getting sharper and sharper. The Pacific Salt has the sharpest factory edge that I have ever seen for a serrated blade and the Spyderco Temperance that I bought recently had by far the sharpest factory plain edge.






- Frank

 

[Ming65]

I've had my Pacific Salt for a week now and the Salt1 for a month before that. By way of comparison, if I take my Military or Native with me for a day of work by the beach they will have tiny spots of rust by the next day - I haven't been brave enough to see what they would be like if I left them covered with salt water overnight but I did this with a Buck Diamondback and it pitted badly and now has rust under the handle on the tang. I left the H1 knives covered with salt water for a few days and apart from a slightly creamy discolouration that wipes off - there is no rust at all. Given that it performs relatively well in terms of sharpness and edge holding, I reckon the spydie H1 is amazing steel.

 

[Sigifrith]

Today was Salt day at work. I used it on cardboard boxes, strapping, 22 Guage phone wire, the spine of a 1" thick phone book, and any other scraps around work. It went thru everything with little or no effort.
With the blade up & right hand carry, I have no worries about it opening in my pocket. No large bodies of salt water here in Illinois, so I can't comment on that feature.
I'm not a big fan of serrated blades, & my only other is a Native. This is a lightweight, balanced blade that was very sharp out of the box. I'd prefer G-10 to the FRN handle, but then my Military is twice as expensive as the Salt.
Overall, a fine work knife, & no worries about rust!

 

[John Watson]

I don't have the Pacific Salt, but do have the Salt I. I took the Salt and a Boye BDC folder to the Gulf of Mexico for a week to carry while wade fishing. My son and I traded off carring one of the knives each day, spending several hours in the saltwater environment. Some days the knives got rinsed off but most times they were just taken out of our bathing suits and placed on the counter to dry. This was done purposly so I could evaluate the rust resistance of both knives.

I am pleased to say that both knives suffered no discoloration or pitting from being exposed to saltwater emersion over the five day period. I was also impressed with the fact that neither knife had any problems with the clips rusting either. The only negative, which wasn't a fault of the knife is the Boye BDC folder did get a bit gritty opening and closing from sand. This has happened with several knives used while wade fishing in the surf.

I can't speak to edge retention on either knife because neither knife was used hard. They were used mostly to open packages, cut monofiliment, and the like. Did use a Spyderco Catherman to filet two speckled trout and it did a fine job. Usually use an electric knife but with only two to clean decided to use the folder. Good to know it would do a good job if needed.

Spyderco's Salt or Pacific Salt would be good choices for use anywhere that you will be around saltwater or cannot clean your knives as you should.

 

[HoB]

Having had the Pacific for a week, I have really come to like this knife. When it arrived it had a little chip on the middle of the large scallops (nothing bad, just barely beyond the means of the sharpmaker) and it was maybe a little less tight in the pivot than I would have liked. Aside from that I really, really liked the knife.

Never held an Endura before, the Pacific seem large to me, but not in a sheeple scaring way. The handle fit my hand well and the blade seemed to have a very nice belly, not too much, not too little, just like I like it. Comparing it to my Delica, it turned out, that the curvature of the belly of the two knives is identical, but the belly of the Pacific appears to be more pronounce because of its greater length. The substantial thickness of the blade gives the Pacific a nice heft.

Seeing pictures of the Pacific, I really didn't care for the tip, in real life though I found that I prefer the Salt/Pacific tip over that of the Endura/Delica. The tip is still acute enough for any work that I intend to do, the tip shape increased the width of the blade a bit which I find more practical for camping like activities (spreading butter etc.).

Doing cutting tests on my favorite journal/magazine (favorite for cutting it up that is ), I found that the edge retention of the small plain edge part of the blade is indeed less than that of VG-10. Enough so, that there can be no doubt about it. I would say, about comparable to Spydercos Aus-6 just as Sal Glesser claimed. On the other hand it sharpens up just as nicely on the Sharpmaker as well and gets very quickly, very, very sharp. The SE edge is too hard to judge for me, I leave that to the experts.

The corrosion resistance I didn't really test either. After Mr. Glessers response to this thread:
http://www.spyderco.com/forum/topic...forum_title=General+Discussion&M=False&S=True
saying that H-1 didn't show any signs of rust in a 48 hour Q-fog test I decided that I wouldn't have the knife long enough to actually see any effects in a corrosion test (off hand I would claim, without much experimental data, that 48 hours in Q-fog translates to several times that just putting it in salt water or having it half covered with salt water), so I thought: forget that.

Bottom line: I really want one! I just don't know if I would rather have the Salt or the Pacific.

 

[fisherk]

I never really got to use this knife. I signed up mainly for the Vagabond half of this deal. With the kind of cutting I do, I don't have much need for a fully serrated blade. Also I have been so busy in work, that I never even got near any water. Sorry I can't provide a useful review.

Ken