I just got mine in the mail yesterday (thanks Brian
) so any comments I make are really only first impressions and you can take them at a suitable discount.
I like its looks a lot. Its a really pretty little tool with a lot of coolness value. I like the size and weight, both of which are small. It's about the same length as the Toyota key on the same keyring. It arrived sharp. It has a pivot screw rather than a rivet, which is good. A rivet would certainly loosen over time. The screw will too, but it can be retightened. All the screws have Allen (hex) recesses, which is good since Allen keys seem to be easier to find and cheaper than Torx.
I wouldn't call it stiff, but the action is relatively tight, which is probably good since you don't want it opening by accident. OTOH, it's not really easy to open this knife with one hand, both because of the tightness and because of the small size.
I put it onto my keyring right away, but I'm not yet convinced that I like it there. The clip does not seem to be removable. Or at least the clip can only be removed by taking the whole thing apart, since the pivot screw goes right through it. You would then want some piece of material to make up for the thickness of the clip in the pivot assembly. The clip would be handy if I wanted a money clip, but I don't. I also don't think that I would want to clip this knife on the edge of my pocket. And for a keyring knife, the clip is worse than useless. It just adds thickness for no purpose. I've moved it to various positions on the keyring in an attempt to make it less ob- and in- trusive, but none of them have struck me as fully satisfactory yet.
I may take the clip off if I can find a washer of the right thickness to replace it, but the alternative of turning the clip itself into a washer by cutting off the rest doesn't appeal to me since I may want the clip again someday. (Unlikely but possible)
Overall, I like the knife (or at least I want to), but I would definitely not want it to be the only knife I'm carrying. If I were to carry only one knife of this general size, I suppose I would buy a LadyBug (if they came with a plain edge) or go back to a "traditional" pocketknife.
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Paul Neubauer
prn@bsu.edu