Spyderco Tenacious - my take on it

[Kwon Kwang]

I agree, Nic. That's a very smart thing to do, and were I to go into a survival or tactical environment, I would be putting one of my tantos or my Gurkha Kukri on my belt before clipping a folder to my pocket.

if your planning on needing to stab someone with your folding knife, you should get gun and use your knife for cutting things. You guys who are worried about tactical sitiations whatch too many movies. your never going to stab anyone with your knife.

I've never been in a car crash, I guess that means I don't need to worry about the quality of my car's seat belt and air bags...

 

[Murdamook]

I agree, Nic. That's a very smart thing to do, and were I to go into a survival or tactical environment, I would be putting one of my tantos or my Gurkha Kukri on my belt before clipping a folder to my pocket.



I've never been in a car crash, I guess that means I don't need to worry about the quality of my car's seat belt and air bags...

A seat belt and air bags are there for the purpose of a car crash. Good attempt, but give me a break. Most knife companies would consider battoning and spine-whacking abuse.

Seriously, the seat belt/airbag comparison is the most absurd analogy I have ever come in contact with on this forum. A person voiced their opinion and you tried to be a smart ass; you failed miserably. If you're going to be snarky, at least use a comparison that makes sense. Your analogy is equivalent if you stated something along the lines of, "I have never been in a car crash, I guess that means I don't need these bungie chords I use for as seat belt proxy." Use the tool for its designed use. I would wager you pry with a screw driver as well.

 

[Kwon Kwang]

A seat belt and air bags are there for the purpose of a car crash. Good attempt, but give me a break. Most knife companies would consider battoning and spine-whacking abuse.

Seriously, the seat belt/airbag comparison is the most absurd analogy I have ever come in contact with on this forum. A person voiced their opinion and you tried to be a smart ass; you failed miserably. If you're going to be snarky, at least use a comparison that makes sense. Your analogy is equivalent if you stated something along the lines of, "I have never been in a car crash, I guess that means I don't need these bungie chords I use for as seat belt proxy." Use the tool for its designed use. I would wager you pry with a screw driver as well.

So it's not really important to have good safety features as long as you don't abuse your knife?

 

[Murdamook]

So it's not really important to have good safety features as long as you don't abuse your knife?

Argumentum ad absurdum. Keep trying. The safety features exist for normal use, not abuse. If you're going to reply, do it without logical fallacies.

 

[Kwon Kwang]

Argumentum ad absurdum. Keep trying. The safety features exist for normal use, not abuse. If you're going to reply, do it without logical fallacies.

Those safety features are not very useful if they can't handle sudden unexpected abuse. What's the point of even having a lock if it can't keep the freaking knife from lopping your fingers off?

 

[Murdamook]

Those safety features are not very useful if they can't handle sudden unexpected abuse.

You are clearly having trouble understanding things. A shotgun has a safety, but isn't drop safe. By your logic, that safety is useless because I can't slam it stock first on to cement without blowing my face off. I suppose slip joints are useless as well because the spring tension that acts as a safety isn't reliable in the "sudden impact" scenario? Again, if you want a knife with a lock that will never fail, get a fixed blade.

 

[quigibo]

You are clearly having trouble understanding things. A shotgun has a safety, but isn't drop safe. By your logic, that safety is useless because I can't slam it stock first on to cement without blowing my face off. I suppose slip joints are useless as well because the spring tension that acts as a safety isn't reliable in the "sudden impact" scenario? Again, if you want a knife with a lock that will never fail, get a fixed blade.

This x 10^1000

 

[Kwon Kwang]

You are clearly having trouble understanding things. A shotgun has a safety, but isn't drop safe. By your logic, that safety is useless because I can't slam it stock first on to cement without blowing my face off. I suppose slip joints are useless as well because the spring tension that acts as a safety isn't reliable in the "sudden impact" scenario? Again, if you want a knife with a lock that will never fail, get a fixed blade.

Someone should make a drop safe shotgun, then.

As you can probably tell, slipjoints are not to my taste. I carry a SAK but it is never the first knife I reach for when I need to cut something.

Why? Because I do carry a knife with a lock that will never fail. That's a story for another forum, however, and I want to emphasize that while the Tenacious has a weak liner lock, I have faith in Spyderco as a company and I do believe that their other folders are up to snuff. As I've mentioned, I'm getting me a Manix 2.

 

[Murdamook]

Someone should make a drop safe shotgun, then.

As you can probably tell, slipjoints are not to my taste. I carry a SAK but it is never the first knife I reach for when I need to cut something.

Why? Because I do carry a knife with a lock that will never fail. That's a story for another forum, however, and I want to emphasize that while the Tenacious has a weak liner lock, I have faith in Spyderco as a company and I do believe that their other folders are up to snuff. As I've mentioned, I'm getting me a Manix 2.

Unless you carry a fixed blade, you don't carry a knife with a lock that is fail safe. If you like abusing knives, that's your prerogative. Don't get mad when the lock fails due to misuse.

 

[joeyza]

agreed i love my tenacious, best value knife i own

 

[Kwon Kwang]

Unless you carry a fixed blade, you don't carry a knife with a lock that is fail safe. If you like abusing knives, that's your prerogative. Don't get mad when the lock fails due to misuse.

I don't like abusing knives, but I know that if my knife takes an unexpected hit for whatever reason, my fingers will be safe because I only carry folders with strong, proven locks. I will be adding a Manix 2 to this rotation, and perhaps an Endura as well.

 

[Murdamook]

I don't like abusing knives, but I know that if my knife takes an unexpected hit for whatever reason, my fingers will be safe because I only carry folders with strong, proven locks. I will be adding a Manix 2 to this rotation, and perhaps an Endura as well.

Okay, so now the liner lock isn't a proven system? My Tenacious has been thrashed on and has never failed. For the record, the Endura has inherent vertical play due to the lock design. You probably wouldn't like it.

 

[Kwon Kwang]

Okay, so now the liner lock isn't a proven system? My Tenacious has been thrashed on and has never failed. For the record, the Endura has inherent vertical play due to the lock design. You probably wouldn't like it.

When the liner lock is designed properly, it isn't terrible, but is far from ideal. When it is designed improperly, as it is on the Tenacious, light bonks on the spine (not even full spine whacks) cause the lock to fail.

I've done my research and, by contrast, I'm fairly convinced Spyderco knows what they're doing with a modern classic like the Endura 4.

 

[thebrain]

The improperly designed lock on the Tenacious is the same overall locking liner design that is featured in thousands of knives ranging from 40 cents to ten thousand dollars. I have two examples of the Tenacious and one had a "weaker" liner lock and I took it apart and bent it some and now it works perfectly and will pass all but the most extreme spine whacks , it has less blade play than some fixed blades I have owned and 40 percent lockup . Sometimes when you buy a knife (or anything really) you get a bad one ,no big deal return it/fix it yourself or throw it away as a lesson learned.

 

[Murdamook]

When the liner lock is designed properly, it isn't terrible, but is far from ideal. When it is designed improperly, as it is on the Tenacious, light bonks on the spine (not even full spine whacks) cause the lock to fail.

I've done my research and, by contrast, I'm fairly convinced Spyderco knows what they're doing with a modern classic like the Endura 4.

The liner lock is a excellent lock design; some would say it's better than the back lock or the frame lock.

 

[Kwon Kwang]

The liner lock is a excellent lock design; some would say it's better than the back lock or the frame lock.

I think that just based on physics, those "some" would be very, very wrong. After my experience with my Tenacious, I'll only trust the best-designed liner locks with proven strength, like the leaf spring lock on Cold Steel's Ti-Lite.

 

[seelow123]

Have you made any attempt at contacting Spyderco's Customer Serve Dept.? You probably just got a defective Tenacious. I've had three tenacious's and a persistence they were all perfect.

 

[jbmonkey]

I think that just based on physics, those "some" would be very, very wrong. After my experience with my Tenacious, I'll only trust the best-designed liner locks with proven strength, like the leaf spring lock on Cold Steel's Ti-Lite.

There is allot of opinions on liner locks....best article i ever read on them by Bernard Levine breaks apart the linerblock as a weak design...when done properly....and in the testing of walkers liner lock design it beat traditional lock backs.....

http://www.knife-expert.com/liners.txt

 

[Kwon Kwang]

Have you made any attempt at contacting Spyderco's Customer Serve Dept.? You probably just got a defective Tenacious. I've had three tenacious's and a persistence they were all perfect.

It failed because of abuse, not normal use. I would expect Spyderco's CS to laugh at me if I called them about it, and rightfully so.

There is allot of opinions on liner locks....best article i ever read on them by Bernard Levine breaks apart the linerblock as a weak design...when done properly....and in the testing of walkers liner lock design it beat traditional lock backs.....

http://www.knife-expert.com/liners.txt

What the article says contrasts with what I have seen about liner locks. Maybe Mr. Walker had a good thing going which wasn't properly imitated by future users of the liner lock design.

 

[Freman Bloodglaive]

There is allot of opinions on liner locks....best article i ever read on them by Bernard Levine breaks apart the linerblock as a weak design...when done properly....and in the testing of walkers liner lock design it beat traditional lock backs.....

http://www.knife-expert.com/liners.txt

In 1984.

No doubt it can be a very strong lock, but there are other strong lock designs around today too. The Axis lock, or Spyderco's ball lock in the Manix knives looks pretty solid. Obviously there's also the Tri-Ad variant of the lockback. However, that said the linerlock "breaking" by jamming the blade open can be considered a safety feature.

That said, there's a Resilience in my pocket.