A bit of history:
I have a pretty good knife collection that includes Strider, CRK, Benchmade, Spyderco, customs, lower end knives and stuff in between. After acquiring customs and high-end productions I didnt stop looking for lower end knives that I consider to be a good value.
I check ebay from time to time, to see what knives are on the market there. I have noticed many custom Thai knives listed. They look pretty good and use good materials. The topic about Thai knives have come up in the past, but I couldnt find any reviews. I found one knife that I liked for $122 shipped and started to consider what Ive got to gain and what Ive got to loose. No brand recognition, possibly lower resell value and questionable quality one one side. Good materials, original design, custom limited production on the other side. I was thinking about putting this knife in use, so I didnt really care about the resell value. Quality was still in question, Since there were a lot of good feedbacks on ebay, and in my understanding quality control on a homemade custom wouldnt pass a faulty knife, I decided that was good enough for me.
Blade thickness was stated to be 1/8 (3mm). It looked thinner on the picture. Also after seeing many knives with bad lockups, I asked seller to clarify this and to send some pictures if possible. I got a reply that Im quoting:
Dear customer,
blade is well made with very firm, it is D2 and it is really close to 1/8 or normally we call 1/8 but it is fomal thick of the blade sheet in Thailand. It is a goodvknife.
No pictures, but at least a confirmation that everything is good.
Paying $122, I didnt expect to get a sebenza or something similar, and was looking for just a good useable knife. So I pulled the trigger and got it and the auction starting price.
Here is the actual review.
First the good stuff  I liked the design (you might not) and materials. Actually I expected to like those to begin with.
Design is pretty good. This is the main reason why I have chosen this knife. It looks a bit unusual. At least the design is not very common. The whole thing reminds me of the Yuna custom (another Thai), maybe even Hinderer XM-18 a bit because of the choil and blade grind.
Handle is very comfy, feels great both in straight and reverse grip. Handle lines are a bit pointy for my taste, but still ok. Rosewood looks good. Buffalo horn boslters arent bad either.
I like the blade shape too. Even though Im not a big fan of recurve tanto style, it looks nice (at least to me). There are a lot of discussions about pros and cons of the blade style, so Im not going to go into this. The blade keeps its thickness almost to the tip, so it can withstand some abuse and this is what I liked about it.
I also like blade steel (D2), so it was a plus for me.
Now the bad. QUALITY. Oh man, where to start ..
I wasnt expecting CRK, but I really thought it will be better than some $10 crap knife.
First and the biggest problem is the lock up. Oh my . UP-DOWN blade play. Lock bar goes all the way to the other side. The blade stops (thumbstuds) arent stopping blade where they should. The bolster area that gets in contact with bladestops isnt even. Right side is not on the same level as the left side. Both bolster sides dont have any cutouts for bladestops, so with time lockup will be even worse.
But wait, there is more The lock bar somehow is twice thinner than the liner! The liner isnt thick to begin with, but the thickness of the lockbar is just a joke. My only thought is that when they discovered that lockup is bad, they tried to deform (extend) the lockbar by hammering it. Also the thumbstuds (bladestops) have marks like they were manipulated with pliers. After I saw all this, I just couldnt believe that I see this on a $100+ knife.
At this point I already made the decision that knife is going back to where it came from.
Well surprises didnt stop there. The bolts used to attach scale to the liner are too long. At some places they almost made contact with the blade. Also the bolster bolts were not tightened all the way, either because they would stop the blade, or because they were overlooked of because of some other problem. The result is that there is a big gap between scale and the liner.
Knife is very stiff. I could barely flick it out using the flipper and the wrist action. I didnt even try to adjust it, because at that point I have gave up on it already.
Further some minor flaws that I couldve lived with:
The blade is not 1/8 (3 mm) thick. It is about 2 mm. It is ok, probably even good, if knife is used for light cutting, but for Hard use and some abuse I would rather have 1/8. It is really not a big deal, but it only shows that advertised specs are not correct. As a matter of fact, when asked specifically about the thickness, no right answer was given.
There are number of other small F&F flaws. Liner and scales could be better aligned. Same with the pocket clip. One corner of the pocket clip kind of hangs off the scale near the bolt. Blade grind is a bit rough. I really doubt that D2 was properly hardened. Blade wasnt sharp either.
Before I have received the knife, I had a plan to modify it a bit. After the first look at the knife, I decided that it isnt worth it. Just for fun, here is what I had in mind:
So here you have it my review of the one Thailand custom from ebay. I didnt have any big expectations about the knife. Some flaws I could live with, some things I couldve fixed, but overall I felt that this knife isnt worth even half of what I have paid for it. $120 knife that felt like a $15 boker magnum. It looks good..., but....well, that's it. Knife was send back, and I have received full refund, but I still lost money shipping this piece back to Thailand.
Ive been very cautious about such customs ever since. I have looked at some others, asked for additional pictures. After handling the knife in review and seeing some more pictures of others, there is no way I would pick one up in the near future.
Hope this review will help others.
I have a pretty good knife collection that includes Strider, CRK, Benchmade, Spyderco, customs, lower end knives and stuff in between. After acquiring customs and high-end productions I didnt stop looking for lower end knives that I consider to be a good value.
I check ebay from time to time, to see what knives are on the market there. I have noticed many custom Thai knives listed. They look pretty good and use good materials. The topic about Thai knives have come up in the past, but I couldnt find any reviews. I found one knife that I liked for $122 shipped and started to consider what Ive got to gain and what Ive got to loose. No brand recognition, possibly lower resell value and questionable quality one one side. Good materials, original design, custom limited production on the other side. I was thinking about putting this knife in use, so I didnt really care about the resell value. Quality was still in question, Since there were a lot of good feedbacks on ebay, and in my understanding quality control on a homemade custom wouldnt pass a faulty knife, I decided that was good enough for me.
Blade thickness was stated to be 1/8 (3mm). It looked thinner on the picture. Also after seeing many knives with bad lockups, I asked seller to clarify this and to send some pictures if possible. I got a reply that Im quoting:
Dear customer,
blade is well made with very firm, it is D2 and it is really close to 1/8 or normally we call 1/8 but it is fomal thick of the blade sheet in Thailand. It is a goodvknife.
No pictures, but at least a confirmation that everything is good.
Paying $122, I didnt expect to get a sebenza or something similar, and was looking for just a good useable knife. So I pulled the trigger and got it and the auction starting price.
Here is the actual review.
First the good stuff  I liked the design (you might not) and materials. Actually I expected to like those to begin with.
Design is pretty good. This is the main reason why I have chosen this knife. It looks a bit unusual. At least the design is not very common. The whole thing reminds me of the Yuna custom (another Thai), maybe even Hinderer XM-18 a bit because of the choil and blade grind.
Handle is very comfy, feels great both in straight and reverse grip. Handle lines are a bit pointy for my taste, but still ok. Rosewood looks good. Buffalo horn boslters arent bad either.
I like the blade shape too. Even though Im not a big fan of recurve tanto style, it looks nice (at least to me). There are a lot of discussions about pros and cons of the blade style, so Im not going to go into this. The blade keeps its thickness almost to the tip, so it can withstand some abuse and this is what I liked about it.
I also like blade steel (D2), so it was a plus for me.
Now the bad. QUALITY. Oh man, where to start ..
I wasnt expecting CRK, but I really thought it will be better than some $10 crap knife.
First and the biggest problem is the lock up. Oh my . UP-DOWN blade play. Lock bar goes all the way to the other side. The blade stops (thumbstuds) arent stopping blade where they should. The bolster area that gets in contact with bladestops isnt even. Right side is not on the same level as the left side. Both bolster sides dont have any cutouts for bladestops, so with time lockup will be even worse.
But wait, there is more The lock bar somehow is twice thinner than the liner! The liner isnt thick to begin with, but the thickness of the lockbar is just a joke. My only thought is that when they discovered that lockup is bad, they tried to deform (extend) the lockbar by hammering it. Also the thumbstuds (bladestops) have marks like they were manipulated with pliers. After I saw all this, I just couldnt believe that I see this on a $100+ knife.
At this point I already made the decision that knife is going back to where it came from.
Well surprises didnt stop there. The bolts used to attach scale to the liner are too long. At some places they almost made contact with the blade. Also the bolster bolts were not tightened all the way, either because they would stop the blade, or because they were overlooked of because of some other problem. The result is that there is a big gap between scale and the liner.
Knife is very stiff. I could barely flick it out using the flipper and the wrist action. I didnt even try to adjust it, because at that point I have gave up on it already.
Further some minor flaws that I couldve lived with:
The blade is not 1/8 (3 mm) thick. It is about 2 mm. It is ok, probably even good, if knife is used for light cutting, but for Hard use and some abuse I would rather have 1/8. It is really not a big deal, but it only shows that advertised specs are not correct. As a matter of fact, when asked specifically about the thickness, no right answer was given.
There are number of other small F&F flaws. Liner and scales could be better aligned. Same with the pocket clip. One corner of the pocket clip kind of hangs off the scale near the bolt. Blade grind is a bit rough. I really doubt that D2 was properly hardened. Blade wasnt sharp either.
Before I have received the knife, I had a plan to modify it a bit. After the first look at the knife, I decided that it isnt worth it. Just for fun, here is what I had in mind:
So here you have it my review of the one Thailand custom from ebay. I didnt have any big expectations about the knife. Some flaws I could live with, some things I couldve fixed, but overall I felt that this knife isnt worth even half of what I have paid for it. $120 knife that felt like a $15 boker magnum. It looks good..., but....well, that's it. Knife was send back, and I have received full refund, but I still lost money shipping this piece back to Thailand.
Ive been very cautious about such customs ever since. I have looked at some others, asked for additional pictures. After handling the knife in review and seeing some more pictures of others, there is no way I would pick one up in the near future.
Hope this review will help others.
Last edited:
If it cuts well and comfortable, it is a deal.
