What are some of the companies that make the best fixed blades?

Bark River. Several others have already said this, but it bears even more repeating. Their knifes are very high quality, functional, and pleasing to the eye. They have such a huge variety, there has to be something that suits you.
 
I would say that the best fixed blades you can get will be from...

Bark River.

Fallkniven.

Spyderco/Benchmade.

For tough knives I agree that Busse and family are the way to go. http://www.bussecombat.com/
With honorable mentions to Fehrman.
http://www.fehrmanknives.com/


On the issue of knifetests.com. I think those tests are very valuable to someone looking for a knife that won't fail on them. Not that we should use a knife as a jackhammer, but it's nice to know that we can.

The behavior of steel is generally that you have a balance of wear resistance and hardness V.S. toughness/strength. In my opinion S-7 is the best steel type for an extremely tough blade (INFI may be better, but technical information on that is hard to come by).
According to Crucible http://www.crucibleservice.com/ S-7 is almost fifty percent tougher than CPM 3V at a similar hardness, and about four hundred percent tougher than CPM S30V.
CPM 3V will be much more wear resistant, but whether or not that translates into significantly better edge holding is debatable, I consider hardness to be more significant in edge holding (at least the razor edge I like to keep on my knives) than wear resistance.
It would be interesting to see a side by side comparison between 3V and S-7 in outdoor use. I suspect that S-7 would not keep an edge as well as knives with more wear resistant steel, but that for the amount of extra toughness you get it would be more than good enough.
 
I have and use a hatchet made of S7 and three large fixed blades made of 3v. I think these two steels work very well as heavy duty choppers. The 3v is a excellent balance of toughness and edge holding. I love the S7 as a hatchet because toughness is the main trait I look for in a axe/hatchet and its edge holding ability is not nearly as important in this form of tool.
 
Rich357 said:
A $5 fixed blade kitchen knife from Ikea will do a heck of a lot of cutting. But, they lack sex appeal.

Most of us could get 99% of our cutting chores done efficiently with a kitchen knife from Ikea, a folding
box cutter from Harbor Freight, and a modestly priced hatchet from Ace Hardware. You could likely buy
the set for well under $50.
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Paying for sex appeal in the form of more expensive materials, better manufacturing, and sexier design are perfectly reasonable, if subjective.

Paying for sex appeal in the form of a big name is, to me, not reasonable.

Is there some tangible difference between the Strider knife and the Cold Steel knife that I'm not seeing? Is the airbrushed finish worth that much to you?

To me, sex appeal comes from having a better knife. I just don't see the Strider as being a better knife. I acknowledge that this is based purely on hearsay, so please, explain to me what makes Striders better.

(And by the way, I'm not American, so "Made in the USA" doesn't carry much weight with me.)
 
I have a several CS knives and a bunch of Striders. The CS SRK is nice knife, IMO one of the best of the CS line. I'm not crazy about "rubber" handle but it is well shaped. I don't think it holds an edge as well as my Strider MT.

I like like many of the Strider designs better than the Cold Steel fixed blades.
Some of the striders you have to hold to appreciate the design.

I also have several Busse knives. They are nice knives but I don't go around chopping a lot of stuff and when I do chop wood I use a hatchet or axe.

If you just want to cut stuff, a cheap kitchen knife will work surprisingly well.
 
Khalnath said:
I just don't see the Strider as being a better knife. I acknowledge that this is based purely on hearsay, so please, explain to me what makes Striders better.
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Warranty and quality control would be two good examples to start with.

If you use your Cold Steel in the same manner as they do in their marketing, it voids any and all warranty due to abuse. Strider has a warranty 2nd to none in the business, ask anyone that has owned one. They stand behind the knives they make.

You might not care Striders are all manufactured here in the USA, but you should take note that having all you knives made in house makes it much easier to control quality of said product. Most Cold Steel owners will even agree that the quality is hit and miss depending on model and the time it was manufactured (hence many will list what models they stick to or if they preferred the old steel etc....). I do not pretend that it would be easy to have consistent quality when you have you products manufactured by different Co's in many different countries.
 
Rich357 said:
If you just want to cut stuff, a cheap kitchen knife will work surprisingly well.
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Not surprising at all. Kitchen knives are purpose built slicing machines. If all you want to do is slice stuff, you're not really going to top them.

They're not terribly convenient to CARRY though.
 
Here are some of the Striders I find interesting.

knivesstriderdblsalwpsfam6.jpg


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Khalnath said:
Not surprising at all. Kitchen knives are purpose built slicing machines. If all you want to do is slice stuff, you're not really going to top them.

They're not terribly convenient to CARRY though.
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You can do like Busse owners must do and buy an aftermarket sheath. You don't have to carry huge kitchen knife.
 
Who would want to use a CS knife in the manner they are advertised? It would be a senseless waste of time and energy. If I did break a CS knife, I bet they would replace it, no questions asked.
 
Bkultra said:
Warranty and quality control would be two good examples to start with.

If you use your Cold Steel in the same manner as they do in their marketing, it voids any and all warranty due to abuse. Strider has a warranty 2nd to none in the business, ask anyone that has owned one. They stand behind the knives they make.

You might not care Striders are all manufactured here in the USA, but you should take note that having all you knives made in house makes it much easier to control quality of said product. Most Cold Steel owners will even agree that the quality is hit and miss depending on model and the time it was manufactured (hence many will list what models they stick to or if they preferred the old steel etc....). I do not pretend that it would be easy to have consistent quality when you have you products manufactured by different Co's in many different countries.
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In general, you have a good point on quality control and warranty.

In this case, though, the price difference is so great that if your GI Tanto fails and needs nonexistant warranty service, you can buy a new one and you'll still be ahead of the game. Ditto quality control. Plus, it doesn't have to be "Made in USA" to be in-house. Or are you going to tell me Spyderco is crap because it's made in Japan? I never hear of anyone talking about how great Spyderco is specifically for that reason, but Strider fans seem to trot that one out all the time.

Specifically, I totally agree with you about Cold Steel's shoddy marketing practices, but it's a question of whether you're judging the company or the product.

Rich357 said:
You can do like Busse owners must do and buy an aftermarket sheath. You don't have to carry huge kitchen knife.
Click to expand...

You've never heard of putting a $10 saddle on a $5 horse?

(The kitchen knife, not the Busse.)
 
Khalnath said:
In general, you have a good point on quality control and warranty.

In this case, though, the price difference is so great that if your GI Tanto fails and needs nonexistant warranty service, you can buy a new one and you'll still be ahead of the game. Ditto quality control. Plus, it doesn't have to be "Made in USA" to be in-house. Or are you going to tell me Spyderco is crap because it's made in Japan? I never hear of anyone talking about how great Spyderco is specifically for that reason, but Strider fans seem to trot that one out all the time.

Specifically, I totally agree with you about Cold Steel's shoddy marketing practices, but it's a question of whether you're judging the company or the product.



You've never heard of putting a $10 saddle on a $5 horse?

(The kitchen knife, not the Busse.)
Click to expand...

Ok, for $15 you have a kitchen knife you can carry. :)
 
It's a fact that there is a lot of fanboyism here. It's neat when a cheapo is compared to an expensive knife like in the destruction test mentioned above or a recent thread where the tester found little difference between 420hc and infi. It's tough for the fan boy crowd to deal with results like these.
 
averageguy said:
It's a fact that there is a lot of fanboyism here. It's neat when a cheapo is compared to infi like in the destruction test mentioned above or a recent thread where the tester found little difference between 420hc and infi. It's tough for the fan boy crowd to deal with results like these.
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actually you did not finish reading the test did you:D

But being a cheapo cold steel junk fan I expect no less of you. CS is ne of those companies that is totally inconcistent in product quality and I recommend against getting. There is plenty of pics to prove this.:thumbup:

Rich, strider may provide sheaths, but it's to bad he doesn't provide handles:D
 
In my mind the biggest bang for the buck available today is Bark River. With their guaranty you in essence have a brand new knife for life, you really can't go wrong with any of their offerings.
 
Guess I will have to take your word about the customer service because I have never had to send one in for repair or service. BUT, thats fine with me.
 
"actually you did not finish reading the test did you

But being a cheapo cold steel junk fan I expect no less of you. CS is ne of those companies that is totally inconcistent in product quality and I recommend against getting."

I read all I needed to.

There are plenty of reviews of CS all over the web that say otherwise.

Cobalt - perhaps you were one of the great chicletiers (those who accumulated chicklets as part of the fan boy club) of awhile back?
 
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