What do you guys think about 'Extra' blade safety locks?

KrisOK

KrisOK

Joined
Oct 17, 2012
Messages
856
I rotate through my collection for EDC on pretty much a daily basis, and today it's a CRKT M4-02. It has CRKT's AUTOLAWKS system, and for the life of me I can't imagine using this little knife hard enough to need a secondary locking system. My main complaint is that it makes the knife EXTREMELY akward to close one handed. You have to hold down the LAWKS lever on the spine of the knife at the same time as you pull the liner lock over. Other than that it's a nice light use EDC folder, but this is so annoying that I'm either going to remove the LAWKS lever or pull the knife from my collection.

What do you guys think about these suplemental locking systems?
 
Stupid. Useless. Clumsy. Awkward. Frustrating. I could go on, but I'll need a thesaurus.
 
Stupid additions to 'try and make it look cooler'. I was fiddling with a SOG Slimjim on the weekend and it was pissing me off to no end. Stupid little extra lock is a waste of time.

PS - If you need a strong enough knife to NEED a second blade lock...then maybe try using a fixed blade? The best lock of all! :D
 
I've never used any knife with any mechanism similar to CRKT LAWKS and really dont plan to. They seem more like a gimmick than anything.
 
I have 2 of the 4" CRKT's- one with LAWKS and one with autoLAWKS. I don't have a real problem with them and on the big knife I've learned to manipulate the auto lock easily enough for closing the knife. I've always thought that linerlocks were very strong but I was testing the older CRKT by trying to close the blade and I noticed that it was causing the lockbar to move back and forth across the blade tang. Apparently CRKT uses an improper angle on the blade tang. So with this knife maybe the secondary lock is important. The standard LAWKS might have some user advantages because you can engage it when you want and leave it disengages when you don't need it. OTOH the autoLAWKS means it will always be engaged when you need it.

One of these days I'm going to do some hard tests on the older CRKT to determine what it can actually do. I have to devise some safety methods for my hands before I attempt that though.

DSC_6633b.jpg
 
i love the seconadary locks it gives me a reason to open up my new knife to remove the afore mentioned secondary lock
 
They're silly. Generally speaking, you can accomplish the same tasks with a slipjoint (ie: no lock at all) that you'd need to do with a locking folder - one lock is not strictly speaking a necessity, but it can be nice to have, to be sure. TWO locks? Absolutely silly.

The little lock on the Kershaw Leek, the button lock-lock on the Hogue EX-01, the Lawks system - they're all just a total waste of space IMHO.
 
Hate 'em. Got rid of my Hogue b/c I couldn't stand the extra lock on it. Just silly to have to disengage 2 locks to close the dang knife.
 
Don't like CRKT secondary locks but do like Benchmades on their autos, can stop accidents by bumping in pocket and keep them open when wanted,
 
Depends, I don't have anything against LAWKS or the Lionsteel Rotoblock, but the Auto-LAWKS is really annoying
 
If someone made a secondary lock that actuated in the same movement as the primary lock (like a Glock?) that would be fine, but I've never seen one of those.

Usually "get a fixed blade" is still the correct answer.
 
Joshua J. said:
If someone made a secondary lock that actuated in the same movement as the primary lock (like a Glock?) that would be fine, but I've never seen one of those.
Click to expand...

CRKT's Fire Safe mechanism is exactly that. It's a lock manipulated by the thumbstud. I have a CRKT K.I.S.S. Assist that has it, and it works wonderfully.
 
I can't tell you how many times I've stubbed my thumb trying to flick open my Sog Blink due to the safety getting bumped on. It takes some serious pressure to get that lil guy to fire, I don't think it needs the extra lock, but whatever. I like it for what it is.
 
nopyo said:
CRKT's Fire Safe mechanism is exactly that. It's a lock manipulated by the thumbstud. I have a CRKT K.I.S.S. Assist that has it, and it works wonderfully.
Click to expand...

I think the OP was talking about locks to keep the blade open vs. locks to keep the blade closed. I have a knife with that CRKT lock and I don't like it. It will serve to keep the knife closed in your pocket and it is probably better than the lock that Kershaw puts on the other end of the Leek, but it seems to me that most knives these days have overly strong detents anyway and they are plenty for keeping the blade closed. It takes me some fiddling with the lock on my CRKT to get it open and I find that this defeats the purpose of having an assisted opening knife. I could open a slipjoint with a fingernail nick faster.
 
Wow, lots of hate for secondary locks around here.

For me, it depends on the knife.

I'm allowed to carry a fixed-blade so if I find myself in some sort of situation where I need to pry with something and I don't have the chance to seek out a better tool then I would use my fixed-blade. But if I could only carry folders, I'd want one of the folders I was carrying to be heavy-duty enough to pry with if necessary (I'd carry more than one folder). And if I had to pry with a folder, or use it in some unusual and high-stress application, I would prefer that it had a secondary lock. If you are in an emergency situation, and you have to put an unusual amount of stress on your folder, is there really such a thing as having "too many locks"?

I was going to tell a story of a time when I had to put an unusual amount of stress on a folder, but I decided to start a new thread with it instead. ;)
 
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