What is the nicest knife you've ever turned into a user?

jmclfrsh

jmclfrsh

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I've probably got 90% of my knives as safe queens. I've kept them so nice I'm actually reluctant to use them, and well, I don't have many "cheaper" knives really, but I pick the worst of the bunch pretty much. Often, what I started out collecting before I became a "knife snob" of sorts.

Now that I'm 65, and have less years in front of me than behind me, I'm beginning to realize that if I don't use them, someone else will get them at some point and possibly use the heck outta them, or buy them for what my wife thinks I paid for them, and probably not realize what they actually are, just that they "look really good."

I have nine CRKs, for instance.

Starting today I'm gonna EDC this OP Umnunzaan from 2009 in S30V. I'm going to send it in to get glass-blasted once my two 25s and (one of my 21s) come back from the mothership after getting spa treatments and one of the 25s gets glass-blasted and a MIM clip. So it does not worry me a bit to use it, and I will. But I have a "get out of jail free card" in the fact that it's going to be glass-blasted anyway, might as well use it.

And once it comes back, I'm going to continue to EDC it because it will remain looking good a little bit longer after being glass-blasted from what I hear. And at this age, hell I might be dead next week, who knows! Bacon is one of my favorite meats, after all.

And BTW, I am not this guy in the picture by any means, even though I like bacon LOL.

I just thought it was a funny image of a "man baby," or "Softbody" as my wife calls them. I still do wheelies like in my avatar every time I go ride. That's what 1000cc sports bikes are for, after all.

All that yakking to simply ask, "How about you?"

What knife did you start out either knowing you were gonna EDC it from the get-go, or ended up doing so eventually?
 

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Koenig Arius, Demko AD20s and Sebenza 31 magnacut are the nicest and most expensive users....I wont abuse those as I want to keep them half decent. I also have beautiful Spyderco Chaparral's in titanium, those are also used but light use only. The Rob Johnsons is a full blown safe queen 😉

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All of them. I enjoy using them all. I don’t abuse any of them, except for the fixed blades. I’ve got some fixed blades that I really use hard. My folders are used for edc type stuff.
 
I use 'em. Mainly because with most high end knives, and especially CRKs, I'm getting a well ground blade of a premium steel that's correctly heat treated and has a high quality finish. They are a joy to use and that's a big part of what I feel is in the price. Plus, at your advanced age if you don't use them, the next guy will. Just kidding, I'm 72.😆
 
All my knives were bought to be users, but no matter what new favorite knife I buy, I always end up carrying the old favorite. For the last three or four years, it's been a Buck 112 almost every day. Before that it was a CRK for several years. I'm an old geezer, and when I find something that I like, I tend to stick with it for a long time.
This is the first CRK I bought about 10 years ago, and probably the one that got the most carry time.
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I have way more than a few dozen knives and it's easier for me to name my drawer queens than my users, though some clarification of those terms should be made. Drawer queens never get carried and used and include a pre-Idaho Bocote-inlayed large Sebenza 21, a beautifully pimped ZT 0801, and an 806 AFCKBK--the first two with blades and handles just too pretty-perfect/polished and buff to mark-up and the latter just too nicely blacked-out and disco'd to be willing to scuff. I largely try to avoid acquiring knives in that category and have sold off a few such to cut down on that inventory, though I might not do that again.

On the other end are work-users--knives I willingly use hard, scratch, mark up, or scrape with, though I don't use as them as pry bars, screw drivers, or risk busting off their tips beyond a little correctable rounding. Those include a few each of Shiros, Benchmades, Spyderco's, CRKs, a Les George, a Cheburkov, and a few others plus some inexpensive and true beaters that may be second carries to be grossly abused. A retractable-blade, razor/utility knife is always close at hand in a job-site situation. Here's one...

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...and another.

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The others of those many dozens get carried and used in a normal, non-work, EDC, cut as needed sorta capacity. My feeling about each of those is that it's too good a knife not to get carried and used appropriately and that signs of use--a scratched clip, a little blade scuff, or other--are inevitable. I didn't buy those knives to sit in a drawer, I like them, and want to keep and enjoy them. Down the road, if the time comes to divest myself of them, I'll sell for what I can get and chalk any "loss" up to depreciation.

Here's a couple that were grails to me for years that get carried and used with regularity. My most expensive knife ever--the RDD--though I got a great deal from a friend here...

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...and another, a unicorn example of the long out-of-production AFCK 806-1101, that I paid way too much for and went right into my pocket as an EDC.

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