Which Company Makes The Best Chinese Knives?

Lots of nice knives and glad the quality/price is working out, but I can’t bring myself to intentionally seek out a Chinese product (no judgment, just personal preference).

So now I’m wondering if these companies are all based in China proper or are any of them based in Taiwan (which I wouldn’t mind buying from…)?
 
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Chronovore said:
A while back, MTech actually did distribute a few $100 models in S35VN. I don't know if they were made by CH or not but it seemed to be a limited run.

CH Knives are decent. Coincidentally, Eafengrow had been the exclusive distributor for CH Knives on Amazon. They were the only Eafengrow knives that were not rebranded to something else. (They retained their CH markings.) Eafengrow is another rebranding distributor but unlike MTech, they are notorious for false steel stamps. (A lot of Eafengrow's "D2" has been tested and was usually either 5Cr15 or 8Cr13Mov.) MTech either tells you what the junk steel is on their cheaper knives or just marks them "stainless steel".

I agree that contracting CH to rebrand better knives has been a smart move on MTech's part. It's sort of like Olight using Kizer to make their knife line at the price level they chose. I actually picked up one of MTech's $50 titanium frame-locks, both because it is a CH model I'd never tried and for the novelty of having it wear the MTech brand.
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And.. What did you think of the 50 dollar to framelock? I'm curious haha
 
They all do !
And none of them do !
7.9 Billion opinions out there ...
I have a CH3530 that rules ...
So I got me a CH3009 .... That reeks ! ( blade steel bad )
So if 1000 people buy CH and actually test them ..... (?) .... then 500 might be really happy and 500 might be really ticked !

And most of the people that dont test , are probably happy .
So , Most Chinese knife companies do a very nice job on BOLTING the knife together !
You would be very hard pressed to tell the difference in a BLIND FOLD TEST .
And if you really care beyond that , then edge retention testing is a must .
Does your one , two or three hundred dollar knife hold an edge ? ( Do you really want to know ? )
Maybe the last thing a person spending $250 on a knife wants to know is that a $50 knife performs better ?
And the only way to know .....
 
Chronovore said:
I haven't really had a chance to mess with it. Honestly, I looked it over, flipped it a few times, got a little chuckle and put it in the drawer. Maybe this weekend I'll get it apart and post some pics.
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Yea that'd be interesting to see what your thoughts are on it. I just got a Two Sun last week after seeing models on amazon and what not starting at about 80 bucks for a ti framelock. I ended up buying an integral ti framelock with m390 blade used from a guy for 175 bucks. It's absolutely wild how good the fit and finish is. It's really crazy. I'll post pics of that later too.
 
Paratrooper06 said:
So you made your Sencut a CIVIVI?
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Coincidentally, the original run of Civivi knives ran on steel bearings. While Sencut dropped some of the cosmetic features, my Snap came with ceramic bearings in a brass cage like the current Civivi knives.

I actually just swapped out the steel bearings in my Civivi Naja for a set of Skiffs. It's the same knife that was tested by Outpost 76. It's 60HRC on the dot. WE's 9Cr18Mov holds a good edge, sharpens up nicely, and has excellent corrosion resistance. I'm really glad to see them continuing to offer it at a value price through the Sencut line.
 
LimpCroissant said:
Yea that'd be interesting to see what your thoughts are on it. I just got a Two Sun last week after seeing models on amazon and what not starting at about 80 bucks for a ti framelock. I ended up buying an integral ti framelock with m390 blade used from a guy for 175 bucks. It's absolutely wild how good the fit and finish is. It's really crazy. I'll post pics of that later too.
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Well, this was the excuse I needed. This is effectively an MTech-branded CH3001. I had forgotten that it comes with a reasonably nice nylon pouch. The blade is decent. The titanium is good (see the close-up shot of the texture) but some of the edges are crisp. The action was okay from the box and lock-up is solid. The box claims that it runs on ceramic bearings and that seems to be true.

Unfortunately, they used permanent thread-locker and the pivot is free-spinning. I thought I might be able to force it from both sides. I applied slow and steady pressure. Then maybe a third of the way out, the drive started to deform. I got agitated and ended up sending it across the room. I then had to very carefully screw it back in and get the tension just right. Luckily, it's better now than where it started.

With disassembly off the table, I cleaned the pivot with hot water, dish soap, and a tooth brush. Then I flushed it with 99% isopropanol and dried it with Dust Off. Now the action is excellent.

5YPCR2P.jpg


wWUtyH7.jpg
 
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Chronovore said:
Well, this was the excuse I needed. This is effectively an MTech-branded CH3001. I had forgotten that it comes with a reasonably nice nylon pouch. The blade is decent. The titanium is good (see the close-up shot of the texture) but some of the edges are crisp. The action was okay from the box and lock-up is solid. The box claims that it runs on ceramic bearings and that seems to be true.

Unfortunately, they used permanent thread-locker and the pivot is free-spinning. I thought I might be able to force it from both sides. I applied slow and steady pressure. Then maybe a third of the way out, the drive started to deform. I got agitated and ended up sending it across the room. I then had to very carefully screw it back in and get the tension just right. Luckily, it's better now than where it started.

With disassembly off the table, I cleaned the pivot with hot water, dish soap, and a tooth brush. Then I flushed it with 99% isopropanol and dried it with Dust Off. Now the action is excellent.

5YPCR2P.jpg


wWUtyH7.jpg
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Man... That thing don't look bad one bit for 50 bucks, that's crazy. I like the design on it too. I think my new thing might be just getting the most knife for my money. It's crazy too when looking at some of the cut test results I've seen, a lot of the chinese makers are heat treating their blades pretty dang good. Like Petrified Fish as a quick example. Outpost 76 did cut tests on their D2 and they performed very similarly to most of the S30V coming from the big american companies. Civivi has awesome heat treat as well. Two Sun turned out to have their S90v 1 HRC lower than Spyderco, not bad at all. Cool knife brother:thumbsup:
 
LimpCroissant said:
Man... That thing don't look bad one bit for 50 bucks, that's crazy. I like the design on it too. I think my new thing might be just getting the most knife for my money. It's crazy too when looking at some of the cut test results I've seen, a lot of the chinese makers are heat treating their blades pretty dang good. Like Petrified Fish as a quick example. Outpost 76 did cut tests on their D2 and they performed very similarly to most of the S30V coming from the big american companies. Civivi has awesome heat treat as well. Two Sun turned out to have their S90v 1 HRC lower than Spyderco, not bad at all. Cool knife brother:thumbsup:
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Thanks. That was actually my PF818 in the test video. Petrified Fish is one of the better choices for Chinese D2. They do a nice job on the blades. The action is usually at least decent. They also have some interesting designs and some of their knives can be had in a wide variety of handle materials. My only complaint is that sometimes, their scales have crisp edges. That doesn't bother everyone and if it does, it's quick and easy to fix.

I had already done that mod to my PF818 before sending it in for testing. It didn't even take ten minutes. I actually hung on to this knife because I really like it. The action out of the box was good. After cleaning and quality lubrication, it was great. I recently swapped in some Skiff Bearings and now it is incredible! I never thought I'd put $12 bearings in a sub-$30 knife but this one is a keeper.

Besides the almost unforgivable sin of thread-locking a free-spinning pivot, this MTech/CH3001 also suffers from crisp scale edges. The texturing is very nice. It's the lines along the transitions. The edge parallel to the lock bar is particularly sharp. The corners at and across from the shoulder of the lock bar are very pointy. I've rounded off a few lock-bar shoulders for comfort in the past and it takes a toll aesthetically. Stonewashed titanium isn't like G-10 or Micarta, which are very friendly to modification.
 
Chronovore said:
Thanks. That was actually my PF818 in the test video. Petrified Fish is one of the better choices for Chinese D2. They do a nice job on the blades. The action is usually at least decent. They also have some interesting designs and some of their knives can be had in a wide variety of handle materials. My only complaint is that sometimes, their scales have crisp edges. That doesn't bother everyone and if it does, it's quick and easy to fix.

I had already done that mod to my PF818 before sending it in for testing. It didn't even take ten minutes. I actually hung on to this knife because I really like it. The action out of the box was good. After cleaning and quality lubrication, it was great. I recently swapped in some Skiff Bearings and now it is incredible! I never thought I'd put $12 bearings in a sub-$30 knife but this one is a keeper.

Besides the almost unforgivable sin of thread-locking a free-spinning pivot, this MTech/CH3001 also suffers from crisp scale edges. The texturing is very nice. It's the lines along the transitions. The edge parallel to the lock bar is particularly sharp. The corners at and across from the shoulder of the lock bar are very pointy. I've rounded off a few lock-bar shoulders for comfort in the past and it takes a toll aesthetically. Stonewashed titanium isn't like G-10 or Micarta, which are very friendly to modification.
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Yup I hear yea, micarta and g10 is definitely nice for being able to easily mod and still look good. And shoot just as a good scale material too. That's cool that PF was yours, it's nice knowing exactly what you're working with! Yea I bought one of their models a couple weeks ago after hearing lots of good stuff about them too. It's pretty amazing for the money. Nice machined g10 in a cool pattern, the action is awesome straight out of the box. I usually have to take apart all my new knives, clean and lube them but this one came really smooth and I don't feel the need to do all that. It does have some sharp inner corners like your said. And the edge is terrible. An extremely obtuse angle, just barely sharpened really. It's decently sharp but very disappointing, especially considering it's D2 and I really don't want to reprofile it, especially since I don't have a guided system. I might actually pay a local shop to sharpen it if they do good work. I don't like doing that but for a knife this price I don't want to invest the time on a full reprofiling job, ya know? G probably put a real nice edge on yours huh?
 
LimpCroissant said:
Yup I hear yea, micarta and g10 is definitely nice for being able to easily mod and still look good. And shoot just as a good scale material too. That's cool that PF was yours, it's nice knowing exactly what you're working with! Yea I bought one of their models a couple weeks ago after hearing lots of good stuff about them too. It's pretty amazing for the money. Nice machined g10 in a cool pattern, the action is awesome straight out of the box. I usually have to take apart all my new knives, clean and lube them but this one came really smooth and I don't feel the need to do all that. It does have some sharp inner corners like your said. And the edge is terrible. An extremely obtuse angle, just barely sharpened really. It's decently sharp but very disappointing, especially considering it's D2 and I really don't want to reprofile it, especially since I don't have a guided system. I might actually pay a local shop to sharpen it if they do good work. I don't like doing that but for a knife this price I don't want to invest the time on a full reprofiling job, ya know? G probably put a real nice edge on yours huh?
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I'm sorry to hear that you got one with a really bad edge. The factory edges on all my PF knives have at least been decent. Yeah, the secondary bevels can be a little obtuse but that's true for most factory knives.

I wouldn't use a local shop unless I knew them and the kind of work they do. Most places seem to just bang it out on a grinder with about as much care as you'd get on a factory edge. If you really want it done well, send it out to someone who will put in the time and care. There are probably people here. Otherwise, I think both Michael Emler and Neeves Knives do sharpening work. Depending on how often you'd want to pay someone else, it might be worth investing in something like a KME.

That said, yes. He sent it back with a fresh KME edge, the same as he uses for testing. That was a nice little "thanks" for the loaner. I've since invested in a KME but I've also been house hunting so it is stuck in storage with a bunch of other tools. (The world is a little crazy right now.) So I just go free-hand out to 1200 and tinker with what I have in my home office.
 
Chronovore said:
I'm sorry to hear that you got one with a really bad edge. The factory edges on all my PF knives have at least been decent. Yeah, the secondary bevels can be a little obtuse but that's true for most factory knives.

I wouldn't use a local shop unless I knew them and the kind of work they do. Most places seem to just bang it out on a grinder with about as much care as you'd get on a factory edge. If you really want it done well, send it out to someone who will put in the time and care. There are probably people here. Otherwise, I think both Michael Emler and Neeves Knives do sharpening work. Depending on how often you'd want to pay someone else, it might be worth investing in something like a KME.

That said, yes. He sent it back with a fresh KME edge, the same as he uses for testing. That was a nice little "thanks" for the loaner. I've since invested in a KME but I've also been house hunting so it is stuck in storage with a bunch of other tools. (The world is a little crazy right now.) So I just go free-hand out to 1200 and tinker with what I have in my home office.
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The world is crazy indeed my friend! Yea, I normally wouldn't take any of my knives to just any local shop and have them sharpened because like you said, most kind of suck and probably don't pay any attention to overheating the edge which is super easy to do. The only reason I was considering it on this one is because it only cost me 27 dollars and if I'm going to send a knife to one of the awesome hand sharpeners here, I want to do it on a knife that is a little more dear to me. I do have a sharpmaker and a waterstone that I came across but it's just too much work for me to reprofile this one, I'd have to remove a ton of steel. That said, I am thinking about buying a KME or one of the other guided systems. I haven't started my research on them really. I had a Lansky and an old Smith diamond guided system that would have worked perfect for this job but it somehow got misplaced when my parents cleaned out the basement. Oh well, such is life. However I definitely do like the knife.
 
LimpCroissant said:
The world is crazy indeed my friend! Yea, I normally wouldn't take any of my knives to just any local shop and have them sharpened because like you said, most kind of suck and probably don't pay any attention to overheating the edge which is super easy to do. The only reason I was considering it on this one is because it only cost me 27 dollars and if I'm going to send a knife to one of the awesome hand sharpeners here, I want to do it on a knife that is a little more dear to me. I do have a sharpmaker and a waterstone that I came across but it's just too much work for me to reprofile this one, I'd have to remove a ton of steel. That said, I am thinking about buying a KME or one of the other guided systems. I haven't started my research on them really. I had a Lansky and an old Smith diamond guided system that would have worked perfect for this job but it somehow got misplaced when my parents cleaned out the basement. Oh well, such is life. However I definitely do like the knife.
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I didn't look at every system but my research ended with the KME. There is a reason it is popular among enthusiasts. It would make short work of reprofiling projects like this one. I'll eventually get around to playing with mine (and a few woodworking projects that have been waiting) once I get a little more work space.

Definitely check out their deals. When I bought mine, the deluxe kit with a full set of ceramic plates, diamond plates, and their diamond recurve tool was cheaper than buying it with just the diamond plates.
 
Chronovore said:
I didn't look at every system but my research ended with the KME. There is a reason it is popular among enthusiasts. It would make short work of reprofiling projects like this one. I'll eventually get around to playing with mine (and a few woodworking projects that have been waiting) once I get a little more work space.

Definitely check out their deals. When I bought mine, the deluxe kit with a full set of ceramic plates, diamond plates, and their diamond recurve tool was cheaper than buying it with just the diamond plates.
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Yea I've definitely heard good things about the KME and that's the one that I was pretty much leaning towardsl Ok sweet, I'll look for their deals. Are those sales on KME's site itself?
 
LimpCroissant said:
Yea I've definitely heard good things about the KME and that's the one that I was pretty much leaning towardsl Ok sweet, I'll look for their deals. Are those sales on KME's site itself?
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Yes. I bought mine directly from the website. They always have some kind of deal, even if it is just all the stuff that comes with the deluxe kit.
 
Dr Rez said:
What is the longest knife a KME could handle?
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Not sure. There are practical considerations on size and weight. Here is a video of someone using it to sharpen an 8" kitchen knife. He mentions compensating for the size and weight distribution by keeping the handle steady.

 
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