While it is a great slicer, and classic design, the lock on my 9 has started to slip on more than one occasion, and I've been lucky to catch it before my fingers get the chop. So I like them, but not their locking system.
I used to think the same thing until folks in the tradtiional forum taught me how to tune the lockring.
Their joint and lock ring need occasional tuning to keep in good working order. Typically they need to be lubricated and water-proofed, the inner collar needs to be adjusted sometimes and the outer lock ring needs adjustment. If this sort of maintenance is not your cup of tea, you won't like the Opinel.
My thoughts on tuning an Opinel here:
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/28597626/tuning-opinels.txt
But, as I said in my first post to this thread, the Opinel is not for everybody and may not be for you.
I guess i am like the OP.. i cannot fathom why i would want one.
Ugly wood handle (yes, i favor modern materials)
Ugly design overall
Don't like two handed opening blades.
I guess for me, i just have no desire for using an ancient blade. We have moved on in both craftsmanship and materials, and while cheap, i just don't see the appeal of staying "old timey".
Flame on i guess..
Ugly is in the eye of the beholder. I don't like the finish nor the clip point and generally prefer to round off the end of the handle. I like the result but you may not.
The Opinel is very easy to one hand open and one hand close. Very safe due to the lack of a spring. Better to say that you don't know how to one hand open one. Or perhaps, that one hand opening isn't as fast as one hand opening a modern flipper, which is true.
Regarding the characterization of an "ancient blade", as an engineer and former professor, that's a comment worthy of under educated freshman. The best designers study past design to understand what works, what doesn't and why some designs seems to survive for decades upon decades.
There are two functional design features of the Opinel that merit respect. The first is the convex grind. It is among one of the few reasonably priced production knives to come with a true convex grind and it's a big part of why it out slices so many "modern" knives, where "modern" can roughly be translated as meaning "Using grinding tooling that minimizes production costs while being sold as "new" to under-educated consumers who don't really understand blade geometry".
The second is the inner collar/lock design, which allows the knife to take ridiculous amounts of cutting and lateral pressure on a repeated basis without developing lateral or vertical blade play. The lock does NOT protect against closing forces but for actual hard use, it will hold it's own or outlast knives costing 10 times more.
Opinel by
Pinnah, on Flickr
