Products I love: Assisted Opener Folding Knives
I’m addicted to folding pocketknives as utility tools, and one-handed assisted openers are probably my favorite of the type. I started with the Kershaw Leek above, a Ken Onion design produced by a large knife company (Kershaw, part of the KAI Group, which also owns some of my other favorite brands like Zero Tolerance). It’s slim, all metal, discreet, and very robust.
Knives are incredibly useful for everyday tasks — opening boxes (especially packages containing other knives…), cutting things (obviously), and even misused as tools other than cutting (the back of a knife, or the handle, can be an adequate screwdriver or prying surface, and of course multitools have wide functionality).
I don’t really think of them as weapons. I’m a firearm guy, and failing that, would go to OC/Pepper products (or maybe a Taser) as a dedicated less-lethal, or a longer blunt object/stick to maintain distance. Hand to hand, I’m more likely to just go in close for grappling and rely on size and a 3/10 level of skill. Fixed blades or very robust folders are reasonable weapons for people who are good with them, but to me, they have all the negatives of being a deadly weapon (legally, etc.), while also having very short effective range, and being relatively inflexible. They’re good for killing (prison style stab-stab-stab in close is reliably lethal, but can be done just as effectively with a sharpened stick or screwdriver as with a knife), but not really good for defense.
Assisted openers are an interesting legal hack. Automatic knives (“switchblades”) are widely banned (due to being scary in movies…), so while I own plenty, and the laws have loosened up over the years, they’re not a great choice for daily carry. Assisted openers accomplish roughly the same thing but actuate by pressing a spring-loaded lever, with the spring continuing the manual task of opening the blade, speeding it up and making it more reliable vs. manual deployment, while avoiding legal characterization as an automatic knife. This is really useful for utility tasks where one hand is already occupied holding a piece of material and you want to rapidly open the tool without looking in order to cut something. It’s also fun.
(There is some more information about the differences available on YouTube.)
The Kershaw Leek series is pretty amazing. There are well over 100 variations in blade geometry, color, material, etc. There are also some related designs (Scallion, Chive) of different size, and some related designs. They’ve gone for as little as $30 in the past, but more recently tend to be $50-150. I think I’ve bought >100 Leeks for myself and as gifts over the years.
I especially love the composite blade options, with D2 tool steel for the blade, and a more stainless steel on the spine. I have a few of these, some in black, as well as some in weird/speciality blade steels overall.
A somewhat more robust knife, which I’m more likely to carry these days, is from Zero Tolerance, another KAI brand. ZT is basically at the Lexus tier, to Kershaw’s Toyota — a bit fancier, and more specialized, but more expensive.
I love the ZT 0350. It’s bigger than the Leek, and much more “scary knife” in design, but also much tougher — it can be used for incidental prying and other tasks with less risk of breaking.
Surprisingly, I don’t really carry a “regular” multitool (e.g. leatherman). They’re too much of a hassle at airports to keep in my EDC backpack, and when I’m home or at the office, I usually have a full set of tools. Between a a knife, a couple screwdrivers (maybe a multi-bit driver), and a set of pliers, I don’t see much extra value in the multitool. I often want to use both the screwdriver and the pliers simultaneously. However, there is a multitool I find useful and carry essentially every day.
The Swiss-Tech utili-key. This is tiny — fits on a normal keyring with other keys — and includes the most useful tools of a multitool — a Phillips-head screwdriver, a flat screwdriver, a bottle opener, and a short cutting blade. It is a little more inconvenient to access than a folding knife, but does the job. Technically this is probably prohibited by current TSA regulations on planes (in 2013 they changed rules to allow up to 2.36” knives on plane, then there was flight attendant union pushback so all knives were banned entirely), but I’ve only run into one problem at one airport (Sarasota SRQ, there they stopped me and stole my utili-key and resq-me seatbelt cutter).
Unfortunately, Amazon doesn’t seem to sell this anymore. I stocked up (10?) last time, so I probably have no need to buy any more for 20 years, but they seem to be available at walmart. Maybe it’s a patent expiration thing, or a counterfeiting problem, unclear, but this is why I like to buy multiples of items I’m likely to continue using, even if they don’t wear out.
For fixed knives, I’m a lot more flexible. They tend to just be collectibles for me, but there are a few I like.
The Cold Steel SRK is a robust, inexpensive ($50-100) fixed blade. It’s rather big, but is great for MOLLE mounting, etc.
The Fallkniven F1 and variants is a Swedish hunting and military knife. A little smaller, more expensive ($150?), and better steel.
The Morakniv Companion (and related) are really inexpensive ($10?), good quality steel, and generally functional knives.
Overall, they’re all functional tools. I tend to collect large numbers of variations of relatively inexpensive production knives, vs. high-end specialty knives, and stock up when they’re on sale. It’s pretty clear I already own well more than a lifetime supply of these (since one or two could easily be sufficient for a lifetime, if not lost), but I like them.