On knife design and the virtue of usability

[mikey177]

I recently bought a high-end production knife from another brand, and it reminded me of this topic because I indeed found it awkward to use for the first few days. I had to watch some videos of folks deploying it, and I found out that said knife used to come with an instruction sheet for how to open it smoothly. Deployment was difficult by design. It was a framelock with the pocket clip resting on the lockbar, requiring the user to hold the knife in an unnatural way. My pinky and ring finger had to be at the very butt of the knife, and my middle had to be floating, while my index finger supported the frame.

Moreover, the thumbstud was right against the frame, and had to be accessed with a forward movement which, even if I was doing so correctly to the best of my ability, only worked 3 out of every 4 times in opening the blade.

I learned that some folders from this maker even had a "break-in period," which reduces their immediate usability even more. Some folks remove the thumb stud from other models by this maker and drill a Spydie-hole into the blade, and I have to agree that it makes that model much more user-friendly.

At least I was able to satisfy my curiosity about this maker and get to understand why many people admire it for its tight tolerances. I will keep said folder in my collection, but I would rather choose a Manix, Spydiechef, Native or any of a dozen other Spyderco models if I had a lot of work to do for the day and needed a folder that wouldn't require me to waste a few extra seconds every time I needed to get it open.

[Humint]

I recently bought a high-end production knife from another brand, and it reminded me of this topic because I indeed found it awkward to use for the first few days. I had to watch some videos of folks deploying it, and I found out that said knife used to come with an instruction sheet for how to open it smoothly. Deployment was difficult by design. It was a framelock with the pocket clip resting on the lockbar, requiring the user to hold the knife in an unnatural way. My pinky and ring finger had to be at the very butt of the knife, and my middle had to be floating, while my index finger supported the frame.

Moreover, the thumbstud was right against the frame, and had to be accessed with a forward movement which, even if I was doing so correctly to the best of my ability, only worked 3 out of every 4 times in opening the blade.

I learned that some folders from this maker even had a "break-in period," which reduces their immediate usability even more. Some folks remove the thumb stud from other models by this maker and drill a Spydie-hole into the blade, and I have to agree that it makes that model much more user-friendly.

At least I was able to satisfy my curiosity about this maker and get to understand why many people admire it for its tight tolerances. I will keep said folder in my collection, but I would rather choose a Manix, Spydiechef, Native or any of a dozen other Spyderco models if I had a lot of work to do for the day and needed a folder that wouldn't require me to waste a few extra seconds every time I needed to get it open.

I would keep up with the Umnumzaan. The opening will become more intuitive as you use it and opening and closing will be second-nature soon enough. Though I agree that Spyderco is faster and initially more intuitive to use straight out of the box

[Humint]

This post is perhaps one of the greatest posts I have ever read on a knife related forum. I couldn’t agree with the topic more and this is why above all else I always come back to Spyderco. Give me an Endura or Delica and it is really all the knife I would ever need in my life. I will enjoy reading this thread over and over for a very long time

[PayneTrain]

...only the grossest of differences in cutlery steel chemistry seem to bear out in practical performance.

I admit I used to be a rather deliberate collector of steels until I began to realize this. Sure, there's a difference between the corrosion resistance of Super Blue and H1, but all the wear resistance and hardness theory we put so much stock into never seems to manifest in the tangible differences we expect. I believe that is partly due to the fact that we frequently ignore many other factors that affect how easily and how many times we can cut something with a particular knife, and also due to the fact that Spyderco just doesn't really use steels that don't make a good blade.

When I open my knife box, the difference I see between my S110V Manix and my S30V Sage 3 isn't edge life, it's size (and to a lesser degree, sharpenability). I pick up my Salt when I want corrosion resistance, my Southard when I want something pretty, my Dragonfly when I need something small, and my Gayle Bradley when I'm gonna be pushing hard into something. I carried my Cutlery Shoppe PM2 all last month not because of the fine edge-holding of XHP, but because it's orange and it was October. I no longer grab my 20CP PM2 over my VG-10 Delica because I think "I'm gonna need the carbides today".

It's all relative though. My minute difference is someone else's deal breaker. Some are perfectly fine with a box full of black-handled knives with every combination of letters and numbers stamped on the blade, while I will absolutely pass up adamantium if it looks too much like something I already have. Though despite our differences in how we perceive the world, the steel nut and I are still very much the same. We're still buying knives superfluously because we find them interesting. Neither of us need 30 knives to succeed in life. There is no cutting performance difference between raffir noble and FRN, and plenty of people have made it through life with nothing fancier than 440C. The steel nut, however, values vanadium carbides the same way I value anodized titanium that compliments my pants.

Perhaps most importantly, I, like the steel nut, like to treat myself! I like variety and while I used to see it in tenths of percentages by weight, I now see it in Pakkawood, polished G-10, bolt locks, narrow handles, and flipper tabs. It's really all the same, as long as I'm not asserting that I can cut 14% longer with my Cruwear Military because it's grey. I don't mean to degrade at all the contributions of the Ankersons or the Larrins of the world (really, you guys are great minds!), but it's not as scientific as many people take it to be, and what's worse is we keep trying to use their data to make grossly oversimplified comparisons. While I do enjoy the novelty of different alloying elements, it's really not fair to say one steel is better than another without specifying many more characteristics of the blade, what attribute is being compared, and under what conditions. Steels are really more like flavors and I enjoy classic Lay's just as much as sweet chili Doritos. Ok maybe not as much, but they're definitely the best chip to stuff inside a tuna sandwich! So just like there's a reason the chip aisle in the grocery store is 50 feet long, there's a reason Spyderco's catalog is so huge. Different knives for different lives!

All that goes out the window when you get me talking about Cruwear, though. That stuff's magic...

[mikey177]

I would keep up with the Umnumzaan. The opening will become more intuitive as you use it and opening and closing will be second-nature soon enough. Though I agree that Spyderco is faster and initially more intuitive to use straight out of the box

Yes, I am keeping the Umnumzaan in rotation. I just found it amusing since I bought an Inkosi prior to getting it, and it took me about a week and a sore thumb to get used to the Inkosi. So when I got the Zaan, it left me wondering how two models from the same maker could have such different motions required for opening.

When I think about it, perhaps the quirkiest Spydie I own is the Swayback. But even with this model, I only had to experiment for about an hour --versus a whole week-- before I figured out how to deploy it consistently.

[buckthorn]

What a refreshing discussion! Thanks to zuludelta for initiating it with that fine essay and to everyone else who has been contributing.

[zuludelta]

I recently bought a high-end production knife from another brand, and it reminded me of this topic because I indeed found it awkward to use for the first few days...

...

... At least I was able to satisfy my curiosity about this maker and get to understand why many people admire it for its tight tolerances.

Good on you for seeing the positive in the experience. I try to be brand-agnostic myself, and I'm always open to trying designs from makers other than Spyderco. Even when the knives don't particularly fit me, I can still at least say that I learned something about my preferences and what works and what doesn't work for me, knife-wise.

This post is perhaps one of the greatest posts I have ever read on a knife related forum. I couldn’t agree with the topic more and this is why above all else I always come back to Spyderco. Give me an Endura or Delica and it is really all the knife I would ever need in my life. I will enjoy reading this thread over and over for a very long time

Aw thanks man, I'm really glad that you enjoy the original post and the subsequent discussion.

... all the wear resistance and hardness theory we put so much stock into never seems to manifest in the tangible differences we expect. I believe that is partly due to the fact that we frequently ignore many other factors that affect how easily and how many times we can cut something with a particular knife...

One of the things that spurred me to write the original post was seeing a couple of edge retention test videos by two popular and well-regarded YouTube knife guys. In these videos, they both tested AUS-8, and had vastly different results: One had his AUS-8 blade perform better than VG-10 and D2 in his particular test (a somewhat surprising result), while the other had AUS-8 (in the same model knife) performing only a little bit better than 8Cr13MoV in his own test (a result most would expect, given their similarities in composition).

Both YouTubers sharpened & reprofiled their AUS-8 knives in a way that the edges would be comparable to the knives they had previously tested.

I have every reason to believe that both YouTubers performed their tests in good faith and that heat treats were consistent between the knives they used (they used a model that has generally good ratings among knife reviewers), but the fact that they had such wildly divergent results got me thinking that differences in how ergonomics and handling suited each user probably radically affected how much they could cut in their respective tests, and each person's interpretation of a "working edge" was probably different as well.

What a refreshing discussion! Thanks to zuludelta for initiating it with that fine essay and to everyone else who has been contributing.

Thank you very much for reading! :)