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Welcome to the Knife Junkie podcast, your weekly dose of knife news and information about knives and knife collecting. Here's your host, Bob the knife junkie DeMarco.

Bob DeMarco:
Welcome to the Knife Junkie podcast. I'm Bob DeMarco. On this edition of the show, I'm speaking with Vol West of Station 9. If you've watched the show in the last few years, you know I've been a big fan of Station 9 ever since my knuckle duster phase, back a few years. Station 9 specializes in making unconventional weapons and tools for combatives and survival in austere and occupied zones, drawing design inspiration from the weapons used by resistance and espionage organizations in the early 20th century conflicts. We'll find out how Volas got interested in this subject and how he carved a niche in the knife world with it. But first, be sure to like, comment, subscribe, and hit the notification bell. And as always, if you wanna help support the show, you can do so by heading on over to Patreon.

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Bob DeMarco:
Vol West, welcome to the Knife Junkie podcast, sir.

Volwest:
Thank you for having me.

Bob DeMarco:
It is my pleasure. My pleasure. Actually, I have a lot of things to to ask you, but it just occurred to me to ask you this. Station 9, let's start with your name. Where does that come from?

Volwest:
So station 9 comes from SOE, basically World War 2, British guys that did a lot of things in Europe during World War 2, mostly behind enemy lines. And they had many, many schools where they did many things, either, development of gear, development of weapons, so on and so forth. Of course, training, physical training, psychological training. They had a pretty extensive fake document department, closed departments on and so forth for sending SOE agents on the other side of the the line. And so station 9 was one of those schools, and, it's a pretty famous one just because they did all the development of weapons and and weird things.

Bob DeMarco:
Well, I love it. I I wanna tell you how I first got interested in station 9. It was it was through this, the lapel dagger

Volwest:
Yep.

Bob DeMarco:
That you make.

Volwest:
What is this? The number 2? That is the number 4, actually.

Bob DeMarco:
The number. Okay. All all of the all of the, Station 9 products have a

Volwest:
A a number. A number.

Bob DeMarco:
Yeah. And a name. Some of them have names, which is very cool.

Volwest:
But

Bob DeMarco:
Yeah. This right here, when I saw this, I had to get it because, I had seen a bunch of these little, SOE and OSS lapel daggers that get got sewn into clothing Yep. By spies and, resistance people, all during World War 2 and and around that time. But, my brother and I had a book full of weapons, and we always, kind of poured over the spy weapons and I always thought these were really cool. So what was your inspiration for making these kind of things? How'd you get into the making part?

Volwest:
Well, it's it's kind of a long and complicated story. We, first of all, there's 2 of us, but one of us doesn't speak English, so he's not here tonight. But there's 2 of us and the both of us have known each other for many, many years, and we are both really aficionados and and really kind of like gear buffs and nerds when it comes to World War 1, World War 2 stuff. Obviously, we're French, so it happened on our soil. But so we've always been interested in in that kind of, world. And then the SOE has such a big role to play in the weapon development side of it and and the cutting edge side of, you know, knife fighting with Fairburn and and all those guys, that it is hard when you're kind of into knives to not be into that world and kind of read as much as you can about it. And why did they do certain things and, you know, all the concepts that go with it. Like the the lapel is a massive concept.

Volwest:
And so that's really what interested us in the first place. It's not necessarily the weapons themselves, but it's what everything that goes around and the concept that goes with it. I feel like today a lot of knifemakers just make knives, which is great, but like we said, we are concept oriented. And so the concept of the Laplle dagger, and the fact that those guys would go behind an enemy lines and put this little tiny weapon, usually into their paper pockets. And when a German would ask for their papers, they would be able to pull out their passport or their papers with the hotel and maybe slash the hand of that soldier, maybe to the face, and give them an opportunity to escape. So those are major concepts, and it's it was very difficult for us to not make very specific tools. So there's, there's really a trilogy of those SOE tools. There's a lapel.

Volwest:
And, of course, there's the our number one tire slasher. We started with this guy, and this guy was, issued to the same agents to basically go behind enemy line and, puncture tires. So anytime they would see a a German vehicle, they would puncture the tires. So those are called tire slashers. And it was very hard for us to go into that environment and build our company, especially since our name is Station 9, and not start with those guys with that SOE spirit, that British World War 2 fighting spirit, weird SOE agent behind enemy line stuff. So those are 2 of the really big, there's a big 4 with the SOE, the lapel, the tire slasher, there's the SOE coin, which we are developing. So right now, I have the prototype. You guys will be the first ones to see it because we've never shown it.

Volwest:
But so this will be our s o e SOE coin. And the same thing, they had this in their pockets in the middle of their change inside the pocket. Very, very devastating little little tool. For people listening, describe the SOE coin.

Bob DeMarco:
First of all, SOE was special operations executive. Right? Correct. Yeah. Okay. Kind of like a precursor to the CIA or the OSS, something kind of like or the m a Mi 5 in Exactly. Great Britain. Yep. But but tell us about this coin.

Volwest:
Well, the coin was one of those 2 that was issued. Usually those guys were issued, like I said, there's many tools in the toolbox, But usually when it comes to spy work and behind enemy line work, we had the lapel dagger, which was either kept with the passport or the papers or if sewn in a pocket somewhere, and that was very, a very small and effective tool to buy them time. There was the tire slasher, which was a sabotage tool even though we can easily fight with it, But that was a sabotage tool. There was the coin, and the coin was kept same thing in their in their pockets, in the middle of other coins, so they could basically disappear inside the pockets. And, same thing that was a last chance, last last ditch effort slashing tool to

Bob DeMarco:
the face. Yeah. And if you're just listening, the coin yeah. It looks like a coin from one side, but on the other side, it has a small, swiveling hawk bill blade of the same circumference as the coin itself. So you can't see it from the one side. Correct. You can drop it in your pocket full of coins and kind of lose it in there. Exactly.

Bob DeMarco:
But then find it when you need it.

Volwest:
Yep. We are the, we are the first one to do actually that that hog bill really, really extremely aggressive design. Usually those, those blades were flat. So they were usually flat and, you know, with a cheese of guai on it, but we went with the the hot bill.

Bob DeMarco:
Yeah. That that gets in. It's, it's it's you're gonna have to, hole it, tear it out together Tear it. Yeah. Something I thought was cool as I was perusing your, website, on the page for, the number 4, the SOE lapel dagger. You have shots of a book that appears to be a manual, an SOE manual, and it show it, it discusses how to use this. And it says specifically target the eyes, the face, and the neck. It is so small.

Bob DeMarco:
You go to the Bob, you're not gonna, you're not gonna really I mean, you're gonna hurt someone badly, but, you're not gonna penetrate all the way to to vitals with this little thing. But to the face, the eyes, the neck, you could do a lot of damage. So I think that, it's interesting about this, the little tire slasher, and the coin is that the tactic is at least half as important as the tool itself.

Volwest:
Oh, yeah. And that's why that's why we enter the world of concepts. That's why we are kind of like, you know, those guys really thought about, okay, what can we hide on our persons, easily? What can, you know, be used as effectively as possible, but at the same time be easy to carry. And, yeah, they came up with those very crude weapons, very small and crude weapons, but that, you know, that are so so SOE and so World War 2. Like I said, those are iconic iconic weapons now for us. Now in 2024, when we look at the the history of of the knife world and the fighting world, the combatives world, it is impossible to, like, you know, step over that that very short period of time with those very iconic tools.

Bob DeMarco:
Before we get to the rest of the knives in the in the, Station 9, analog, and and you've got some really impressive, well, cool designs that we've seen do impressive stuff in videos online. Before we get to that, something that I think is really in the spirit of the SOE, dagger, the coin, and the tire slasher are the g ten chopsticks. There's they're, you know, they're, totally unexpected and, well, tell us about those.

Volwest:
Well, I think that the actually, the the g ten chopsticks, are for us for us, they are kind of like, you know, in the same vein of that SOE special agent, type weapon, which we have a weapon that's extremely easy to carry with us, that does not suspect. They are just chopsticks. We can take them with us on the plane. We can take them everywhere, but it's a solid chunk of, of g ten. And, yeah, we we have we put some tests, especially on Instagram, but, same thing, a devastating tool. And we kind of want it to be in the, stay in that vein of discreet. And so we made the the silliest packaging possible. Like that it goes everywhere.

Volwest:
It doesn't raise suspicion. But, yeah, this is this has become one of our best sellers just because it's it's such a cool product, and we wanted to just make it as silly and corny as possible, but at the same time have a devastating tool. And, in that same vein, there's 2 of them. So if we are with a buddy in a plane or something, there's 2 weapons here, which is, you know, which is often, you know, it's it's pretty cool. I think it's pretty cool.

Bob DeMarco:
So, tell us about g ten and how it tests. I mean, I've seen a lot of g ten knives, undetectable knives, things that people, market for, you know, getting into non permissive environments. But,

Volwest:
I I have never actually tested out g ten. How does it work, especially in that sort of long, slender format? It's actually incredible. We use g ten a lot on on other parts of NICE, for example, for the handles just because and that's what we've, we've determined. G ten is great because it's extremely stable. So we can go, my partner loves going to the jungle. I live in Montana. So we we always joke that we do minus 40, plus 40 centigrade here. But g ten won't move in those environment.

Volwest:
It can be wet, it can be dry, it can be extremely cold, extremely hot, and it's a very stable platform. It's also extremely hard. And if you do get I don't know if you have Shanghai sticks, but, it's actually pretty impressive how heavy they are and how dense GTN is. And, I was actually surprised myself. We have another Jiten tool in the line, which is our Jiten push. And we've done crazy tests with those those tools and they perform so well. It's actually pretty impressive. So I've I've always been impressed with g ten and the performance level of those tools.

Volwest:
What what kind of tests have you done on them? Metal, genes, any anything goes. But mostly mostly metal by, you know, very negative temperatures, in Montana, which is usually extremely hard on on gear. But, yeah, I mean, they they perform extremely well. Like I said, we have a lot of videos on our YouTube channel and, also on Instagram where we show the the capacity of those of those tool and the penetration. I mean, it's it's pretty remarkable.

Bob DeMarco:
Well, it's funny. I I love your test videos, especially considering, I don't have much of a chance to go out and and do the testing myself, or maybe it's more like I'd rather know that the knife can do it, but not do it to my own knife. Sure.

Volwest:
Of course. That's why we're doing it.

Bob DeMarco:
I'm a collector. Mhmm. But so, Jim is scrolling through your catalog here. But let let's, let's talk about some of the specifics here. I'm holding in my hand the partisan, and something that's very interesting to me about this knife, it's about a 6 and a half, 7 inch blade. It's got this really nice, somewhat neutral, micarta handle. Yep. It's a great knife, and we look at it and it looks, it resembles, a French chef's knife or a French fighting knife.

Bob DeMarco:
A lot of them a lot of similarities between those 2, especially the blade being wide enough to be the guard itself. Correct. Yeah. I I'm fascinated by this knife because of, kind of the historical inspiration. Tell us about this.

Volwest:
Well, the partisan came out of this is our World War one line, So we have the World War 2 line, and we also have the World War one line. Right now in that World War one line, we have the partisan and we have the knuckles, which were Austro Hungarian, issued to the to the soldiers during World War 1. But the the partisan what's interesting with this knife is that during World War 1, French soldiers went went into it. And at the time, we were still transitioning between very long bayonets, and field duty knives and soldiers in the trenches. Remember we went into that war. We thought it was gonna last 6 months and be over, But French soldiers started realizing that we were in a very close quarter, war trenches. It was extremely cold, and I'm sure we've all seen photos of French and German soldiers during World War 1 in the mud with extremely stick clothing. Most of them had sheep, sheep, entire sheep pelts on them with very thick wool coats.

Volwest:
And, everybody realized that in the trenches when it's cold like this, so we are far far away from 2024 with electric bicycles and knives that are this small for fighting in the streets. But we were lacking we were lacking a knife and soldiers didn't have knives. And so they started going to the butchers in the small villages and grabbing butcher mites, which was perfect for them because it offered a very natural knife that everybody knew and had at home. And it offered a guard, which is, for us at least in in our world, in our station 9 world, is absolutely, necessary for battle. And it offered a really long blade, really thin blade that was able to go through, heavy duty materials like wool and sheep skin and so on and so forth. So they started grabbing those those butcher knives and a lot of French soldiers went to war and killed Germans with butcher knives. And so this is our homage to them to those soldiers. This is our homage to those types of knives.

Volwest:
Of course, ours is a is a little bit thicker. It's got a false edge on it. We modernized it a little bit, but it is the essence of that knife. The essence of that knife is a perfect world war 1 trench fighting knife, soldier's knife.

Bob DeMarco:
You went with 1095, on this knife.

Volwest:
Absolutely.

Bob DeMarco:
One of my favorite steels. What what do you find the benefit for a a knife like this?

Volwest:
Well, first of all, 1095 has been around many, many years. We have to understand that in the knife world, the, metallurgy side of it, really exploded this past 10 years, with amazing steels that are doing amazing things. But we have a history, a very long history of of 100 of years where we used very specific steels for very specific reasons. One of those steels, at least for this past 50 years, has been the 10 95 carbon steel. And what's very interesting for us here is that it's very flexible. So it's able to flex and not, and not break like D2, for example. A blade like this in D2 would be absolutely impossible just because it would break too easily. So we are again big proponent of rusticity at Station 9.

Volwest:
So we like rustic things. We like things that we can use. We like things that can be sharpened in the field extremely easily. And for all those types of blade, which are survival blades or combative blades, soldier blades, we stick with 1095 because one, everybody knows how to make a really good heat treatment on 1095 by now because we have years decades of experience, which is what matters the most. I'd rather personally buy a a knife in 4 40, for example, a very crappy steel to modern standards, you know? But at least I know that for the past 50 years, you have factories, that have made, heat treatment on that steel that know exactly how to make a really good heat treatment on that steel. And it's the same with 1095. 1095 is a classic classic steel. It holds the world record for cutting.

Volwest:
So, I mean, easy to sharpen on the field for soldiers. Let's remember that this is for us a soldier's knife, a soldier's blade. So I can be in the trenches, grab a a rock, grab a mug, a ceramic mug, and I should be able to sharpen my knife. Very easy to maintain, cuts like crazy and, and will will bend under certain forces, and not break. And it's what we want with a a soldier's blade, a utility blade.

Bob DeMarco:
Yeah. Yeah. It seems like a natural fit for a combat blade. Yes. I mean, you know, KA BARs, which are which are, legendary, also use, 1095. Yeah. All the tops knives and all the outdoors knives, worth their salt are 10.95 or or something also tough. You know, there's a, you know, 3 via is a kind of a luxury steel in that sort of category, but 10.95 is, like you said, like tried and true.

Bob DeMarco:
It is proven. And to me, it makes the most sense on something like this, which, is also tipping its hat towards, history.

Volwest:
Oh, yeah. Absolutely. And it's a long blade. So you you want that you want a mild steel, you want a steel that will be able to move, you know, that's super important. If we were on something smaller and we have smaller smaller tools with us, but on on smaller things, then we can we can try things and go to different steels. But again, this is World War 1 mud, trench coats. And, you know, that's that's what it is. That's the that's really the soul of that knife.

Bob DeMarco:
Something about this knife that also is interesting to me, conceptually is the fact well, you know, it's based on the the history of people grabbing what they could grab and what makes them more the most sense for trench fighting, something that's already optimized for cutting meat. And, you know, that's what you're doing when you're fighting hand to hand. You're cutting meat. And to me, that, putting that all together makes this knife, all the more interesting, to me because it's it's not a pretty picture it paints, but it's realistic. What are you gonna go for? You're gonna go for something that's already used for that purpose.

Volwest:
Yep. Like like we always say, if you jump back to World War 1, we put you in a trench. We give you, you know, a big heavy coat. You're in the mud, and you we're gonna tell you, hey. You're gonna fight hand to hand with another guy. What what do you want? You know? Do you want let's be one thing. Yeah. Do you want me to? Yeah.

Volwest:
Yeah. I'll take I'll take that. Yeah. Well, speaking of

Bob DeMarco:
that, I mean, this, so these are the your your knuckles, and they're based on, the knuckles issued to Austro Hungarian soldiers during World War 1. And to me, you know, well, first of all, as someone who didn't serve and was never issued any weapon, it's, you know, that's a that's a whole different world to me. But the fact that people, at one point, were issued something as, close and personal and just, devastating as knuckles like this is very interesting. There's no palm swell. There's no, we're used to seeing certain kind of knuckles that come down here. And, tell tell me about this design and, how you chose this and why you chose to go knucks, no calls at all.

Volwest:
Well, so, back to World War 1, Australian Hungarians were issued this, And, first of all, it's a very clean, simple design. It's extremely violent, which we love, and, it has no palm swell. So, when they were issued this, you have to remember that at that time, they have to service they had to service their weapons. They had to work their weapons, constantly. And so they were issued those because they could wear those knuckles in the trenches and still manipulate their gun, load their guns, fire their guns. But if somebody came over the wall and fell into their trenches, they could also just right away fight them with a tool in their hands. So that's why those, were made that way. And again again with Station 9, we're just wearing 2 concepts.

Volwest:
And that concept of being able to have knuckles, but at the same time grab somebody by their coat, head butt them, manipulate a weapon, grab a knife, do all those things was extremely appealing to us and very interesting, not only historically speaking, but, also in terms of combat and combatives on the ground. We modernized them because, we made them out of aluminum, so they are extremely lightweight, very easy to carry in the pockets. But it's a devastating tool, absolutely absolutely violent, but, extremely interesting in the sense that in in if we transpose it to our modern day, I can still grab somebody. I can still open the door. I can still open the car door. I can still, grab my phone. I can do a lot of things with them that we cannot do with regular, more traditional knuckles. So that's why we went with those.

Volwest:
And again, they fall into our World War 1, territory with the with the partisan. So those two things go together, and we have a a third that will complete this set of this World War one set coming hopefully, this year.

Bob DeMarco:
Oh, can you give us a hint or is that, still to be determined?

Volwest:
I can't give you a hint, but, it's gonna be pretty wild because I think it's gonna shake up again a little bit the the belief system around certain tools. And so, yeah, we'll, you know, I'm will I will gladly come back on your podcast and talk about it, but yeah. Cool.

Bob DeMarco:
I I already have some ideas. We'll see if I

Volwest:
was right.

Bob DeMarco:
Good. Before we before we move on from the knuckles, something that I used to think was, very necessary with knuckles is weight, the weight of brass, for instance. You pick up brass knuckles and and a huge component of what you're getting out of that is additional force from the weight. These, it seems like what you're getting out of, is is additional speed. You you've got these these terrible spikes on there and, and you can go fast with these and recover quickly with them. I, I've hit them with my Bob dummy. I had to wrap, as I was showing you before, I had to

Volwest:
wrap a little, paracord in there just to make it, easier for my hands to fit, but, they really stay stable in the hand. What, if any thought went into the trade off of weight? So the trade off of weight, is again how we're gonna use the knuckles. Most people have in their mind that we use knuckles like if we were boxing. For us, we come from the combative schools. And so for us, it's gonna be angle 1, angle 2. It's gonna be hammer fists. And when we use knuckles with hammer feasts, we actually don't need that weight. This is going to be devastating in the face.

Volwest:
I mean, we can we can imagine, but if I go hammer fist, it's gonna be absolutely devastating and therefore I don't need that weight. Same thing, if we are on clinch or something and I can hit the ribs with this or just even rub the ribs. It's gonna be extremely painful. So I think there's a little bit of miss with knuckles in how we use them, what they are for. Most of the time the knuckles are are so devastating that we actually don't need to traditionally box with them. I can just do little jabs with them, But for us, in our school of thought, we go full on combative wisdom and therefore it's all hammer fist. Angle 1, angle 2, and, yeah, there's no no need for weight here.

Bob DeMarco:
That's, to me, angle 1 and angle 2 and that kind of raking motion is, is what I end up doing with these, and and all knuckles. I have I have another pair of knuckles that are a little bit more traditional with the palm swell, and, they still, are not as comfortable to me in anything but that hammer fist and that sort of raking motion. Yep. So that's that's cool to hear. But, so you're talking about combatives and how you come from, less of the your instinct with these is to do something more like Filipino kali or whatever, whatever art uses a knife, as opposed to, say, boxing. So combatives go into your designs, and it seems like outdoor survival and, well, survival in austere environments, as your mission statement says, is a big part of it. Tell me about, your your combatives and your outdoors experience and how those come together with you and your partner to create these, these cool products.

Volwest:
Well, I mean, the, and to to to just go back just a few seconds on this, because you mentioned Cali for example, we do not come from the Cali school. We come from trenches and and World War 1, 2, and therefore, you know, that that actually that hammer fist is prevalent in in those, in those concepts and sets of combatives. So basically after after those World War 1, World War 2 sets, we have our urban line and our outdoor line, if we can call it that. But, yeah, it's the same thing. We, we've worked intensively, with the military and we, my partner and I really wanted to put out a soldier's knife. We felt that even though they are really good soldier's knives on the market, we felt that something a little bit, more rustic was needed. And so we came up with the number 8. I don't know if you have a number 8, but The seer? The seer.

Volwest:
Yeah. Yes. So that really is the start of our of our outdoor survival, you know, concepts. And the seer, it's the same thing. The seer came out of, for us a need for for a military knife. And by now, we just signed our first contract with, French special forces. Oh, cool. So they are, you know, they bought it.

Volwest:
Congratulations. That's a real feather in your cap. Yep. But so we really wanted, to go back to the roots with the soldiers knives. Bowie, very simple, 1095, 5 inch and a quarter, double guard. We again emphasized a lot on the need for guard. It's amazing the amount of fighting knives on the market today without a guard. But we wanted a double guard and we made it, of course, kind of modern and not as pronounced as some other double gods.

Volwest:
And again, this very simple, simplistic, rustic, handle, g ten. So very, very rustic, very usable. Like I said, 1095 G10 handle. So, you know, a very, very strong knife. It's not too big. It's not too small. It's not too heavy. It's not too light.

Volwest:
It kind of fits that that perfect spot for us. So, yeah, we are extremely happy with it. It's definitely my favorite knife in our in our collection, but, you know, yeah.

Bob DeMarco:
Well, let me, let me please give you some observations I have about this knife. Go for it. Couple of couple of things. I got these on the same day Yeah. And I did a totally nonscientific, thrusting test against the the Bob. It came in, without any weight in it, and this was an amazing penetrator. This, this and maybe it's that swedge, maybe it's the tip and and how it's all set up. But this so effort effort effortlessly penetrated very deeply, with very little effort.

Bob DeMarco:
So that that impressed me and surprised me, but right off the bat. A couple of other interesting, design things I found is that though you definitely, added the double guard

Volwest:
Yeah.

Bob DeMarco:
With the top guard smaller, so you can use the thumb on the back of the blade and all that. You still maintain some of this, French design. Even if you didn't have that guard there, the width of the blade against that handle would still act as a guard, which is something that we see very traditionally kind of in this knife here. And then the, the long swedge starting from all the way near the recasto and come coming all the way down. Yeah. Is, a, very effective for those thrusts that I was talking about. And b, to me, is kind of a tip of the hat to that MACV SOG design with that super long swedge. Yeah.

Bob DeMarco:
This thing hits on all cylinders for me.

Volwest:
Yeah. Good for you. Yeah. The the long swedge, is actually a throwback to a more, traditional eighties, seventies, eighties, you know, type design. And, yeah, it's definitely we did have, you know, the the sub Boeing mine, of course all the Randalls, you know, the 15, the Randall number 15. But yeah. So it's it's, it's the child of all those, you know, kind of combat knives. And like we said, we, you know, we really wanted to have a soldier's knife that they could use and get out of, you know, certain choices that for us, even though they are great knives, like we see a lot of soldiers today wearing esses.

Volwest:
And esses are great bushcraft knives. They are great outdoor knives. I love Essies. I have a I have I have a few, but to us, we we really wanted something with a double guard, extremely important for soldiers. And that's that's really the the soul of this knife. And of course, the Bowie makes it for for everything that's thrusting, devastating.

Bob DeMarco:
Yeah. Yeah. In a in a pinch, if a soldier needs a knife like this, in a in a I've from what I've heard from stories told to me, it's all about being able to thrust through layers of of clothing and and that kind of thing. Yeah. And and this this is perfect for that. This knife to me seems like a great, go to war sort of knife. And, like I said before, I haven't gone to war, but I've talked to a lot of people who have, and and we know a lot of the most popular, designs for combat knives are not big giant things like you see in the movies. They're manageable 5 and a half inch, Bowie style blades with with great handles.

Bob DeMarco:
And I think this fits the bill.

Volwest:
Especially nowadays. I mean, those guys carry so much gear. Yeah. We see it, you know, we were we were training with, special forces last week and those guys carry so much gear, have so much weight on. And that's another thing. You know, there's a lot of things in combatives where, you know, you you were talking about Cali and stuff like that. When you are wearing, plates, when you are wearing, you know, magazines on your chest and everything, angle 1 on the chest, you know, useless, pointless. Yeah.

Volwest:
Yeah. So so we do go back to more traditional combatives theories, and concepts, but, that is also why we wanted something that was not overly built, that was not too heavy because those guys, like we said, carry so much so much weight already, India.

Bob DeMarco:
Yeah. I mean, to me, this is, it knocks a venerable knife out of the water for me, which is the SOG Seal Pup, and I love that thing, and I carry it in my backpack. Well, the the handle the handle won't burn on that one. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. That's in my backpack in case I lose the backpack.

Bob DeMarco:
That's why I wouldn't carry this all the time

Volwest:
because it's That's good.

Bob DeMarco:
But, so something cool about this knife and then, you also have a very small, clip point blade that is definitely like, it's like a neck knife, but, both that knife and this knife, come with not come with, but you can, accessorize with sheaths that have pouches and all sorts of sort of, survival accoutrement. Like, to me, this is a fighting knife.

Volwest:
Mhmm.

Bob DeMarco:
Because I'm not well, I'm not doing either, but, I'm not out there in the woods surviving, so I don't look at this and think survival knife immediately. Right. But that's that is what it is because it's called a sear knife. Yep. So tell us about the the the packet the, the sheaves with the extra on them.

Volwest:
Well, and that's what we wanted to do with this knife. We wanted, you know, so right now, if you look at soldiers, you'll often have, that seer concept ingrained in them, which is great, but I personally feel that the seer stuff went more and more bushcraft and less and less survival and resistance. And so we kind of wanted to balance again this, this seer concept. And that's why I think a lot of guys end up with, knives that are not necessarily fighting knives, but that are that are tools, which is great. We need a tool. With the SEER, we wanted a tool, but also a weapon. So we wanted to marry both, tool and weapon to kind of rebalance the thing. And because it was in that SERE vein, we were like, okay, well, we would love to also be able to attach a SERE kit, a survival, evasion, resistance, and escape kit to it, to be able to put some some gear to go with it, to go with that cutting tool implement.

Volwest:
So we, we we did those patches with the Leicester River Bushcraft, with Jason, and those patches are absolutely fantastic. And that's why we also designed the, Kydex the way we designed it. We designed it for soldiers that jump out of planes, so we had to have, really good retention. But also we were we wanted something where we could adapt a pouch on it, a utility pouch for some gear. And because we did this on the on the seer, the number 8, we also did it with the little one. The little one, is also kind of interesting because it was also, and we really didn't mean for this, but it was also picked up by the French special forces. Yeah. How cool.

Volwest:
And they wanted it because they started carrying it in missions, in their in their pants, as they are real SERE kids. Most of the guys right now, when they carry the seer on their gear, they'll put a smoke grenade in it or they'll put a grenade, but they won't put a kit in it. But this guy, they they keep it fully kitted, so we developed a a sear kit for them. And, same thing, this comes with that little, little pouch, which is actually Velcroed on there so we can separate them. Those guys can use the kit or they can use the knife. And the knife, we wanted something extremely small, extremely lightweight. This is 42 grams, VG10. They don't have to worry about it.

Volwest:
It won't, you know, rust on them. There's no maintenance. They can keep it in their pocket. And that really becomes their cutting implement for their circuit. We developed that knives though that knife, at least 15 years ago. So it took us that long to bring that knife to market. But yeah. This this little guy, unbeknownst to us, same thing got picked up, you know, by the military.

Volwest:
And now they are using it as a as a full kit with the with the pocket and, you know, the the patch was always gonna go with those 2 knives. From the get go, we were like, okay, let's let's make a knife that can be completed if people want and carried, with a with a kit in it.

Bob DeMarco:
I I love that little knife because, well, first of all, I like the little kit on there and, you know, you can imagine just the the bare essentials go in there. Yep. And, and you can, you know, create better opportunity for yourself out there in a survival situation with those things. But, also, I love that you have a little compass attached to the pommel that, of course, lengthens the handle so you get utility in 2 different ways there and you're really maximizing your space and weight.

Volwest:
Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. It's, it's a, again, very small, very small utility knife, again, with this guard because we are obsessed with guards on knives. But, clip point, very utilitarian blade. Right now I just have a little photon in the in the back of it. Oh, yeah. And that's how we actually give it to the military guys.

Volwest:
But, yeah, it's such a small capable knife. It's actually been same thing. Pretty amazing to us what that those guys picked it up. Those guys go on mission with it. And it's it's just, you know, cool brownie pounce for us, but, we really wanted to make something extremely lightweight. We can carry in the pocket. We can carry, in many ways. Obviously, we can carry it as a as a neck knife.

Volwest:
That's how I carry it. But, yeah, 42 grams, VG 10, it's a it's a great little great little knife. And again, I I I we felt that something like that was kind of missing, with the you know? So here it is. Yep.

Bob DeMarco:
Well, you you're talking about how, you and your partner, are obsessed with guards. Everything's gotta have a guard, and that's obviously, for retention, but also, so that your hand doesn't go sliding up on the on the blade and all that. Well, you teamed up with, the great and powerful Fred Perrin to create your scorpion knife Yep. Which has so much of a guard. Your finger is encapsulated. Tell us about that. And and and, by the way, I think he's one of the coolest dudes out there, period. I had a chance to talk with him.

Bob DeMarco:
I met you also, briefly two and a half years ago at Blade Show, and then I talked with Fred

Volwest:
Parent, who were right next to you. Fred was with us. Yeah.

Bob DeMarco:
Yeah. Yeah. Cool guy. Tell us about that collaboration.

Volwest:
Well, first of all, so my partner is a full time knife maker. He's been a time knife maker for 20 years and he actually apprentice with Fred. He's the only knife maker in the world that apprentice with Fred for

Bob DeMarco:
No way.

Volwest:
For many years. So we've known Fred for 20 years. And of course Fred has Lagrif. Everybody should know about Lagrif now. Great great concepts with this, finger hole, And this is our version, but there's I've got other other glyphs out there. But, really, the main concept here is, to have a guard. Again, to be able if somebody if we're in a fight, somebody punches us or we hit the ground for some reason, if we have to open our hand, the knife stays in our hand, which is pretty cool. And, of course, it gives us a full, a full guard.

Volwest:
We, from the get go, I think when we started station 9, we've always wanted to do our version of the glyph. And, of course, Fred was always okay with it. But so we did a fuller length grief, because I think that Emerson's got a grief, Spyderco's got a grief. I think he he gave that design to a lot of a lot of companies. CRKT's got one. Okay. Okay. But we wanted something extremely aggressive.

Volwest:
So now we go into our urban line and extremely aggressive, something that's actually extremely comfortable to use either hammer or pickle. And we have serrations on top. I mean, this thing in pickle like this, it's it's a college. So, you know, that's that's where this comes from. But, yeah, this is our homage to Fred. And, you know, we we are just so proud and lucky to know him and, of course, to be able to to do a collab with him. So we were super excited to do that.

Bob DeMarco:
Is this, is this like a neck knife? How how would you how do you wear that when you when you wear that?

Volwest:
I wear that, static line, Apanist. So either left side, right side, doesn't matter, but I wear that static line. And no clip, no nothing. It moves with me, and I wanna be able to and that's the great thing about the static line is that I'm able right now, carrying a number 9 from a spot. This

Bob DeMarco:
Oh, I love that one.

Volwest:
The static line allows us to when we are on the ground fighting and so on and so forth, to be able to pull the blade away from our body. Especially with double edged weapons like this, if this is, take a look for example, right next to my skin and I'm bent weird or I wanna grab by knife while I'm fighting on the ground or bent, and so on and so forth, and I pull this against my skin, then, you know, I I might injure myself. The great thing about, you know, the static line is that I can pull away from my body. So that's how we carry this, but you can carry it many, many other ways. It really depends, you know, who you are and what you do and, you know, but the

Bob DeMarco:
Well, I gotta say, I'm really glad I asked you that because, I've I've carried I I have certain knives that I carry on a static cord. Usually, that has to do to size. But I was just thinking today because I had a double edged pickle on me today. Uh-huh. And, I put on a little bit of weight during Easter, and I was thinking if I had to draw this thing while sitting, I would have to, like, I would have to clear my stomach. Yeah. Because I would cut my stomach, and and I'd never thought of that. I love, discrete carry concepts clips.

Bob DeMarco:
I love close in the waistband carry. But it's usually, for a long time, I'd carry it over at the 3 o'clock position. But now that I carry appendix, Yeah. I have to think more about how I draw it. And am I gonna cut my own belly?

Volwest:
Right? Well, especially with yeah. I mean, especially with double edged blades and, you know, but, yeah, the the static carry, I can I can pull my knife? I'm not against my skin. I'm not against, you know, my own body. So that's that's really the great, the great way to use that static line.

Bob DeMarco:
So you have mentioned, your partner a few times, and I've been following him for years. Mister Lopez Yep. Knifemaker, does amazing stuff. Tell us a little bit about, him and and his angle on things.

Volwest:
Well, he's my brother from another mother, so we we, it's actually pretty rare to have exception especially in this world. In this world of mixed combatives, guns, knives, and so on and so forth, it's pretty rare to find somebody where you actually agree on everything. And that's the case with, Tony. We so that's how we really started with that universe. And that's actually how we met Fred. We met Fred through combatives, not through not through knife making. But so yeah. I mean, that's really the key for us is, like I said before, we we are more into concepts than than knives.

Volwest:
We love knives, obviously. We we are, you know, obsessed with knives. But what really tickles us is the all those little concepts that go with it. Why why static line? What's going on there? Why Techlock? Why did everybody move to Techlock? And Techlock is great when I'm in the military and I wear a uniform and I have plates on and I have to put a knife on my plate carrier. Fantastic. Street stuff. So it's weird because you have all those little micro universes, and everybody is kind of like going from one universe to another saying, oh, in your universe this doesn't work, in your universe this doesn't work. But there are different universe.

Volwest:
And that's that's the whole part with, I think, the knife world is understanding, am I holding a bushcraft knife or am I holding a combat knife? Am I holding, let's go in the woodcut mushroom knives, or am I holding a combative knife, a fight for my life knife? And what does that mean to that knife? How is that knife built? Why is it built that way? You know, yeah. If somebody, if I if I have to pull out that knife and I'm holding that knife and somebody headbutts me or I trip on a sidewalk or something and I fall over and my hands open because that's a human thing to do. Yeah. Am I gonna lose that knife or is that knife gonna stay in my hands? All those things start becoming extremely interesting to us. And so, you know, it's just like we were saying with the partisan. It's great to fight in the streets with with in the streets of San Diego with little knives when it's always a 100 degrees and everybody's t shirt and shorts. But what happens to us in Montana when I have to fight guys that are cowboys, that are wearing Levi's, you know, jean jackets and sweaters and snow hats and have beards and, you know, it's a different world. It's a completely different world.

Volwest:
And so it's fascinating to us on how those micro worlds affect tactics and combatives and concepts. And then we go back to concepts and we're like, okay. During, yeah, World War 2, if I was a guy that was pushed out of an airplane dressed in civilian and I had to, you know, spy on Germans, I would have a set of tools and skills that was defined by that environment. And the concepts coming out of that are fascinating. So, you know, the the concept of the grief is fascinating, you know, when you start digging a little bit. So, yeah, it's it's it's great to have found a partner that, you know, is into the same thing and we think the same way and we have the same culture. You know, we we both feel that we have lost a lot of that knife culture in the past 20 years. So, you know, we're just, this is our little contribution to this culture and the knife culture and the fighting culture and the street culture, the soldier culture, the bushcraft culture, you know, but it's all it's all different tools and, you know, I would never go to war with a bushcraft knife.

Volwest:
Yeah. And I would never go carve a spoon with, you

Bob DeMarco:
know, with a battle knife, you know. Well, I I appreciate the, I I appreciate the the, the attention to the different concepts and designing within those concepts and within those realms. But what I really personally, appreciate is your and Station 9's unabashed, dedication to making weapons and to making them, time tested, especially in a time where knives are, are, especially out of, an overabundance of caution relegated to the tool. You'll hear a lot of guys say, I just review tools. These aren't weapons. Don't demonetize me, and I totally get that. And a lot of people aren't into combatives and stuff. K.

Bob DeMarco:
But for those of us who are and who love the history of weapons and, and and are interested in those eras that are not that far gone. Yeah, I appreciate what Station 9 is doing. What, before I let you go, what, anything in the offing, any concepts, that you're thinking of? You don't have to announce future knives or anything, but any concepts, in the offing that you'd like to, as a company, take, take on?

Volwest:
Well, I mean, we are still working on developing our urban line. I still feel that there's, a gap within the combative knife world with women. So we are developing right now a tool that is gonna be, we feel appropriate for women. Not that they can't use any of those big knives, but, there are certain realities just the way, women dress and just the way their clothes are designed. There are certain realities here that we have to we have to obey by. So I think for us, the the big challenges ahead, we, we were asked again by the by the special forces to develop another tool for them. Everybody wants us to, make a shovel. We love shovels.

Volwest:
So there there are plenty of great challenges, for us ahead. But I'd say, as of right now, and that's after developing the number 9, which is, you know, right now kind of our flagship urban urban blade, but it's gonna be it's gonna be tackling that that that gap with with women self defense and, you know, combatives.

Bob DeMarco:
Great. Well, we're gonna we're gonna talk a few more minutes, for the patrons in an exclusive, little bit of, interview, and I'm gonna ask you about that number 9, which I love, ever since I saw, mister Lopez making a night very similar to that, few years back. Yeah. And sometimes he put a double edge on it. Whoo. Beautiful. So we'll get to that, but I wanna say, Volwes, thank you so much for coming on the KnifeJunkie podcast. It's been a real pleasure meeting you and talking with you about your, design philosophy and the philosophy behind Station 9.

Volwest:
Well, thank you. Thank you for having us and, you know, thank you for the opportunity to explain a little bit, which we rarely have the platform to do, you know? People just see the the tools and the knives, arriving on the website, but we are rarely given the opportunity to explain a little bit where we come from and why we do certain things and, you know, so hopefully, we were able to answer some of those questions tonight, and and thank you for the opportunity.

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Bob DeMarco:
There it goes, ladies and gentlemen. Vol West of Station 9. If you aren't familiar with them, definitely go check out their Instagram and, all their test videos and their, their products. As they come out. They make some seriously cool stuff, and as you heard, really deep and interesting philosophy behind everything they do. Alright. Be sure to join us, Wednesday for the midweek supplemental and Thursday for Thursday night knives, 10 PM Eastern Standard Time right here on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitch. For Jim working his magic behind the switcher, I'm Bob DeMarco saying until next time.

Bob DeMarco:
Don't take dull for an answer.

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