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The Knife Junkie Podcast is the place for knife newbies and knife junkies to learn about knives and knife collecting. Twice per week Bob DeMarco talks knives. Call the Listener Line at 724-466-4487; Visit https://theknifejunkie.com.
©2024, Bob DeMarco
The Knife Junkie Podcast
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Transcript

[0:00]Coming up, my collaboration knife with T-Kell Knives is ready for Blade Show, I get a box of goodies from OG Blades, and my top 10 favorite Jack Wolf knives. I'm Bob DeMarco, this is the Knife Junkie Podcast. 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.
[0:28]Welcome back to the show my favorite comment this past week was from justin of tier one gear reviews also uh the man one of the two behind dc blade and uh talking about chinese manufacturing he says come on let's be honest here this is something i'm highly passionate about because it ultimately concerns me you literally can't go anywhere or do anything thing these days without buying or using something made in China. It's unavoidable at this point. You can't say that you're taking a stand against tyrannical government by not using Chinese manufacturers while wearing a fresh pair of Nike shoes or talking on your new iPhone 15. It doesn't make any sense at all. Plus, Americans could never produce the kind of quality coming from China in this economy for the same price. Companies like mine, that's DC Blades, EMP, Key, Arcane, Devo, Jack Wolf, and many, many more could never even exist if it wasn't for China. I could literally name a hundred of them right now. Only about 50 to 60 percent of the gross cost from each project pays for the manufacturing cost, and the other percentage goes right into your fellow Americans' pockets.
[1:39]But that profit can shrink dramatically if an American manufacturer is used, unless you pick up the cost of your knives, of course. I hate to be that guy, but I'm I'm sick of seeing $100 knives selling for $300 plus. We are quite literally veering into firearm range, firearm prices, and it has some, I'm sorry, and something has to give. All right, so lengthy comment. I appreciate it, Justin, a longtime friend of the show and a very interesting dude who's been on the show, and I love his knives. And I sort of agree with some of this. To me I feel like You do have to do what you can Where you can It's kind of like dieting It's sort of like well.
[2:26]I know I can't hold myself to zero carbs, so just every meal is going to be pasta. You can go all in on something or you can do what you can where you can. So if your belief is, well, the knives I produce are going to be in America, even though I have to wear these Chinese shoes and use this Chinese phone, what I can control is where I do my knives. And so I get that. I can see both perspectives. And it's true. It would be a more barren place, the knife buying market, if it weren't for China and their exceptional manufacturing and the ability of enthusiasts to start their own knife companies. And we have definitely benefited from that. So it is a debate. It is a debate indeed. And something Jim and I are talking about.
[3:16]Maybe actually doing an official kind of debate. And no winners, no losers, but just hearing from both sides of this. And I think it'd be fun. I think it'd be great. We do a lot of debates here in this house. That's how we don't argue as much. We just sort of frame it as a debate. And sometimes you're forced to take the side you don't want. And that's when you do well that way, then you know you're a good debater anyway uh justin thank you so much for your detailed comment and and your point of view it's greatly appreciated all right all that said let us do get now to a pocket check what's in his pocket let's find out here's the knife junkie with his pocket check of knives.
[4:01]Today, in my front right pocket, I had a newcomer, the Civivi Borzam. I had this in my pocket today, and almost by accident. Well, not even almost. It was by accident. So I just got the Borzam and the Primatrox, Civivi Primatrox from Civivi Sencut, to check out and review. And I like them both very much. And I was showing them to my wife before I left for the day and had this in my pocket. it. My intention was to grab a Microtech because that's what I'm into these days. But this is what I had in my pocket because I was running around, but I had to show my wife this and the Primatrox. Ends up, she carried the Primatrox and loved it. So I think that's going to her. So I put this in my pocket just rather by accident and loved it. It's a 9CR18 MOV, super, super smooth action. I love the midline drop point on this blade.
[4:57]It's got a nice sweat. Wedge. At first blush, it looks like sort of an innocuous drop point, but when you really look at it, it's a rather capable spear point. It does have, like I said, a swedge and an asymmetrical grind and everything like that. It's not an actual spear point, but the point goes straight down the center, and to me, on a drop point, that is perfect. It's about a 3.8-inch blade. You've got a full finger choil here a crowned it's not crowned but nicely heavily chamfered spine uh leading up to that swedge this one has a black micarta and a black blade it does come in a silver blade or you know a satin blade with um jade g10 and then and then i uh just a black g10 also very very nice blade uh sen cut savivi's sort of cheaper younger brother is making some really cool stuff this is where i think uh the the great action is hang on i'm gonna pull out my little stats sheet here.
[6:02]And uh yeah oh okay black and tan black and black and green and satin and the other thing i was going to say about this uh a map pricing 39 bucks for this so it's an inexpensive knife and a really good one. And I found that out kind of by accident. Not that I wasn't going to give it a thorough look at and carry and go through before I do my video, which I'll be doing this coming week. But, you know, ordinarily, it wouldn't be taking center stage. And it did today. And it did so wonderfully. So that's the Borsam Bison.
[6:41]Okay, next up, this is a bit of a crossover with the state of the collection. Since I'm talking all about Jack Wolf Knives later, I want to introduce this and show you what I had in my pocket today. This is the brand new mini Cyborg Jack. And if you want a size comparison with the original Cyborg Jack, there it is. A modest size down, but a very nicely done one. I'll get into the specs in a minute, but I just want to show you this beauty.
[7:15]This is one of five of this model. That's how they roll there. They come out with five different configurations. This is the one full titanium configuration in this run of mini Cyborg jacks. Now, if you don't know, the Cyborg, this original Cyborg, back when they were doing Micarta, by the way, is an original pattern designed by Ben Belkin. He has angularized uh he's taking kind of an arc almost like a sow belly uh shaped handle and put some angles to it and i gotta say it's so comfortable um when you look at it you see the angles and you think it might not be but anyone who's held a strider or any other sort of uh angular handled knife and found it found it surprisingly comfortable we'll find the same Same thing here, I'm gonna put the large one away so we're not conflating anything here. This is a really, really perfectly sized slip joint for me. I like smaller slip joint because my larger knives tend to be the fixed blade or the folder in my front right pocket. I like my third knife to be a little bit smaller, A, for pulling out and using in front of the sheeple, but also just in terms of having on my purse and stuff.
[8:33]This one, Blasted Titanium, so nice. It feels like a new Sebenza. It's got that feel. And then gorgeously anodized lilac-colored hardware here. And then, of course, you always got to look at a Jack Wolf on the back. It's so perfectly hafted. All the materials so perfectly married together. This titanium S90V, really unique and gorgeous clip-point blade shape. I mean, sometimes almost like a tanto because you have two distinct straight areas, but instead of meeting at a point, you get a belly there. Outstanding walk and talk. I find that smaller slip joints with stiff walk and talk are just the perfect, perfectly appealing. Here, I'll do it in front of the mic.
[9:27]So nice. Crisp and lovely. All right, putting that down. All right, next up in my left pocket was my fixed blade today, and I haven't been doing that. I never do that, but this time and recently, due to the Fisher Blades Beckwith Covert, which has inspired me, I've been re-inspired to carry fixed blades in my pocket. The first time I ever did that was with the Amtak Northman. Awesome and awesome knife. But this is the Little Ruffian by Hogtooth Knives. This is the first one ever made. He's He's making 30 of these for Blade Show. He sent me this one just to check out, and I happen to know that he's going to... I just know it. Anyway. But I shouldn't count my chickens before they're hatched, so maybe I'll shut up right now. I had... I've been, like, having this, not owning it, but having it and carrying it on and off for about a month, I'd say. And I have...
[10:29]A couple of notes that I gave to Matt Chase about it, but not about the knife. The knife is absolutely perfect. With the sheath, there's a little bit too much coverage of the handle, making the retention a little more than it needs to be. But other than that, this is the perfect little unit here. This is the small version of his popular Ruffian, a 4.75-inch fixed blade blade knife that you've seen here a lot. And this is his small version of it. And it's perfect. It's like a three and a half finger knife. And by that, I mean, I get the full grip with most of my fingers with my first three fingers. But then my pinky kind of wraps around the back for a very comfortable grip. It's really sharp. It's hollow ground 154 CM blade steel. It's been acid stone wash and this one uh has a lanyard hole which i do appreciate because um if this were mine or once this is i'm gonna put a little leather fob there maybe even a little bead um not so much for holding it in the hand but for drawing it from the pocket that's just a little something extra to hold on to uh this thing is beautiful let me see how a blade wise it's three and.
[11:53]And nearly three and three-eighths inches long here. And overall, it's about seven inches long. So great, great little package. Great pocket fixed carry blade. I have to be 100% honest. Pocket fixed carry is not my favorite or ultimate way of carrying a fixed blade. I will always come back to in the waistband just because that's how I normalized it for myself. But I'm really liking the pocket carry for certain knives And that is one of them Last on me today for emotional support.
[12:29]The micro jimbo. I had the micro jimbo on me. If you noticed, all of these are bellied. This one is a drop point and then two clip points. They all have bellies. I need something on me that is straight edge every day. I kind of like to have two different types of blades represented, one with a straight edge, one with a bellied or curved edge. So I had this one on me. Plus, I just love this little knife. It is awesome. I live near Washington, D.C., and whenever I have to go into Washington, D.C., which isn't too frequent, I will carry this and this alone because this is exactly why it was created, except not for D.C., for another very restrictive city, the city of Chicago, where you can get in a gunfight pretty easily, probably. Well, from the news anyway. But you better not have a blade that's longer than two inches or you're in deep doo-doo. Speaking of which, a young man, if you can call him that, decided to shoot 26 bullets out of an AR-15 in a community in D.C. Close by. And he was just let go. They didn't even, they just let him go by a admittedly and self-proclaimed woke judge. So now you can go Blow off a magazine of 556 in the street at a car Moving by with people in it And go to jail.
[13:55]Uh just by god's grace no one died all right let's talk about the next thing which is t-kel knives and my collaboration with him uh you've seen this uh this is the prototype that was 3d printed in resin last night as i record this i got a text from tim saying i got uh wait uh what was it 186 um agent 001s that's this model uh back from nickel boron coating ready for an edge and handles. He will have a bunch of these to sell at Blade Show. I'm so excited. He's putting together a couple for me as we speak. Mine will have purple and black swirl handle.
[14:38]We have a picture of it and it looks really cool. The handle will be this 3D milled G10. You can also get Micarta. They have a couple of Micartas but but most of the cool stuff that they have there swirl. Now, with this one, we are also offering a single edge, so it looks just like this with an unsharpened top edge. If that is your preference or where you live necessitates that. It probably does, but are you getting in trouble with the cops? That's the only question I'm going to ask. Alright, we're going to get to some Knife Life news here in a minute, but I want to say, if you're We just had a Patreon giveaway We did the Gentleman Junkie giveaway this past week And had Chaz Fisher Of Fisher Blades on And he gave away a Beckwith Covert So I just wanted to remind you That if you feel like supporting the show You can do that on Patreon You can scan the QR code here And if you become a Gentleman Junkie every month You get automatically entered into a Um.
[15:50]Contest to win knives we have uh we have some we have a whole bunch others coming up so can't wait to give those away quickest way to get involved with patreon is to scan your code or go to the knifejunkie.com slash patreon and check out what we have to offer again that's the knifejunkie.com slash patreon among this week's specials at knife ship free the new orlando special just arrived from RMJ Tactical. This Clover-style dagger has a 4.5-inch blade of Nitro-V stainless steel. The Azula is made in the USA with 1095 carbon steel and has a protective gray coating. This knife is perfect for EDC or to stow in a pack or survival kit. And the new Jack Wolf Knives Mini Cyborg Jack features CPM S90V and titanium liners and bolsters. It is available in several handle materials and colors.
[16:45]Get these deals and other great specials from our friends at Knives Ship Free. Just use our affiliate link, thenifejunkie.com slash knives ship free. That's thenifejunkie.com slash knives ship free. Support the show and get a great new knife at the same time. The Knife Junkie.com slash knives ship free. You're listening to the Knife Junkie podcast. And now here's the Knife Junkie with the Knife Life News. Okay, first up in Life Knife News is the new Jack Wolf Knives Mini Cyborg Jack. I showed that off before my own personal model. But I want to talk a minute about it. So this is a smaller version of Ben's futuristic original pattern. And this is the one that gets all the press.
[17:33]Every time there's a release, there's one that's just like, ooh, look at that material. And this pink and black, man, that is a pretty attractive knife. Yeah, I like the way that looks. So this is the smaller version of the release from fall 2022, which when it dropped was kind of like, wow, look at that. It's like an angular sowbelly to me. I say sowbelly just because it's got that arc. but those angles everything is is faceted and beautifully done so that's 2.69 inches of s90v this will come with two carbon fibers as you can see that's the first and the fourth going from the left two very unique acrylics that's two and three and then one titanium blasting as i showed you earlier, the one that I have here. These are available now as of May well, they drop May 17th, 2024. So go check those out. And if you are, if you like the size of a boy's knife, this is perfect. Actually, let me show you.
[18:45]Real quick, this is what it looks like with the little bro. So it's a great, great size ring. About the same size as a little bro. All right, more about those later. Next up, from Lionsteel in Italy, they are releasing a knife called the KC-01. The KC-01 is made by, birthed by, the Italian knife community. Now, in 2020, when everyone was online because everyone was locked down, some Facebook pages, a Facebook page over in Italy for a knife enthusiast was sort of more officially turned into a knife community by Raffaele Santoro and Michele Pensato, who's known as Moletto.
[19:35]I'm sorry to the Lionsteel guys They came together and made sort of an official knife community Knife community Italia And through all of their machinations and communications They came up with a sort of official knife for the outfit It's a 6 inch 3V drop point This thing is beautiful, I'm just looking at it on screen It's a full tang, it's going to come with 3 different micarta handle scales looks like a perfect sort of do-all outdoors knife especially considering uh it's in 3v they're only making 300 of them and uh they're available only in europe however they're going to bring a bunch of them or a number of them to blade show uh so if you're in the states and you're in atlanta uh second weekend of june you can pick one of these up for the low low price I have no idea, but I'm betting it's not inexpensive.
[20:35]But a cool little knife community project there. All right, next up from Civivi. This is an interesting one, and actually they reached out to me, and they will be sending me one of these if you're interested. It's the Civivi Quick Snip. It's their take on the Hobby Knife. Now, they've done the Utility Knife with the Elementum Utility, a cool uh i think a cool version of that knife but this one is more their take on an exacto blade you know the tiny little kiridashi on the pencil stem that we use when making models or cutting out things out of paper well this is an edc version goes around the neck on a ball chain and has a little ring handle so an interesting uh little little uh blade here it does not use regular X-Acto blades, which have an oval slot, if you can remember that, that you screw in there. This has a circular hole and a little screw goes over it. So definitely proprietary blades here.
[21:41]But this comes with three of them. They attach to the ring. The latest knife you'll find all week. 0.14 ounces, and it'll be available in June. When I get mine, I'll show you. Now, I don't even know if that ring is aluminum or plastic. I'm betting it's plastic. I didn't mention in the article, but I will show it off to y'all when I get it. All right, last up in knife life news, this is exciting news from Hawaii. Beautiful state where i have never been but would like to change that someday uh so this comes to us from knife rights and i'm going to read from some of the article here hawaii legalizes butterfly switchblade and gravity knives and more exclamation point hawaii governor josh green has signed hb 2342 into law act 21 the new law repeals the ban on manufacture sale transfer possession and transportation of butterfly knives, switchblades and gravity knives, as well as brass knuckles, including trench knives and karambits, swords and spears, and swords and spears. The new law is effective immediately. Now, there's a warning. Hawaii's ban on concealed carry of these knives is retained. These knives should only be open carried. So only open carry your spears, please. Also, the new law increases penalties if they're used in the commission of a crime.
[23:05]Let's see scrolling down knife rights chairman doug ritter says this is a huge victory for knife owners and knife makers in hawaii knife rights is proud to have played a role with our amicus brief in peter v lopez appeal which resulted in a huge second amendment win for all knife owners and second amendment supporters while knife rights welcomes this new law loosening restrictions on knife possession it does not finish the job in hawaii we still have work to do and look forward to working with our friends to continue the fight until there are no restrictions on Perry in Hawaii.
[23:41]This is something that I love about Doug Ritter. He will not relent. No restrictions, period. When he's been on the show, he's been on the show multiple times, and we've talked, and I've heard certain laws, and I once mentioned to him, that kind of sounds reasonable, and he came down on me with the hammer of God saying, no, no, there should be no laws restricting these things. It was about automatic knowledge. And I was conceding to the other side, like with Stockholm Syndrome, and he snapped me out of it. Stop.
[24:14]Stop it. There should be no restrictions on that. You're right, Doug Ritter. What am I talking about? So this is what I love about him. He's tenacious. He's a mild-mannered, great guy, but he's a pit bull and is fighting for our rights. So in that spirit, if you want to support Knife Rights, go to kniferights.org and support them directly. Or you could go to KnifeWorks and buy an exclusive Ritter Hogue RSK Mark I or RSK Mark I Mini or RSK Mark I Auto, formerly known as the Ritter Grip, and support them that way. All right, coming up, we're going to take a look at a box of goodies sent to us from OG Blades. But be sure to like, comment, subscribe, hit the notification bell, download the podcast app, and do all that stuff so you can listen on the go. And of all, share the show with a friend, a like-minded weirdo who likes this kind of stuff. Send this to them. That helps the show. All right. Coming right up, State of the Collection. The Shockwave Tactical Torch is your ultimate self-defense companion, featuring a powerful LED bulb that lasts 100,000 hours, a super-sharp, crenulated bezel, and a built-in stun gun delivering 4.5 million volts. Don't settle for ordinary. Choose the Shockwave Tactical Torch. TheKnifeJunkie.com slash Shockwave.
[25:38]And now that we're caught up with Knife Life news, let's hear more of the Knife Junkie podcast. So I got a box of goodies from OG Blades. He has rebranded from this old sword. So I'll say that a couple of times. I mention him all the time. So I'll say that a few times until everyone knows. But I'm not going to do what they do with Twitter X. X, formerly known as Twitter, it's like, yeah, it's been that for a lot. We're not dumb. We know what X means now. Okay. You can stop with the formerly known as Twitter. So, OG Blades sent me a box of six really cool knives that will be passed along to y'all.
[26:14]Think Thursday Night Knives giveaways. Okay, so here, this first one is really cool. It's from CRKT, and it's the Tige Fighter. T-I-G-H-E, that's Brian Tige. And he has a very, very unique design language. And this is right smack dab in the middle of his design language here. So you've got the deep finger grooves and the fully contoured handle. I mean, you're not holding this in a lot of different ways. Actually, that was not that uncomfortable turned around.
[26:46]But this really puts your hand in a perfect position for saber grip here or the Filipino grip. It's a gorgeous Americanized tanto blade with a long swedge on top, a flipper and a button lock and you know what crkt was doing the button lock flipper thing without fanfare uh kind of long before this uh current uh trend so it was kind of like when when certain companies dialed it in at last it's like wow look at what you can do a flipper uh on a button lock but crkt has been doing it on the cheap for a little while so uh this is a cool one and I'm loving this knife. That's 8CR13 MOV blade steel, as is sort of the norm for CRKT. Even still, look at the ergonomics. You can see it best upside down.
[27:36]Yeah, you see the obvious finger grooves in this swale, which really nicely cradles my hand, and I think even a larger hand too. But I'm looking at this thumb swale here that goes from the center spine forward into the blade very very nice this is a cool one and great action on this one all right next up this is something i saw on a couple of people's channels but i'm not sure about it this is the ketuo venter i think v-e-n-t-r and it's a great little edc tanto thing drop point modified Certified Tonto Cliff or Sheep's Tonto. I don't know what the hell it is, but it's pretty cool.
[28:22]And not only is the blade shape unique, this reminds me of the first knife we gave away as a Gentleman Junkie knife.
[28:30]And I don't remember what it was, but it had a blade shape like this, a long straight and a long straight.
[28:36]But not quite a tanto. Interesting thing about this knife here is the locking mechanism. It's a liner lock, but you access it with a button. So it's not like a compression lock. It's not a top-mounted liner lock. It's a regular bottom-mounted liner lock, but it's accessed by this button. And the action is ultra-smooth on this knife. Great little EDC knife, A giant sort of carabiner hole on the back or lanyard hole there. Interesting angle of the blade to the handle, downward swooping, so you have a lot of utility in the blade. Even that front portion, with the downward angle of the blade to the handle, you get great access to the tip and it makes this forward straight very useful as well. So, cool little knife, the Ketuo Venter. If I'm pronouncing that wrongly, please let me know. Cool little knife for EDC. Next up, this is a weird one, but a cool one indeed. This is designed by RS Knife Works. This is the Kaiser Mini Paragon. It's the Mini. I don't think they made a Maxi, but it's the Mini. And let's see, the blade is three and a half inches long and.
[30:01]An inch and three-quarters wide at its widest. So it is a big recurve tanto. Very striking design indeed. Very comfortable in hand. Again, we're looking at angular ergonomics here that are just very comfortable. Remember, our hands were designed to hold sticks. And so sticks are relatively neutral, but they also have dips and swales and knots and bumps and stuff. and they will not have a perfectly smooth surface. So just because it's angular and not perfectly smooth or rounded doesn't mean it's not going to feel good in the hand. This one definitely does. A big clip here that is only mounted on one side. It's got a micarta backspacer, which is cool, and just a giant compound ground recurve tanto. So you have three different grinds here. the main grind, which is recurved, flat. Up here towards the front portion, you have the usual chisel tip of a Tonto like this. And then back here, strangely enough, you have this.
[31:12]At most three quarters of an inch run, more like a half inch of wider behind the edge. I think that's just for looks. I don't think you have any appreciable difference in cutting there uh great flipper great action it's a kaiser so with kaiser if you like the design you know it's just going to be spectacular because even if you don't like the design it's still going to be a great knife all right next up is the civivi typhios sounds like a disease uh it's a cool little two-stage knife that comes in this pleather might be leather case here but this is belt -mounted, it is a nice case, don't get me wrong. And when you draw it, you draw it like this as a push dagger.
[32:00]Or push knife anyway, push clip point, and then it changes in hand into a regular knife. It does not lock in either position, but you can go from that to that in a heartbeat. So from defensive, you know, are you a threat? Oh, no, you just need some help? Okay, let me cut that for you. That was pretty smooth, wasn't it? Look, I have it. I draw it out of the sheath. The leather sheath, what do you want from me? I just want your help. Okay. And then you just change it, and it's a regular knife. It is pretty cool. Actually, I have never done the one-handed thing. I was kind of flipping it back and forth by holding it and flipping it, but actually, it makes more sense to just slowly roll it. You can do it in hand very easily.
[32:53]Would I like this better with a little lock? Yeah, I think I would. But it is an extremely cool knife. The engineering is really neat. It reminds me a little bit of the CRKT Paradigm. Is that what it was called? Paradigm?
[33:10]The Joe Caswell Morphing Karambit, whatever that one was called. So very, very cool. The Civivi Typhius. This next one I remember seeing a lot because I follow this guy on Instagram, Brutallica. He's like a knife dealer from Russia. And this is a design of his own that he had made by Gonzo. This is called the Adianti Samson. And I think I've misspelled it, Adamanti. But anyway, that's what this is. It's the Samson, and this was a very limited release. I remember when this came out, I was like, ooh, I've got to get my hands on this thing, and never did, and here it is, the Adamantium Samson. Sorry for that misspelling. A beautiful dagger-esque, I'm going to say bayonet, but it's a spear point, it's symmetrical, and that top swedge comes about halfway, or I'm sorry, about two-thirds of the way up the blade, giving you a nice place to rest your thumb. It's got two quillions, a classic dagger look and shape, and those quillions make for an excellent flipper and also an excellent wave opening mechanism out of the pocket. Green G10. I'm not sure if these bolsters are aluminum or steel. The liners are definitely steel. You can feel that.
[34:37]Yeah, those are not integral liner bolsters, so those could be aluminum. I'm sure they're probably steel, the same material. And if I had a magnet right close, I could tell you. But I really like this one. It's kind of a nasty and militaristic-looking knife, but those lobe-shaped quillions make it look kind of old-fashioned. All right, last up is the first non-traditional Rosecraft I've had come across the table here. This is the Rosecraft Joka, or Yoka? I don't know, Joka? What are you, some kind of a Joka? D2 blade steel, very nice long drop point with a swedge. Beautiful looking blade, and sort of a very neutral doctor's knife style handle here with parallel spine and belly, and down here a flat portion, so very much like a doctor's knife. Deep carry pocket clip here, It precludes your using this like a doctor's note because it comes a little bit over the top of that. But very, very nice, pretty long blade. What are we working with here? This is about a three and a half. It is exactly a three and a half inch blade.
[35:53]I really like the faux bolster here with the two-tone G10 handle. The one ding on this one, nice access to the pocket clip. but the detent is a little, it's easy to fail this one. This might be, I mean, you can, it's easy to get it, but it's easy to fail it, too. Well, I guess when the blade is up and it's going against its weight, it's easy to fail. Anyway, you just feel it. It's not the crispest detent in the world, but a great knife, and actually nice to play with, and feels good in hand. I like the clip. I called it a drop point. It's more of a clip point.
[36:32]So, nice knife, kind of CEO style, kind of large folding doctor's knife style. And Andy Armstrong, the designer of this, has a deep knowledge of traditional knives and has designed a lot of these modern knives as well. So this is what I've gotten new in this past week. But of course, these are going out to you. These are giveaway knives, courtesy of Dave of OG Blades. All right, let us get to Jack Wolf Knives now. I have a vast collection of Jack Wolf Knives. Thanks 100% to Ben Belkin Who sends them to me As he does other reviewers As his marketing We help him market I know for me, It's also a personal thanks Because he talked about The company a lot, built up a lot of steam Here before he even started it On Thursday Night Knives And I know he's very grateful for that Way more grateful than I'm deserving But I accept.
[37:36]Because these knives are so, so awesome. Now, we just, we're talking about, we've talked a lot about how there are modern slip joints and traditional slip joints, at least how I define them and how I know others do. Actually, I got this idea from Patty, of Patty's Potato Peelers, but a modern traditional uses a stop. A traditional slip joint, I'm sorry, a modern slip joint uses a stop pin. A traditional Slip joint uses the kick On the ricasso.
[38:13]There are benefits to both, but the main benefit, two main benefits to using the stop pin are that you're never going to get blade wrap as long as it's dialed in properly and the pin is in the right place. You'll never get blade wrap, which is the blade edge hitting the inside when it's being closed. So when you do this. And the other thing is that you can get more edge with a stop point, a stop pin because you're not having to design in the kick and that is the ricasso here so ben belkin designs and has manufactured uh traditional slip joint knives but with very modern materials okay so we know we know the deal with jack wolf knives but i wanted to get out of the way the traditional part because i love them both i have a strong love for the modern slip joint and the traditional, but I got to say, ultimately, my heart resides in the traditional because that's the first experience I had with it, and that's how I really got to know the inner workings of a slip joint, with this kind of kick. All right, so this is the first on my list. This is the Little Bro Jack. I have the original, one from the original run in Micarta, but this one with this incredible Kieranite stole my heart.
[39:42]The knife itself is the size of a number 15 boys knife which is my favorite great eastern cutlery and kind of one of my favorite traditional patterns altogether it's the sleeve board pattern so if you've ever seen an old school ironing board that has two levels that top level is called a sleeve board that's where you iron your sleeve and it is symmetrical but tapering and so that's what we have here dual bolsters sorry for the stutter dual bolsters here fluted with a single groove and on all jack wolf knives you have the integral bolster so the bolster is, milled from the same piece as the liner so that's all one piece just with a pocket milled out for the cover this one s90v the whole first run of jack wolf knives or at least through the first about 10 knives oh wow were uh m390 and then he switched over to s90v so this is s90v and just the perfect size and what size is that you ask two and about three quarters in no two and two and two-thirds inches on the blade. Sorry about that. Full-height hollow ground and machine satin. Amazing.
[41:06]Walk and talk on these knives. And something that I love about all of them, with one exception, and it's in this list, is that they are full height hollow ground. So when you get up at the spine, it's convex. So it looks like this, you know, up at the spine, it's coming up like this. So you always have a great pinch point for opening these knives, knives. Even if the nail neck is inconvenient, and that's another knife I'll show, that full height hollow grind allows you to grip onto the top of the blade and rip it open. Grip it and rip it. So this is the Little Bro Jack. I'm going to say this. These are all my favorites, so I'll stop saying that. Okay, next up is one that is a crowd favorite, and I'm showing both versions of this. This is the Midnight Jack and the After Hours Jack. Now, for the Midnight Jack, I'm going to show you my original one from the first run. It's got a green canvas micarta and that incredible M390 full-height hollow ground sheep's foot blade with the swedge.
[42:21]Just a thing of beauty here. Triple fluted bolster. Now, this is a Barlow, and you can tell because that bolster extends for for about a third of the length of the handle, and a single bolster. Some of these have a bolster in the back. Some of them are, what do they call that? Naked end? Not naked end. Bare end. And this is one of them. I love the octagonal coffin-shaped handle. It reminds me of a Bowie knife, like my Laredo, actually, very much like my Laredo Bowie knife. Like I said, three flutes there in the blasted titanium bolster. This was M390 This was the third release No, no, no.
[43:03]This was their fifth release originally, and then they came back around and did a second drop of these not that long ago. I would say about five months ago as I'm recording this, and that one I also have has a hand rub satin blade and very nice carbon fiber, but this one is a different knife, but in the same family, so I wanted to show them both because this one I've carried so much. I probably carry this more than both of my slip joint versions of this knife because it's got the same, like, perfect, I'll say, design for a pocket knife in that incredible tapering at the ricasso, broadening at the tip, sheep's foot with the swedge, long pull, full height hollow ground, in this case, S90V. Be uh but in this case larger that blade is three and a quarter or three and an eighth inches long and on a titanium frame lock and it is so good it is so good i can even let's see ah i can almost always uh middle finger flick it with my left hand and i carry this a lot in my back left pocket it.
[44:16]It is great. It's just a great knife. I just love this knife. And I have to say that I probably wouldn't have selected the all-black model for this, but I'm so glad that it was selected for me because I'm absolutely in love with it. I like all-black knives just as much as the next tactical loving dude, but I wasn't thinking of my slip joints, but I love it. I love it. So this has been one of my favorites. Not as good at front-flipping this left-handed as I am the sharpshooter guy. All right.
[44:56]Next up in this list, I was mentioning before, is the only one that isn't a full-height hollow grind. It's the Benny's Clip, a take on Tony Bose's Lanny's Clip.
[45:10]The Lanny's Clip, an original Tony Bose design, has a trapper-style handle, albeit broader, but trapper-style meaning it has a drop down at the bottom and a nice curve back here, and then a curved handle for the fingers to dwell in. But this one, as you can see, comes up in a saber grind, hollow saber grind. I know that doesn't quite make sense, but by saber I just mean comes partially up the blade, more than halfway. A very unique style blade here is clip point, similar to the Cyborg Jack, as I was mentioning, but this one has a slight recurve right here. Now that recurve, you'll see that in a lot of traditional clip point blades. And that is there so that when you're using it over the years, you're going to use it mostly in this area. So you're going to sharpen mostly in this area. So if you give a little bit of recurve and a little bit of extra on the belly, as time goes on and you sharpen through it, you'll still have a good belly there, a decently shaped blade. The blade shape over time will change, but it'll still be a nice bellied clip point. You're just starting with a little extra belly.
[46:30]Kind of like my childhood. This one had a black micarta scale, but I changed, I dyed it maroon. I'm not sure if that's coming through right here, but I dyed it maroon because the black micarta was that kind of chalky micarta. You know how sometimes it's left kind of on a level where there is too much glue, too much epoxy, and you don't get a nice rich black or a nice rich color, even if you put oil in it, which is what I was doing, and that wasn't working. So I decided, hey, maroon is my favorite color. I have some dye that's maroon. Why not? And, you know, the cool thing about this is you don't have to disassemble it. You just pop two screws, and the covers come right off.
[47:17]Next up is the second run of the Vampire Jack. Vampire Jack, I got to say, is my favorite drop point slip joint ever. And that is because of that beautiful dagger-shaped drop point. I love the design of this knife, everything about it. As I mentioned, the dagger-shaped drop point that tapers slightly at the ricasso and has a nice symmetrical widening near the tip. Love that. But it's nice and slender and will slip into whatever you're trying to puncture very easily. This one has a hand rub, horizontally hand rub, satin blade here of S90V.
[48:07]Nice, big sharpening soil there, sharpening notch, and then the handle. Just this gorgeous Coke bottle handle or swell center. Here, I'm going to hold it by the blade so you can see the handle. That swell right here is meant to accommodate the pin and the screw that you can see right there and get out of the path of the blade so that you can do two things. You can either create a broader blade that'll fit in the handle, or more of the blade will fit in the handle because you don't have that bulge on the inside to accommodate the pin. So that's why you get that swell center or Coke bottle shape. This one blasted titanium, a lot like my mini Cyborg jack, but jigged.
[48:59]Has such a great feel. If you like that sort of chalky texture that you get from blasting and anodizing titanium or aluminum, you'll love this. It feels so good in the hand. I know some people are averse to it, kind of like how some people try cilantro and it tastes like soap to them. Some people really bristle at the way this feels tactically. I love it. But a great knife is the Vampire Jack. And my first one is in carbon fiber. Next up, arguably my favorite, because it's arguably my favorite pattern, period.
[49:37]When it comes to uh slip joint knives is the laid back jack and and uh the sway back pattern, uh what i love about what ben did with the sway back here you know every one of these designs he's he's tweaked to his own liking he being ben belkin the the designer um has is a connoisseur of these kind of knives and has a collection a vast collection of small run production slip joints and custom slip joints and has been able to distill out of each pattern what he loves and what he could do without, kind of like Jeet Kune Do. And he Jeet Kune Do'd out the super dramatic curve of the handle. We still have that curve of the handle. It's still great in that reverse grip for pairing fruits and that kind of thing.
[50:25]But in the forward grip, it does not bulge. It does not divert up into your hand and create a weird angle or anything like that. It feels great in both grips. And not for nothing, and you know I had to go here, if you ever needed to use a slip joint knife defensively, okay, I know it sounds crazy, but this would probably be the way to go because it's a great Pakal style knife in reverse and you'd be going against the lock with this, but that's enough of that. A triple fluted bolster. This also is a bit of a Barlow. So the first run of this had a shorter bolster, and mine had black micarta covers.
[51:10]This one, as you can see, has a long third length, one third length bolster, making this a Barlow swayback with a triple flute. I love that. This was the first time he used natural materials or wood. And this is cocobolo just stunning gorgeous haven't seen too much i'm not sure what the challenge is or if he has come up against any of the challenges he suspected he might using natural materials and having them manufactured in china in a totally different climate and then having them ship and all that would the materials warp or swell and i have had no issue whatsoever with at all with my wood handles like they don't they haven't in any way changed shape or anything like that and i have a number of civivies with wooden handles and they seem it seems pretty seems to be not so much of an issue so i'm very excited i got this model with this handle.
[52:13]That is the Laidback Jack. Next up is the Feel Good Jack. You know, like Dr. Feel Good. This is Ben Belkin's version of the Doctor's Knife. And the Doctor's Knife, as I was alluding to before with the Rosecraft Joker, is, well, it's shaped like this. It's got a handle that's got a virtually parallel top and bottom. And then the pommel comes to a very, very flat and broad shape. And that is meant to crush up pills so the doctor's knife pattern was developed uh during the the time when doctors would make house calls and house call is when a doctor comes to your house and uh you know determines your sickness and and treats you at home so their doctor's knives usually had two blades uh two tools a blade and then a spatula uh same length uh that was just sort of a flat tool. And what you would do is you would take the pill, you would determine that the person was sick and that you needed to give them a pill. You would take the pill, you would cut it into pieces with the blade of your doctor's knife, and then you would use this flat portion of the pommel to grind it up into a powder.
[53:33]And then you would take the other implement, the spatula, and you would scoop that crushed up pill into alcohol or water to make a tincture and then you would stir it up with that spatula and bada-bing, bada-boom, you got medicine. All with the help of your pocket knife, your doctor's pocket knife. So in a tip of the hat to this great pattern.
[53:58]Ben designed a really, really amazing doctor's knife because it has an awesome sheep's foot blade that has such an acute point and so it's got sort of the point of a wharncliffe uh but the rest of the profile is sheep's foot all day long and i love it feel good of course after dr feel good uh the motley crew song and nickname of what is that heroin or cocaine or some whatever they were into they called dr feel good and so uh in a in a little cultural nod uh ben named it the feel a good job and it does make me feel good this one here is one of the few um carbon fiber models i have and it's got this blue arctic storm so beautiful uh carbon fiber now i'm not a huge fan of all carbon fibers but all the the kinds that ben chooses and these modern carbon fibers have really uh brought me around to liking the material more when it was all uniform basket weave it was turned like this i love uh this next one also has a beautiful carbon fiber.
[55:05]This is the Venom Jack. This is like the best of all worlds here. You've got a sort of extreme trapper handle, and by that I mean it's a trapper-style handle. You've got that downward curve and the rounded-off end and the asymmetrical sort of swale for your fingers to sit in, but here it's got much more of a widening here and gives you a bit more grip. And then on the blade side of things, you've got this beautiful big broad-worn, Just a gorgeous, gorgeous wharncliffe. Now, if you're wondering, I say wharncliffe and sheep's foot, and if you're not as familiar, this is a sheep's foot. They both have straight edges and a point down at the bottom of the blade.
[55:49]But a sheep's foot looks more like a hoof in that it descends straight and then has a curve and then a straight drop to the tip. Whereas a wharncliffe, technically your curve is basically starting from the ricasso and coming down to that point. So arguably, a wharncliffe, which this Venom Jack is, will make a better penetrator once you get past. My voice just cracked on that word. Will make a better penetrator once you get past this front portion. But what I love about this knife is when you hold it straight and you look at the blade spine and then the spine of the handle and make it totally flat, that your wharncliffe here has a descending edge so that in essence when it's in your hand and then and then curved down anyway because of this portion of the handle it presents the edge at a at a nice angle to whatever you're cutting and it it traps that material in the triangle created by that downward sweep and works somewhat like a recurve and accelerates the cutting so i'm a big fan of that. I also like how broad this wharncliffe blade is. Usually wharncliffs have a more thin profile. And this one widens out towards the.
[57:09]Towards the nail neck, and then, so the widest point is right here, towards the tip, in the first third, whereas most wharncliffs, the widest point is the ricasso, and it tapers from there, so this, this is definitely a modified everything, modified wharncliff, modified trapper, and just in a beautiful package, this wharncliff, this carbon fiber is my speed, I love it, looks sort of wood, you know it's not but with the blue and the black and hints of purple in there it's just gorgeous I love it and you know a lot of the, carbon fibers used by Jackal's knives are louder and fun and that's great for you young folk but I really like some of the subdued that doesn't mean I wouldn't like a cool you know crazy pink or something like that but I do like the more subdued carbon fibers.
[58:06]All right, second to last here is very unlikely for a number of reasons. First of all, carbon fiber. And this is closer to a basket weave, but it's not. I'm not sure what this is called. But it's got some feel of regularity to it. But the way it's contoured, it looks like snakeskin to me. That's why it's so appealing.
[58:30]But anyway, what I really was not expecting to love about this knife was everything because it's got a spear point drop point that's always my least favorite style blade but this one is nice and bulbous again fully flat ground this was the m390 blade uh days so it's very broad and fully fully i'm sorry fully hollow ground and very broad so it's wickedly thin i mean this is paper thin this is an incredible slicer they all are but this one, even more so um and then the dog leg the dog leg pattern i always thought was ugly, so i never had one and then i got this in hand and man does it feel good in hand the ergonomics are incredible and that's what i've mentioned many times but have failed to mention here in this discussion is that when you really get one of the things that i appreciate about jack wolf knives is that they're all single bladed so there's nothing to obscure the profile like a the secondary blade, of the handle and the ergonomics. So you get the full benefit of that handle. You don't have a blade interrupting the shape on the bottom. Oh, yeah, this kind of feels good. You get the whole handle, and you really see why this style handle was ever designed. Those ergonomics are incredible. Not all about the looks, Bob. Don't be so superficial.
[59:55]So a big surprise to me was the K9 Jack. really liking it as much as I do and um.
[1:00:04]As with all of them, great, great action and presents enough blade that you can open it up just pinching it. Love the K9 Jack. But lastly is the Sharpshooter Jack. The Sharpshooter Jack is the first, this is the second run of it, but it's the first frame lock flipper that Ben ever designed. And he knocked it out of the park right away. This uh is a i'm sorry a little brain lock there uh this is a uh rifle stock or a gun stock jack you can see when you hold it upside down it looks like a cowboy gun stock there um and again a single bladed knife and so you get to feel the real benefit of those ergonomics this is why this was created those two fingers fit there those two fingers step up it's a little wider here you're accommodating for your shorter fingers this thing locks into hand unbelievably uh let's see i think it's a yep it's a three and a quarter inch blade so slightly longer uh than its other than its its buddy here the other uh flipper and it's got the long pull which you can use to spidey flick off this one has the cocobolo so beautiful cocobolo triple fluted bolsters.
[1:01:30]My other one has the blue Arctic Storm carbon fiber also is beautiful from the first run of these and something I like about the Gunslinger Jack and the After Hours Jack is that they get pocket carry they do come with filler tabs if you want to pop off the clip and put this in a slip but I don't, these are larger knives than the other Jack Wolves I just carry them with the clip And what I like is that I'm getting the scuffing on the clip. I mean, I'm not crazy about that. But I'm getting a little bit of snail trail. These will show pocket time and wear more than the other ones because the slip joints I insist on carrying in their slips.
[1:02:17]So I cannot wait to see Ben at Blade Show again this year and see what else he's got cooking up. We've got to have him back on the show and talk. He's very tight-lipped about what he has coming out, And I appreciate that. But, you know, we can always we can always guess. You can always kind of, you know, mind mind the mind and see if we can guess. All right. Thanks for checking out these top 10 ish Jack Wolf knives. I love them all, but but some are even closer to my heart than others. The last one I forgot to mention, of course, is the new one.
[1:02:51]And because I'm going to be carrying this so much, that is the mini Cyborg Jack. Sorry about that. Forgot to mention the mini Cyborg Jack. Definitely on this list due to its size. I feel like the size right in there with the little bro has maximized this funky, cool shape he's come up with.
[1:03:11]All right, that's it. Thanks for checking this out. Be sure to join us on Sunday for a conversation with Charles Jones. No, not Chuck Jones, producer, legendary producer of Tom and Jerry, but Charles Jones of Charles Jones Blades, who's on his way to being legendary because his knives are so, they're amazing. And he was recommended to me by a viewer, which is great. I love that. Bob, you'll love this guy's work. Check him out. Never, I hadn't seen him before. Knives, swords, and other greatness. So be sure to join us for that conversation. Conversation and be sure to join us tomorrow night for thursday night knives we're going to be doing a giveaway so come join us then and you can become a fee by going to the knife junkie.com slash patreon all right for jim working his magic behind the switcher i'm bob demarco saying until next time don't take dull for an answer thanks for listening to the knife junkie podcast if you enjoyed the show please rate and review at review the podcast.com for show notes for today's episode Additional resources and to listen to past episodes, visit our website, TheKnifeJunkie.com. You can also watch our latest videos on YouTube at TheKnifeJunkie.com. Check out some great knife photos on TheKnifeJunkie.com and join our Facebook group at TheKnifeJunkie.com. And if you have a question or comment, email them to Bob at TheKnifeJunkie.com or call our 24-7 listener line at 724-466-4487. And you may hear your comment or question answered on an upcoming episode of the Knife Junkie Podcast.
[1:04:40] Music