[Ken Hom]

Anyone have an opinion about Randall knives. I have a few and wanted get a feel for how many carry them as opposed to displaying them. If you carry one which model do you prefer. I am thinking about a model 5 with 6” stainless blade and micarta handle. I have a model 14 and a model 1 currently and hsve other custom knives that could fit. Just asking

Discussion

[David]

Your question takes my mind back to EJ Snyder and the Ka-Bar Black Tanto knife failure that he experienced on “Naked and Afraid” in Tanzania. My point is that I see two completely different approaches to knives. I wouldn’t advocate taking expensive knives and beating them with a rock – I put them in the group called “Collectibles” – reserved for emergency use only. The second group contains what I’d call “Working”. Those are the knives I carry and use. Personally, I can’t afford the higher-end name brands. Randall knives look very nice, but I’m not willing to abuse a $500 knife to make sure they work as advertised. I’m left with brands like Cold Steel or Tops where I buy two, and use/beat the crap out of the first one. If the first one holds up to my own torture testing, the second one becomes “Collectible”. If the first one fails in use, the second one becomes “Yard sale”.

Enjoy your Randall knives – they are inarguably very nice knives. I’d vote to keep them under glass with the label “Break in case of emergency”.

Great topic for discussion and different ideas – thanks for adding it.

[TJ]

I’m not a big knife guy but probably wouldn’t want to carry an expensive option on a daily basis even if I was. My pocket knife is used daily for utility and gets scuffed up with all the other stuff I have in my pockets. I’m pretty happy with my $50 knock around. It has held up well over the years.

[Author]

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