Sweet onions: Kershaw's custom collaborations with Ken Onion are a hot ticket

Jim Gardner

The 2004 Las Vegas Classic knife show was a blur of activity. This is one of the most prestigious shows in the country, and the number of remarkable bladesmiths present was awe-inspiring. Greg Lightfoot, Brian Tighe, Trace Rinaldi. Jerry Hossom, Bud Nealy; we could go on and on.

If these names aren't familiar to you, suffice to say the experience was akin to walking into a room and speaking with Samuel Colt, B. Tyler Henry, J.M. Browning and dozens of other equally legendary talents. Imagine shaking hands with them, looking at their current work and passing a few minutes in friendly conversation.

Where The Action Is

The entire show was busy, but it was difficult not to notice a consistent crowd at one table. This was the booth of Ken Onion--one of the most influential and successful custom knifemakers on the scene today.

It seems everything about Onion's work delights the custom knife buyer. His sense of style, characterized by flowing lines that look like a work of nature, not of man, as well as the intricate mechanical detail of his designs (such as his revolutionary Speed-Safe[R]) has made his work one of the hottest commodities of the knife world.

I asked my friend Trace Rinaldi for his candid opinion about Onion and his work. "Bottom line," explained Rinaldi, "is that Ken's an innovator. His designs are awesome and the execution is simply flawless. What amazes me is his thought process. He doesn't design something that might be easy to build, but rather he decides what the ideal approach to a particular problem would be, and only then works out a way to fabricate it."

As you may expect though, the prices for Onion's custom knives have skyrocketed along with his acclaim. I looked into buying one of Ken's hand-made beauties--the simplest, plainest version I could find wore an $800 price tag, and they seldom linger at such prices. That's just too rich for a working stiff like me, but luckily, we have an ace in the hole.

Kershaw Collaborations

Some perceptive soul at Kershaw knives of Wilsonville. Ore., spotted Ken Onion's genius early in 1998. His then-new Speed-Safe design would have been a sure winner by itself, but in tandem with Onion's proven sense of style and design, the combination proved unbeatable. The first Onion collaboration Speed-Safe knives bit the market in November of '98, and the demand for them has never wavered.

"It's been extremely important to us." Doug Flagg, Kershaw's director of sales and marketing replied when asked about the Kershaw/Onion collaborations. "And not just Iris assisted knife, but his entire design influence."

"How have they been received by your customers?"

"Fantastic!" he answered. "Our customers love the Ken Onion designs, and we receive constant praise about the sense of style and the ergonomics of his designs."

Best Of Both Worlds

But just what is a custom collaboration? It's a knife design by a noted custom maker adapted with permission to production manufacture. In the case of the knives we're looking at here. Ken Onion has entered into an agreement with Kershaw allowing them to produce copies of his unique mechanical and design features.

What this really means is the best of both worlds for you and me. We can own, enjoy and really use an Onion-designed knife that would otherwise be completely out of reach. But there are other "copies" of custom knives out there that area different story.

A hot topic these days is the flood of extremely poor quality, foreign made knock-offs of custom designs that are littering the swap meets and discount outlets. Believe it or not, these things are often sold wholesale by the pound.

The quality of materials is unbelievably shoddy, and even at the $10 to $20 selling price, they're not worth what people pay for them. Perhaps worse yet, buying one of these illegal copies is akin to aiding the theft of someone else's property. It's really not much different than some Jasper cashing your paycheck without permission.

Okay, let me step off the soapbox and explain why the Speed-Safe mechanism is so interesting.

The Spring's The Thing

When I was a pup, I had a switchblade knife my dad brought home from the orient. It was of pretty poor quality, but pushing the button and watching that blade snap into alignment was magic. I don't think I've ever met a gun or knife guy who didn't find these fascinating. There are very high quality automatic knives manufactured today, but in most states it's illegal to one degree of another to carry of perhaps even to possess one.

Ken Onion's Speed-Safe system is not an automatic knife, but it is an assisted opening design. Pushing forward on the blade's thumb stud (or pulling back on an exposed trigger) requires a certain degree of force as the blade is held closed by the action of a torsion spring. This is an "over center cam" design, and only after the blade has been opened manually a certain distance will the force of the spring change from holding the blade closed to assisting it in opening fully.

Admittedly the "coolness quotient" is probably the reason most of these knives sell, but the assisted opening design has real merit. We must give credit where it's due--Spyderco brought us the one-hand-opening folding knife with the handy pocket clip, and millions of sportsmen. workers and craftsmen have voted their enthusiasm for this idea with their wallets. The Speed-Safe design is simply the one-hand-opening knife taken to the next level.

So Many To Choose From

With the variety of Speed-Safe designs offered by Kershaw, it's tough to know where to start, but let's begin with one of the most visually stunning--the Rainbow Leek. Slip one of these from your pocket in a crowd of friends and it won't be a moment until you hear, "Hey, let me see that!"

The Rainbow Leek is finished with tough, scratch resistant Titanium Oxide. The unique coloration comes from the varied application of electrical current. The Rainbow Leek is beautiful but it's capable too, with a sleek dropped-point 3-inch blade.

This is a frame-lock design, meaning a heavy section of the knife's "handle" springs into line with the blade as it opens. The result is a more rugged and dependable locking system than many of the more common liner lock designs.

One additional distinction should be noted. The Leek is a "flipper" design, meaning that when folded, a small segment of the blade extends through the back of the frame. This forms a trigger that when pushed against the torsion spring of the Speed-Safe mechanism opens the knife smoothly and easily. It's a great design. Like nearly all of Kershaw's similar designs, the Leek incorporates a small safety slide which may be engaged to positively secure the blade against accidental opening. MSRP for the Rainbow Leek is $99.95.

Want all that "neat-o" engineering without the flash? Go for the standard, vapor finished stainless Leek for only $69.95. Both carry a stout pocket clip and at 4" overall (folded) and 3.1 ounces, are just the right size for an everyday carry knife.

Hot Off The Drawing Board

Next let's look at a new design from Kershaw and Ken Onion, the Blur. The Blur is larger than the Leek, at 4 1/2 inches folded with a 3 3/8-inch blade and a weight of 4.2 ounces. Those figures don't sound large, but put the Blur in your hand and it feels like it's ready to be worked--hard.

The scales are hard-anodized aluminum with Trac-Tec inserts (think skateboard tape). Grip this cutter and it almost seems to grip back. This is one blade that won't squirm around in your hand when you're wet or greasy or stiff with cold.

The Blur does not employ a flipper or trigger. To deploy the blade, push on the ambidextrous blade stud. It's uniquely angled and serrated and just plain comfortable. The blade is slightly recurved, looking like a gull's wing in flight. An edge of this shape generally offers an especially aggressive cutting action.

We looked at two different versions of the Blur, a low-profile model with black, TiN coated blade, black anodized scales and a 40 percent serrated edge. The second wore scales anodized to a pleasant red color, not too bright, not too dull, with an uncoated, plain edged 440A stainless blade.

The Blur sports a reversible pocket clip for tip up or tip down carry and MSRP ranges from $89.95 to $99.95 depending upon configuration. All of these Kershaw/Onion collaborations are nice--really nice--but the Blur looks like a guaranteed winner. However, looking good won't get the chores done, so we decided to put one of these to the test.

Taking the plain-edged Blur out of the box, we cut a sheet of paper to test for a sharp, smooth edge. The knife sliced the paper cleanly and smoothly, shearing off thin ribbons.

To see how that sharp edge would hold up, a length of thick sole leather roughly an inch wide and 15 inches in length was sliced off in quarter inch pieces. Next 82 long cuts reduced a 2x3-foot sheet of cardboard into so much scrap. Cardboard tends to dull an edge quickly, but the last slice was as smooth as the first.

A few lengths were split off from a short section of 2x4, twisting and levering on the knife to pop them loose. This sort of abuse will break a too brittle blade or loosen a flimsy blade pivot, but the Blur stood up to this challenge before shaving off more ribbons of paper as cleanly as it had at the beginning. Bottom line? These Kershaws are darn good tools.

Other Choices

Want a low-profile workhorse blade of the Speed-Safe variety? Have a look at the Model 1550 Blackout. A poly handle keeps the weight low (3.5 ounces), and the flowing fines make the Blackout smooth in and out of the pocket. Blade length is 31/4"--available in plain or partially serrated.

My friend Eric Tse has a long history with this model. "I really like it," Eric commented, "It has held up well, the half-serrated blade was a good choice, and I really like that assisted opening design."

Nothing fancy in the Blackout, just a solid working tool that sells for $89.99, MSRP.

By the way, don't let that throw you. Shop aggressively and you can find these enormously popular Kershaw Onions at bargain prices. A quick look on the Web found the Blackout as well as the Blur selling for less than $60.

Okay, saving the best for last we come to the new Kershaw Bump. The Bump is about as close to a custom Ken Onion blade as you're going to get without robbing junior's college fund. The CNC milled, multi-colored Titanium frame is a knock out, but as importantly its texture makes the knife remarkably secure in the hand.

Pull back on the protruding trigger with your index finger (or press upon the thumb stud) and the 3 1/2-inch blade snaps smartly to attention, secured in place by a robust frame lock. It's constructed of S30V stainless, a very highly regarded specialty alloy noted for superior edge retention. See it? There's that distinctive recurved blade edge again, although in the Bump the point is a little leaner and a little lower--brought directly in line with the axis of the handle to maximize piercing power.

The Bump is marketed more to collectors and "upscale" knife consumers. It's a serialized, limited edition product and carries a MSRP of $275. Given the demand for custom Ken Onion knives and the exotic features of the Bump, it probably won't be around long.

Exotic styling, great build quality, aggressive cutting ability and unique design--it's no wonder these Kershaw/Onion collaborations are so popular. If like me you enjoy stuffing something more interesting that the average hardware store folder into the pocket of your jeans, you need to take a look at these. Just be careful when your buddy asks to see your new cutter--he might not want to give it back.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:

Kershaw Knives

[800] 325-2891

www.kershawknives.com

COPYRIGHT 2004 Publishers' Development Corporation
COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group