Displaying items by tag: knives

Orion Knives is a fairly new company that's been around since 2019. David says Orion Knives combine his love of mechanisms and design. He found early on that he was fascinated with mechanisms and workmanship. The name of the company, as well as the logo, holds a special place for him as he has 3 boys and their favorite constellation is Orion. This was going to be the model name of the initial knife, but it turned into the name of the brand.

The naming of their products come from constellations, the one I'm taking a look at today is the Cetus. The Cetus (sometimes known as the whale) is one of the largest constellations in the sky. The name comes from the shape and look of the knife when in the open position rather than the size of the model. The curved spine provides a bit of an optical illusion as the cutting edge looks like a recurve. The edge is straight with a small belly at the blade tip providing ease of sharpening.

The Cetus comes in a couple different configurations, I'm checking out the stonewashed and black G10 version. Some others comes with a black blade as well as Amboya wood handles. I chose to go with G10 because I was afraid in my clumsiness, I'd drop this knife and have the wood crack, maybe I'm reaching, but with me you never know.

Around the world various countries and cities have different laws regarding what is legal to carry when it comes to pocket knives. Places such as the UK and Australia for instance have very strict laws in regards to blade length and locking mechanisms. Such laws have allowed many knife styles to flourish like Swiss Army Knives and other modern traditionals.

Benchmade founder Les DeAsis has passed away on february 21st following a stroke suffered a week before.

In an early morning announcement on Instagram, company founder Mick Strider states that after 25 years, Strider Knives is closing it's doors.

According to our friends over at Knifenews.com (full story HERE) the famous firearms manufacturer Smith & Wesson has purchased Taylor Brands LLC for $85 million.  For those who don't know, Taylor has long produced knives and multitools with the Smith & Wesson name on them, and I have often commented on the quality (more accurately, the lack therof) of Taylor knives, whether they are marked S&W, Schrade, Uncle Henry or Imperial. 

For years I had labored under the impression that the folks at S&W were blissfully unaware of the crap that Taylor was producing with their name on it- I am a big fan of Smith & Wesson firearms, and that name has become (in my mind at least) synonomous with quality revolvers.  I had assumed that someone at Taylor had arranged for a dump truck full of cash to arrive on a bi-monthly schedule at the house of S&W's licensing manager, and that as a result, he or she just didn't ask any questions.  It seems that isn't the case, and that S&W is fully aware of the crap that Taylor is producing, and that is very disapointing to me.

The worst part is that S&W doesn't appear to even want to fix it- they seem content to merely take advantage of the distribution network that Taylor has, so that they can make their own in house accessories more available.  As if having their name on crappy knives wasn't damaging enough to the brand, now Smith & Wesson will be selling their actual merchandise on the shelves right next to crud, strengthening the connection.

This is one of those times when I really hope I am wrong.  As I said, I have lots of respect for S&W, and I hate to see them take a bad decision (like giving a license to Taylor in the first place) and make it worse.

Def