So this year, I've been getting a lot of the folks on my Christmas list knives, and for ~$20 gift exchanges and what not, this means that my choices are limited. I like Byrd knives and Spyderco's value line, but they tend to hover around $25-30 and I've gotten a few of those, but what I'm finding out (and I posted this over in the Kershaw section of BF) is that for every ~$20 Kershaw I buy for someone, I end up ordering another for myself. I've done this with a few so far and am really impressed, so here is EZ's list of knives for ~$30 or less that are actually quite impressive:
Small knives:
Kershaw Chill
Kershaw G10 Hawk
Kershaw OD-2
Kershaw Half-Ton
Kershaw Nerve
Blem'd Chive/Scallion from KershawGuy
Spyderco Ambitious
Spyderco Ladybug
Spyderco Manbug
Byrd Robin
Byrd Medowlark
CRKT Lake
CRKT Drifter
CRKT McGinnis Tuition (one of my absolute favorite CRKT knives and a great designer - Gerry McGinnis)
CRKT 14K Summit Series
CRKT Ripple Aluminum (Ken Onion's design)
Medium knives:
Spyderco Persistence
Kershaw Nerve
Blem'd Kershaw Blur (from KershawGuy)
Kershaw One-Ton
Kershaw Black II
Bad Blood Knives Spiraling Demise
CRKT Ryan Seven
CRKT Premonition
CRKT Carson M16 / M21 series (several in this price-range - look for the Zytel versions)
Large Knives:
Spyderco Tenacious
Ontario RAT1
Bad Blood Knives Harbinger
Bad Blood Knives Fire Splitter
Bad Blood Knives Partisan Nano
Byrd CaraCara2
CRKT Surf N' Turf
Check out H&K's Benchmade-made knives (basically their old Red-Box value line), or some of the Lone-Wolf Benchmade-made knives too - good values there.
I'm sure I've missed some, but I'm having a blast with giving out knives to friends and relatives (and I'm making out like a bandit with the whole "one for you, one for me" system going).
Small knives:
Kershaw Chill
Kershaw G10 Hawk
Kershaw OD-2
Kershaw Half-Ton
Kershaw Nerve
Blem'd Chive/Scallion from KershawGuy
Spyderco Ambitious
Spyderco Ladybug
Spyderco Manbug
Byrd Robin
Byrd Medowlark
CRKT Lake
CRKT Drifter
CRKT McGinnis Tuition (one of my absolute favorite CRKT knives and a great designer - Gerry McGinnis)
CRKT 14K Summit Series
CRKT Ripple Aluminum (Ken Onion's design)
Medium knives:
Spyderco Persistence
Kershaw Nerve
Blem'd Kershaw Blur (from KershawGuy)
Kershaw One-Ton
Kershaw Black II
Bad Blood Knives Spiraling Demise
CRKT Ryan Seven
CRKT Premonition
CRKT Carson M16 / M21 series (several in this price-range - look for the Zytel versions)
Large Knives:
Spyderco Tenacious
Ontario RAT1
Bad Blood Knives Harbinger
Bad Blood Knives Fire Splitter
Bad Blood Knives Partisan Nano
Byrd CaraCara2
CRKT Surf N' Turf
Check out H&K's Benchmade-made knives (basically their old Red-Box value line), or some of the Lone-Wolf Benchmade-made knives too - good values there.
I'm sure I've missed some, but I'm having a blast with giving out knives to friends and relatives (and I'm making out like a bandit with the whole "one for you, one for me" system going).
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