The Avispa, designed by MIke Perrin and Jeff Randal from ESEE Knives, features a full flat grind spear point blade that offers a bigger blade and handle than the smaller Zancudo. The Avispa (Spanish word for wasp) delivers an ergonomic handle with an FRN front scale and stainless steel back framelock scale. Extremely slim and comfortable to use even for extended periods of time, the Avispa is perfect for the serious outdoorsman. Reversible, right/left tip up pocket clip. The 1301 has a black front handle scale and a stonewash finished blade.
SPECIFICATIONS:
- Blade: 3.5"
- Open: 8.5"
- Closed: 5.00"
- Weight: 4.4 Ounces
- Handle Scale: Black FRN (Fiberglass Reinforced Nylon)
- Blade: AUS 8 Stainless Steel
- Blade Finish: Stonewash
- Blade Grind: Full Flat
- Blade Lock: Framelock
- Reversible Pocket Tip Up Pocket Clip
ESEE Avispa
Rubric: 1: poor 2: below average 3: average 4: above average 5: exceptional
Carry ergonomics: 4/5
How comfortable is this knife to carry
Use ergonomics: 5/5
How comfortable is this knife to use
Materials: 4/5
How well do the materials hold up against general everyday use?
Construction: 4/5
How well was this knife crafted?
Cost: 5/5
Is this knife cost effective?
Total: 22/25
0-5: poor 6-10: below average 11-15: average 16-20: above average 21-25: exceptional
Synopsis:
This is a well-crafted sturdy knife. The Avispa can be considered an exceptional everyday carry knife. It is built strong with a solid reasoning in practical daily use. This knife was designed by Mike Perrin and Jeff Randal of ESEE knifes, but built by a knife distributed by Blue Ridge Knives. This knife is comfortable to carry and use. I put this knife through three general purpose tests for functionality, reliability, and esthetic feeling of the knife. The Avispa passed completely on each test. This knife is built out of fantastic AUS-8 steel that has proven time and time again. It is a solid built knife that sells for less than 40 dollars. When grading against the rubric this knife scored in the exceptional range. It is a knife I would strongly recommend owning.
History:
Although this knife was designed by Mike Perrin and Jeff Randal, this knife was not made by ESEE. This knife is made anddistributed by Blue Ridge Knives. Blue Ridge Knives has been around for nearly thirty years. Blue Ridge Knives, also known as BRK, is a main distributor for many well know established knife companies. These brands range from Blackhawk, to cold steel, to zero tolerance. Needless to say, they know what they are doing and it shows clearly in this knife. This knife reflects many qualities found in other exceptional brand knives.
Lets start with the ergonomics of carrying this knife. This knife has a slim, lightweight profile. The body of this knife is 9 millimeters, or 3/8 inch thick. As a reference point, this is about 5 quarters thick. It is a very thin, comfortable knife to carry in the pocket. The handle, is a skeletonized aluminum frame with one side covered in a g-10 handle. This knife has a 4 position carry option allowing you to tailor this knife to your personal carry style. The height of this handle is five inches long. With a standard sized pocket, this is not a problem. However, if you have a shallow pocket this knife wont fit comfortably. For this reason I reluctantly dropped it by one point. Im hesitant to drop it to a four for this sole reason, but I decided to do so because it does affect how this knife can be carried.
Next I will address the ergonomics of using this knife. This knife feels great while in use. It has a strong, reliable feel. When deploying the knife, it opens smooth and locks up tight. There is minimal blade play, which bolsters a feeling of security and definite reliability when using. It has a pronounced choil, holding the hand steady while using. Aiding this feeling of security is the textured g-10 handle. The blade is a comfortable length of 3 and 3/8 inches, or 85 millimeters long. At the shoulder of the blade, it is a beautiful 1 millimeter thick tapered over the one inch width blade up to 3 millimeters at the spine. This thin shoulder allows for exquisite blade control and handling. This is a comfortable, reliable, and strong knife to use.
This knife is made with average materials. The blade is made of cold treated AUS-8 steel. This steel is fantastic and holds up strongly to everyday use, and if dulled, it is very easy to re-sharpen to factory or beyond factory sharpness. One deduction in accordance to material I decided to make was with the material of the pocketclip. The pocket clip itself is ok, but it is made of a softer aluminum. If caught on something while walking, it can be bent out easily. This causes problems for retention of the knife while in the pocket. It is possible with the light-weight slim profile of this knife not to notice it falling from your pocket if the clip becomes damaged. For this reason, I decided to deduct it one point.
The construction of this knife is excellent. It is a solid feeling knife. I would compare the feeling of security that comes with this knife to folding knives in the 80-100 dollar range. It has a smooth action when deploying and closing the knife due to the brass/nylon combo washers used. This washer setup is almost identical to Benchmades washer setup. However, there is one potential downfall to this knife. It is a liner lock. It is a solid lock up when deployed, but it does suffer the same danger areas of a liner lock. The two major failing points of liner locks are the milling of the handle to allow flex of the lock, and the potential that the lock angle inhibits a true lock of the blade. That being said, these failure points are not a guarantee failure, but rather a greater potential of failure in comparison to arc or back lock. It is this greater possibility of failure over other locks that I decided to deduct a point.
This knife is priced so affordable that it almost warrants purchasing on its own. This knife is priced at 35 dollars. This knife is so well constructed and so comfortable that it feels like an 80-100 dollar knife. This is one of my top recommendations to carry every day. It is a sturdy knife that will function as an excellent utility knife. Even buying this knife and for some reason it does fail, it is so relatively cheap that its not as big of a loss as a more exotic or expensive knife.
It is important to know that a knife will function properly during use. In order to ascertain this, I put this knife through three different tests. These tests are not hard core torture tests. They are simply functionality test. However, they illuminate key features in a knife the ode to a positive feeling of use.
The first test that I put this knife through was the general paper cut test. This test illuminates the cutability of the blade. This test is simple. Take a single sheet of paper. You hold the paper perpendicular to the ground from the corner adding a very slight curvature to the paper. This provides a minimal amount of rigidity to the paper. Starting from the top of the paper, you then slide the blade across the paper. It is important to only allow gravity to pull the knife down and to not force the knife through the paper. You then examine the cut that was made into the paper. You want to base your judgment on the cleanliness of the cut. This knife provided a very clean, consistent cut to the paper. This shows an excellent blade profile.
The second test I performed on the knife is called a blade wobble test. This test involves putting lateral stress on the blade while it is closed, partial deployed, and fully deployed. You simply hold the knife handle in one hand and with the other hand move the blade side to side. The knife has little to no blade play in all three positions. This shows proof of an excellent quality control in manufacturing. Three general factors that cause blade wobble or blade play are poor handle anchors, which this knife has multiple excellent anchors from top to bottom, poor axis pin construction, which this knife has a very precisely machined and ridged axis pin, and for quality of faceting materials, which is not present in this knife. Due to the high quality standards in these three areas, the blade remains fixed in place in all three positions.
The third test applied to this knife is a three point balance test. This test is important to feel of use in the knife. This test is more applicable to fixed blade knives; however, it still has a place with folding knives. With a knife, there are three crucial points of balance. They are center mass of entire knife, center mass of the blade itself, and center mass of the handle. A knife that is unbalanced in any of these three areas can have a tendency to feel awkward until one is used to the feeling of the knife. This test is somewhat difficult to interpret because it is partially based of opinion of feel. This test is done by finding where the knife is most comfortable while in hand. This is done by holding the knife on the blade, the full open knife, and holding the handle. This knife felt balanced on all three points of balance. This gives the knife an aesthetically pleasing feel as well as an ease of use feel.
In conclusion, this knife is awesome. It is a strong and reliable knife that can be comfortably carried and used with little or no worry of failure. It is constructed with excellent quality control of very good material. The design is a simple no thrills build with use and functionality in mind. The only con I found in this knife is that it is a liner lock. It is hard to even call it a negative because it only is a potential hazard not a guaranteed failure. Buying this knife will be a positive addition to a collection or to any everyday use.