Kershaw 3-Piece Set Knife Review

Kershaw Knives designs and manufactures a wide range of knives, including pocket knives, sporting knives, and kitchen cutlery. Kershaw is a brand of Kai USA Ltd., a member of the KAI Group, headquartered in Tualatin, Oregon.

Kershaw Knives was started in Portland, Oregon in 1974 when knife salesman Pete Kershaw left Gerber Legendary Blades to form his own cutlery company based on his own designs. Early manufacturing was primarily done in Japan. In 1977, Kershaw became a wholly owned subsidiary of the KAI Group. In 1997 the U.S. production facility was opened in Wilsonville, Oregon. Due to an expanding market, the facilities were moved to a larger production site in 2003. Currently, Kai USA manufacturing facilities are located in Tualatin, Oregon with some products coming from their Japanese and Chinese factories.

Kershaw has collaborated with a number of custom knife makers over the years to produce ground-breaking knives. Collaborations include working with Hall of Fame Knife Maker, Ken Onion on Kershaw’s SpeedSafe knives, Ernest Emerson, Grant and Gavin hawk, Frank Centofante, Rick Hinderer, RJ Martin, and more.

With Kershaw, you get incredible bang for your buck. Even their inexpensive models are impressive. In fact, everything about a Kershaw is solid, crafted, reliable. That’s why they back each of their knives for the life of tis original owner against any defects in materials and construction with their famous Limited Lifetime Warranty.

Kershaw was founded din 1974 to design and manufacture tools that knife users would be proud to own, carry, and use. This has meant that every Kershaw knife must be of the highest quality. Whether it’s a hardworking pocket knife, a hunting knife, or a special collectors’ edition, Kershaw always chooses appropriate, high-quality materials and is dedicated to intensive craftsmanship. Along with extremely tight tolerances and state-of-the-art manufacturing techniques, this ensures that Kershaw knives provide a lifetime of performance.

Kershaw says, “if this is your first Kershaw, be prepared. You just may be back for more. If it’s not your first Kershaw, welcome back.”

Today we will be discussing the Kershaw 3-Piece Set, which includes a spring assisted knife, a multi-function tool, and a K-Tool.

The Spring Assisted Knife:

The Blade:

The blade is made out of 4Cr13MoV steel. This is a budget line of Japanese steel. The biggest advantage that this steel can boast is that it is inexpensive. On the other hand, you do get what you pay for, so while this knife will get the job done, it won’t do much else. It is not going to maintain an edge for very long, but it will be very easy to sharpen. This steel is also going to be more prone to rusting and corrosion, so Kershaw has coated the blade to combat that. This steel is going to be just enough of everything, tough enough, durable enough, corrosion resistant enough, but you will have to put in a good amount of maintenance time.

The blade has been coated with a black-oxide coating. To put this coating on, a chemical bath converts the surface of the steel to magnetite. Kershaw uses this coating on some blades and pocket clips, mainly for appearance, though it does add some corrosion resistance. Some of the biggest benefits of a coating is that it does add a layer in between the blade steel and the environment, which helps with the corrosion resistance. With this blade, the coating will add enough corrosion resistance to the steel to boost it to regular levels, although you will still want to be careful with any moisture around the steel. The coating is also a sleek, matte black, which cuts down on all glares and reflections, whilst adding an elegant look to the blade.

The blade has been carved into a drop point blade shape, which is the most popular blade shape in the cutlery industry today. This is an all-purpose blade shape that can really stand up to almost anything. This blade shape is most commonly found on hunting knives, although it is commonly found on many other styles of knives, such as regular folding knives, and even Swiss army knives. To form the blade’s shape, the back edge of the knife runs straight form the handle to the tip of the knife in a slow curved manner, which creates a lowered point. This lowered point is what adds more control and strength to the tip. Because of the tip strength, drop point blades are a popular option on tactical and survival knives. The broad tip that adds all the strength to the blade is also the drop point blades only disadvantage. Because of how broad it is, you do lose out on most of the blade’s piercing capabilities. This blade shape is often compared to a clip point blade that also has a lowered tip, but has a finer tip designed for piercing. Because the tip on the drop point blade is lowered, it is much more easily controlled. This means that you are able to perform fine detail work with this blade. One of the other reasons that this is such an all-purpose knife is because of the large belly that it sports. The belly is the slicing edge, and the bigger the belly, the more capable you are with slicing tasks, which will probably be the main style of task that you will be performing.

 

The Handle:

The handle on this spring assisted knife is made out of stainless steel and also features a black-oxide coating. Stainless steel provides excellent durability and resistance to corrosion but it is pretty heavy. Stainless steel handles are also known for being slippery, which means that the manufacturer will need to incorporate some form of ridges or etching. To help with the texture on this particular knife, Kershaw has added diagonal ridges across the face of the handle.

The advantages of having a stainless steel knife handle is that it is going to be strong, durable, and corrosion resistant. But, it is a heavier material and it can be slippery.

Just like with the blade, the black oxide coating does increase the stainless steels corrosion resistance abilities. This makes the knife an all-black sleek look. Plus, because of the extra corrosion resistance, the maintenance for this handle is reduced.

 

The Pocket Clip:

The pocket clip on this knife is black, as is all the hardware on this knife. The clip can only be attached for tip up carry on the traditional side of the handle. The clip is held in place by two screws and has “Kershaw” stamped across the middle.

 

The Mechanisms:

This is a spring assisted knife that utilizes a flipper mechanism and locks with a frame lock.

An assisted opening knife, which is often referred to as a spring-assisted knife, is a knife that spring open only after the blade is slightly pushed open with force. This is not like a switchblade, because nothing holds down the assisted opening knife when it’s in the closed position. As the user begins opening up the blade with the flipper, which does have some resistance, the spring or torsion bar attaches the knife and propels it open where it locks into place.

A flipper is a shark’s fin shaped protrusion that extends out of the spine of the handle when the knife is closed. The flipper is there to enable fast and easy one-handed opening as well as being fully ambidextrous. One of the other major advantages to a flipper is that it keeps your fingers out of the way during the entire opening process, which a thumb stud does not. This protects your fingers from accidentally getting sliced during the opening process.

To open this knife, hold the knife handle vertically in one hand and place your index finger on the top of the flipper. Gently apply downward pressure on the flipper, which will open the knife quickly and easily and lock the blade into place. Keep your fingers away from the blade edge when you are closing the knife.

This knife features a frame lock, which is when the knife handle, or its “frame”, consists of two plates of material on either side of the blade. To ensure a secure lock up, one or both of these plates is usually metal. When the knife is opened, the metal side of the frame, the lock bar, butts up against the backend of the blade and prevents the blade from closing. To close a frame lock knife, the user pushes the frame to the side, unblocking the blade, and folds the blade back into the handle. Like locking liner knives, frame locks are manufactured so that the locking side of the frame is angled toward the interior of the knife, creating a bias toward the locked position. Both the blade tang and the lock bar are precisely angled so they fit together for a secure, reliable lockup. The thickness of the frame material blocking the blade open makes the frame lock extremely sturdy.

 

The Specs:

The blade on this knife measures in at 3.25 inches long, with a handle that measures in at 4.5 inches long. The overall length of this knife when it is opened measures in at 7.75 inches long.

 

The Multi-Tool:

The multi tool measures in at an overall length of 4.0 inches long. This knife is made out of 3Cr13MoV steel, also with a black oxide coating. Just like the knife in this set, the steel is more of a bargain steel than anything else. The steel is going to be soft which isn’t as big of a deal with a multi-tool, like it is a big deal with a knife.

The black-oxide coating is ideal for this tool because it prolongs the life of it. This tool shouldn’t be encountering too many humid environments, so you shouldn’t have to worry about corrosion like you would the knife. However, if it does encounter a wet environment, make sure that you dry it off completely and oil it every once in a while, to avoid the rusting that would be bound to happen.

This multi-tool encompasses four different tools in one. The first is that it is a screwdriver, then a bottle opener, then a hex wrench, then a cord or seat belt cutter. The seat belt cutter is at the tip of the knife. This is a sharp piece of metal that will come in handy in any emergency situation. You will be able to slice a seat belt in a car wreck, or cut twine in an emergency situation. The screwdriver will be able to help you from day-to-day. The hex wrench has a couple of sizes that you can choose from, and again, this will be a good tool to have on you at all times, because it is small enough not to get in the way, but tough enough to work as a great tool. The bottle opener is on the bottom of this multi-tool, where a circular hole has been cut out of the tool.

This is the perfect tool to have with you at all times. While it only has four purposes, the four purposes that it does have are exceptional.

 

The K-Tool:

The K-tool is a tool that is completely unique to Kershaw. This tool is made out of 3Cr13 steel, which is a value priced high chromium stainless steel. Like the rest of the set, this stool has been coated in a black-oxide coating, which is perfect for prolonging the life of this tool. The tool has been carved into the Kershaw “K” shape.

This tool measures in at 2 inches long and functions as a bottle opener. This is the better tool to have on hand if you know that you won’t be needing a screwdriver, hex wrench, or cord cutter, but will be opening a lot of bottles.

 

Conclusion:

This limited edition Kershaw 3-Piece Set boasts a black oxide finished Spring assist knife as well as a multi-function tool and a K-tool. With this set, you can be prepared for almost any situation. Pick up this bargain set today at BladeOps.