American Knife of the Year - Benchmade Narrows

Wouldn’t be surprised if you see a more budget option of the narrows down the road.
 
HexY3co said:
Well CRK did get you the technical advancement of the frame lock in addition to the creation of s35vn. M390 is known not to hold up well in a super thin edge so we will see how the BM does with such a thin blade.
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For CRK money, I expect better than S35VN. I didn't carry my Sebenza until I had it engraved by a dear friend who has since passed, and rebladed afterwards. Those are the only reasons why I carry and use it these days. Not because of the framelock, and certainly not for S35VN. I have knives in S30V and S35VN, they are nowhere near CRK money 😆

TRM uses 0.090" 20CV in their Atoms and Neutrons, and they've held up very well. Granted, they're not really designed for hard use, but they are slicing demons that touch up very easily.
 
HexY3co said:
Well CRK did get you the technical advancement of the frame lock in addition to the creation of s35vn. M390 is known not to hold up well in a super thin edge so we will see how the BM does with such a thin blade.
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I don’t think M390 poses much of a problem with this blade. TRM and Hogue are/we’re both making very thin blades with CPM20CV and they seem to be okay. The blade on the narrows is thin but has a robust feel to it in my opinion. I don’t think Magnacut is the answer for every perceived problem. Plus, the narrows would absolutely wear your hand out if you were trying to use it very long for heavy use tasks. It’s just too thin to be comfortable for extended periods in my hands at least.
I do think this knife represents a bit of an advancement. It’s surprisingly solid in both the overall construction and dead solid in lockup, extremely thin and the two I handled at least had perfect action. I’m not a drop shut action fan at all but I was impressed at how fast they closed when I unlocked them. I also wanted to believe I could squeeze the scales together but I couldn’t. I appreciate BM’s effort to bring something a little different to the market, I just think it’s a miss at the price they’re asking. It will be interesting to see what the consensus is after they’ve been out in the real world for a while.
 
Hard to talk about this one without the price-tag coming in to play... Benchmade's prices have been teetering on lunacy for a while now, but the Narrows seems to have been created in the #%$ asylum.

I can't make an argument that this knife isn't innovative or that R&D, machining, coated hardware, etc. aren't expensive - so I won't. The Narrows should be expensive.. i get that. When the first pictures were released, I thought to myself "$350 +/- and the 'butterfly tax' will probably put this close to $400." I knew it would be expensive, but I still wasn't prepared for the sticker shock of $522.. I actually laughed out loud when I first read this price, wondering to myself how BM arrived at it. When you start to compare the Narrows critically against the competition, the math just doesn't add up. Ti & machining seems to be a sticking point.. Overseas manufacturing aside, there are more compelling (imo) USA-made analogues available that cost significantly less than the Narrows. Off the top of my head.. Tactile, American Bladeworks, TRM all have (imo, more intricately-milled) Ti & 20CV (or magnacut) options in the $300 - $400 range. I simply can't rationalize what the Narrows is doing beyond "being a Benchmade" that warrants the $120+ price bump over these other brands for similarly constructed knives.. Being thin? Ok, cool i guess haha. And once you cross the $450 - $500 threshold, you're into CRK, McNees, Hinderer, Les George, Spartan, etc. Idk.. compared with all of the more compelling competition, I think BM has priced this knife into being a really hard sell.

I do think it's a cool knife and I don't doubt that its a well-made knife.. hell, it may even be worthy of the title, "American knife of the year".. but the Narrows is a hard pass for me at $522. If a big sale ever brings it around $350, I would think about buying one..
 
Congrats to Benchmade, good on them, but personally I'll stick to the overall knife of the year: Giant Mouse GMX

The Manufacturing Quality of the year award: Spartan Blades limited edition Harsey Folder

and/or the best investor/collector of the year: Shirogogrov mini quantum CD

And over a dozen other knives out there before I imagine anything by Benchmade tickling my fancy in the foreseeable future, particularly at near gold-class prices. But good for them on winning!
 
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Magnacut would make no sense in the Narrows. Increased toughness is not needed in such a design & M390 will hold a better edge. Steels like M390 & 20CV are especially good choices for thin blades with thin grinds, that's where they show their strengths.

A steel with great edge retention is wasted on a blade with a thick grind. Its like putting a Ferrari V12 in a pickup truck. Reversely, using 3V for the Narrows would be like installing armour panelling on a F1 race car.
 
Boatmanxxx said:
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Well she's way skinny! Pretty cool knife. I like it. Not for everybody I guess.
1. I like the Axis buttons, very grippy.
2. I like the blade shape ( lotta blade for this weight)
3. M390 steel, good as it gets imo.
4. I wish it was cheaper ( like every knife I buy!)

5. Would I take it to war? no
6. Would I take it to lunch? yes
7. would I open packages and mail with it? yes
And the best part...when I put it in the pocket of my gym shorts to run to the ice house, to buy more snuff, it doesn't drag my shorts off my ass...
Cheers
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Ok, it's thin. So what? Is it really 4x better than a knife that's .100 wider??
 
Reswob said:
Ok, it's thin. So what? Is it really 4x better than a knife that's .100 wider??
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That’s all just a matter of personal preference but for most people I’m guessing the answer is probably no. I’m just glad the pendulum is starting to swing back towards thinner/slicier knives a little. Good to see a major player pushing the limits a little.
 
I own a lot of Benchmade knives.......
Some before the prices really increased.
Looks like a great knife although it's too expensive for me.
If I would spend $500 it would be on a Pro- Tech.
 
Reswob said:
Ok, it's thin. So what? Is it really 4x better than a knife that's .100 wider??
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I'm sure you meant .01 thicker. A .100 would be rather thick if adding .08, that would be .18 and that is fat. My CRK inkosi is .13 which is the thinnest I would have, my Dpx was .16 which I loved that fatty and deep belly in niolox steel. .18 is fixed blade range at an about 4.5mm
It's all about manipulating buyers, today it's super thin tomorrow it's the next super steel. Next year who knows maybe it will be back to sanity but I doubt it.
 
I first saw the knife without knowing the asking price, and I thought it fitted right in my general interst. I like thin, slicey blade and light knive, I like the locking mechanism.
But then I saw the price 🤣🤣🤣
Sorry, but I could not think about the knife anymore, I was filled with pricing questions that I can resume with the words: why? How?
I do wish them luck with it.
 
I‘m sure the hefty price tag is a recoupment of the investment into R&D for the project, high for me but this also isn’t made by Reate or WE.. and perhaps those two have biased us on cost.

In any case, price aside.. the knife is just too bland for me.. and for the thinness, what is the benefit of shrinking thickness while increasing width? I do appreciate manufacturers making attempts to change things up.

tl;dr: While it isn’t for me, I appreciate the effort to try something new while manufacturing domestically.
 
Some of you know how I feel about BM but I did take the time to watch a couple of reviews. Frankly, this doesn't look even remotely impressive to me.

An obvious question is whether it's worth two WE knives in comparable materials. How about three? Also, how much better will it be than any of those? BM might do a better heat treatment but by how much? (How many people will actually notice?) The WE knives will probably be better in other ways, such as in the actions or using flush screws under a deep-carry loop-over.

Of course, for this price I could also buy a Cheburkov. It would be made with greater care and the blade would have a better heat treatment.
 
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