Spyderco Ambitious: size comparo

powernoodle

powernoodle

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Joined
Jul 21, 2004
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Just a few pics of the newest and smallest of the Spyderco budget lineup. Same G10, 8Cr13MoV steel, full flat grind, jimping and milled liners that you are used to with the Tenacious, Persistence and Resilience. Tip up, tip down, left and right. All for maybe $28 plus shipping. Good stuff. Mine came from gpkinves.com, which I figure I can mention as they are a paying BF dealer.

In my view, the Ambitious with its 2.25" blade and 3 19/32 OAL is about as small as I can go while still comfortably opening with one hand. Solid lockup with no wiggle on my example. For EDC, this one should handle just about anything that its larger siblings could handle, short of slicing through a wheel of cheese or whatnot where length comes into play. But it should excel at opening boxes, clam shell packages, zip ties and the like. And a smaller blade is just much handier for many of these tasks. I've been moving my rotation in that direction as of late.

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Top to bottom: Ambitious, Persistence, Tenacious and Resilience.

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Tenacious and Ambitious.

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Resilience and Ambitious.
 
Nice family photo's you made!
Enjoyed them alot.
The ambitious looks very usefull!
I carry my Tenacious as EDC, sometimes a smaller knife would be easier...
 
Great lil budget-friendly knives, only gripe is that closing it can get a bit painful due to the lack of a choil or blunted part near the handle. You learn to be careful after getting cut once or twice though :eek::D
 
looks like a chicago...but without the cf...thats a great small carry conceal type of knife...sometimes one just cannot carry a larger folder and that fits the bill excellently
 
wow thanks a lot of the pics! Looks like one of the most stout little knives out there! Does it carry discretely and out of the way in a pocket? Or does it have the feel of a big knife?
 
edcrefiner said:
Does it carry discretely and out of the way in a pocket? Or does it have the feel of a big knife?
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Hmm. Its hard to describe with a keyboard. Its not a thin knife, if you are familiar with its siblings. Being short, it does not take up a lot of vertical room in your pocket, but it is moderately thick. But for folks who have carried big boy knives like the Cold Steel Recon 1 or Strider AR, the Ambitious is nothing. Its all relative. The Ambitious is about as thick and as tall as an Endura, though for some reason it feels just a little blockier in the pocket (to me).
 
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Yes, Pete. For me at least, and I'd say my hands are pretty average sized.

Something else about this knife - we don't often see a folder that is this short but this stout as well. Most of the shorties are also on the flimsy side. While the Ambitious is not a pry bar, it is pretty solid for such a small knife.
 
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Nice! Mind throwing up a pic of it next to a current Dfly model? I just got the Dfly 2 FRN and it has been in my pocket ever since I took it out of the box. I like the Ambitious but if it's about the same size as the Dfly, I probably wouldn't carry it much.
 
lacrosse11attack said:
How do you like the ambitious an persistence. I'm gonna try to pick up both next pay check :)
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I just got a Persistence. The grip is about as short in length as I'll go in this series.

I was surprised at how heavy and stout this knife is. The Resilience has to be an absolute monster. For something smaller, I think I'll stick with a Dragonfly.

Get the Persistence first, see if it fits your hand well, then decide on the second one. For me it'll be the Tenacious.
 
Nice pix! :thumbup:

Originally seeing the Tenacious and Persistence side-by-side, I opted for the Persistence. It is a great EDC choice, but now I’m curious about the entire line, especially since the Resilience and Ambitious joined the party.

So, which one is your favourite? Would you recommend getting the others as well? Perhaps after selecting your favourite, the rest is moot...
 
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