WalMart $10 Ozark Trail Knife

[Cementite]

Supposedly this knife is D2 steel and sells for ~ $10

I saw a review of this knife on YT by the OUTDOORS55 guy (whom I respect as a knife guy) and his initial review said it had very poor edge retention. He concluded that it was a POS. But then he ground the edge down a ways and he (in a subsequent video) concluded that it was an issue of somebody getting it too hot in sharpening, rather than a bad heat treatment.

On a whim, I bought one in my local Virginia Walmart for $10. The factory edge was pretty bad (too steep), but I sharpened it on my Norton India alox combo stone, and finished it off on a 1k grit diamond plate, and afterwards the knife was close to push-through-paper sharp.

Here's the remarkable aspect: After that, I stuck the knife in my pocket, and just used it like a $10 knife for a few weeks. (My knives take some abuse.) And noticed damn this thing stays sharp. So then I repeated the same paper test, and it was damn near as sharp as it was fresh off the stone/plate a few weeks ago.

I'm not sure my $300 Spydercos in M4 and CruWear and Maxamet can even make the same claim. (I don't carry them routinely, because they're too valuable, so I don't know.)

YMMV. The only complaint I have with this knife is that the clip is only for tip-up. But if you want a sharp piece of D2 steel for $10 ... check it out.

J

 

[jbmonkey]

suggesting maybe walmarts d2 10 dollar knife on edge retention could be better than spydercos m4, cruwear and maxamet is pushing it a bit....

I'm not surprised it's not a bad user though for a 10 buck knife.

 

[SharpBits]

If you flood a market with enough below cost goods that are subsidized, you can eventually destroy the indigenous industries of said market. When we’re all unemployed, let’s hope the prices remain low.

 

[Cementite]

suggesting maybe walmarts d2 10 dollar knife on edge retention could be better than spydercos m4, cruwear and maxamet is pushing it a bit....

Well, let me put it this way: My Spydercos sit idle, slicked up with a nice coat of oil/grease, on my desk. Doing nothing. For months.

And this dopey D2 "Ozark Trail" knife accompanies me everywhere, cutting -- let's see -- rope, branches, zip ties, whatever -- and it still slides through paper that the Spydercos stumbled across after doing nothing, ever, in their entire lives.

I'm not saying the Walmart knife has better edge retention than the knife that cost 30X as much, only that "it's close."

ETA: Competition is a good thing. (Why I oppose tariffs on a philosophical basis.)

 

[SharpBits]

Dumping is not competition.

 

[Mk-211]

Outdoors55 still concluded that it was a POS. Yes, it did better after all the work he put into it.

 

[bdmicarta]

I bought one of those today. When they came out some youtubers got them and with some video exposure they got real popular to the point that they became impossible to find. This lasted through the holiday season then the furor settled down a little bit. They had a somewhat similar white knife for sale right before Christmas for $5. It was a pretty good knife but the blade was something like 3CR... I did manage to find one of those. It came out of the package very dull. I sharpened it and I still use it occasionally. I bought the orange one today and it also came out of the package very dull. I do like D2 even though I frequently carry S110V, Rex45, M4, K390.

Now why did I buy the $5 and $10 knives? I do a lot of camping, hiking, jeeping. Last summer I was out and I was carrying my Manix 2 LW Rex45. It got pulled out of my pocket by a pack strap and I spent 5 minutes walking around before I found it. I decided I would be better carrying a $10 knife for that rather than a $150 knife.

Occasionally there has been a lot of talk on the forum about the lower priced brands like Civivi. Everybody was talking about the great $40 knives, the ones that now cost $80. This $10 knife from Walmart is a much better value. I've also seen a few real low priced brands on Amazon that looked good for near throw away use and I thought if I didn't find the Walmart knife I might buy a Flissa for around $20.

I also have a Spyderco LW Tenacious that I was using for hiking. Using these Walmart knives you always know it is a $10 knife vs. the $40+ Tenacious but it works well enough to cut some things if I need to.

 

[jbmonkey]

Well, let me put it this way: My Spydercos sit idle, slicked up with a nice coat of oil/grease, on my desk. Doing nothing. For months.

And this dopey D2 "Ozark Trail" knife accompanies me everywhere, cutting -- let's see -- rope, branches, zip ties, whatever -- and it still slides through paper that the Spydercos stumbled across after doing nothing, ever, in their entire lives.

I'm not saying the Walmart knife has better edge retention than the knife that cost 30X as much, only that "it's close."

ETA: Competition is a good thing. (Why I oppose tariffs on a philosophical basis.)

I think until you use your spydercos it's bout impossible to compare them to that walmart d2 budget knife......

glad ya like it though.....

 

[Sam Wilson]

True story. $10 is the retail price, multiple people have to make a profit on that. How much profit is there in $3-$6 for a "heat treated D2" knife being shipped across the globe?

I sell a lot to Europe, everything that people buy from the U.S. they gotta pay import or VAT or other types of taxes on. It's one of the reasons why they choose to buy domestically, or they get it from an importer who eats the cost.

Sam

If you flood a market with enough below cost goods that are subsidized, you can eventually destroy the indigenous industries of said market. When we’re all unemployed, let’s hope the prices remain low.

 

[jbmonkey]

True story. $10 is the retail price, multiple people have to make a profit on that. How much profit is there in $3-$6 for a "heat treated D2" knife being shipped across the globe?

I sell a lot to Europe, everything that people buy from the U.S. they gotta pay import or VAT or other types of taxes on. It's one of the reasons why they choose to buy domestically, or they get it from an importer who eats the cost.

Sam

when's your 10 dollar d2 knife coming out, Sam?

 

[knarfeng]

If heat treated correctly, D2 has edge retention a bit better than that of S30V. (Based on my own side by side testing cutting manila rope. D2 blade I tested was a 61HRC. S30V was 59.5, which is not unusual for S30V) And because D2 is used for a LOT of industrial applications, it's relatively inexpensive as alloys go, and a LOT less expensive than PM alloys. And it's pretty easy to work with in the annealed state.

So, it could happen that you got a good heat treat on a $10 D2 knife.

 

[Sam Wilson]

If I could get in on the party I probably would. Gingers don't have a soul anyway, so no sense pretending. I do a lot of things, but I don't be frontin'.

Sam

when's your 10 dollar d2 knife coming out, Sam?

 

[Halfneck]

I picked one up, poured a lot of time & effort into getting an edge on it. Never really got it as sharp as I prefer, but it was decent. Didn't take much moderate use to lose that sharpness. Ended up giving it to my oldest son to use as a beater knife. He builds golf courses, so he'll probably loan it out to contract workers that pry & stab with it.

 

[DocJD]

In retail sales , especially at the level of WalMart , some products are offered as "loss leaders" .

These particular items are sold at cost , or even at a loss , in order to attract customer traffic.

In the hope that their overall store purchasing will provide a net profit .

 

[The True North]

In retail sales , especially at the level of WalMart , some products are offered as "loss leaders" .

These particular items are sold at cost , or even at a loss , in order to attract customer traffic.

In the hope that their overall store purchasing will provide a net profit .

I'd he extremely surprised if Ozark Trail knives fall into the loss leader category.

 

[DocJD]

I'd he extremely surprised if Ozark Trail knives fall into the loss leader category.

IDK why ?

Just because one (or more) "Ozark Trail " branded item is sold as a loss leader , that doesn't mean they all are .

Plus , WalMart has huge bargaining power over the package deals they contract with their suppliers .

The suppliers may be willing to offer loss leaders , just to win shelf space at WM for other products ?

I don't claim any special insider knowledge , just a suggestion for a possible explanation , for knife bargains "too good to be true " .

 

[Drop bear]

suggesting maybe walmarts d2 10 dollar knife on edge retention could be better than spydercos m4, cruwear and maxamet is pushing it a bit....

I'm not surprised it's not a bad user though for a 10 buck knife.

Geometry?

 

[Corton93]

I know there's been alot of back and forth on these Ozark Trail knives since they got popular. I was skeptical sure, but I picked one up a few months ago, the Bugout copy. The pic is from when I first got it. Currently the knife is beat to hell, lives in my tool pouch at work.

It's done everything from just opening boxes and whittling sticks on lunch to stripping wire and cutting sheet rock and everything in between. Is it as good as my Spyderco's or CRK's? Absolutely not, but it's still been a hell of a knife for the $10 that I paid for it.

 

[Drop bear]

By the way.

I am more than happy for knives to be $10 and good.

 

[Mikel_24]

The truth is that 80% of even the knife nuts (not counting the non-knife people) don't really cut that much stuff in a daily baisis for edge retention to become a real problem. So anything that doesn't dull by looking at it should work well.

I like knives and I carry daily. But in reality, I could go days without the real need of cutting stuff. I finde myself looking for uses to justify carrying a knife. I do work in an office and live in an urban environment, probably someone working in the country does need to cut stuff often.

Mikel