Why do people hate Spyderco?

TimButterfield said:
I have my first three in hand now. They are the Para Military 2, Native 5 Salt, and Chaparral.
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There is another thread here where some have mentioned having issues with the spydiehole. I don't want to discount their issues, but add another data point. Even though I have a desk job and don't have super tough hands/thumbs, I didn't find any issues with the hole openers. Though it does add a little to the height of the blade, I haven't found that to be an issue in practice and they are very easy to use without needing any modifications or chamfering, at least for me.

The PM2 is quite fidget friendly. It's very comfortable in hand. I really like the compression lock. I'm curious to witness how the Native 5 Salt handles the beach when I go next month. In the mean time, I'm hoping to get more general use from that Magnacut blade. I'm super impressed with the Chaparral, though. What an awesome little knife! I took to it almost immediately and can see it becoming one of my favorites.

Overall, I'm very glad I gave these a try. Spyderco will be another brand I start building a small collection of. The next batch are already inbound.
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Man, I just found this forum and you made me buy that purple Paramilitary 2 already. Killing me here.


Back to the topic of this thread, though. I do have some bad blood with spyderco (who got me into knives originally and I've carried any number of them for years with no complaints). But my last spyderco EDC was my tenacious (pic below), until one day I pulled my pants up and the tip had opened out from the handle just enough to stab me right in my hip. Quite a nice wound and I still have a scar from it. Haven't carried one since. Switched to Zero Tolerance. But I do still have a soft spot for Spyerdco.

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smills said:
But my last spyderco EDC was my tenacious (pic below), until one day I pulled my pants up and the tip had opened out from the handle just enough to stab me right in my hip. Quite a nice wound and I still have a scar from it. Haven't carried one since. Switched to Zero Tolerance.
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This sounds like user error to me, were you carrying tip down? Because if anything the Zero Tolerance knives I've owned and used have much weaker detents than my Spydercos. And years ago I used to carry a deassisted Kershaw with no detent at all tip up with no incident because the right front pocket seam keeps the knife closed.
 
stillshot2 said:
This sounds like user error to me, were you carrying tip down? Because if anything the Zero Tolerance knives I've owned and used have much weaker detents than my Spydercos. And years ago I used to carry a deassisted Kershaw with no detent at all tip up with no incident because the right front pocket seam keeps the knife closed.
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Tip up on my right side along the waistband, so the tip opened a little out toward the back. I think it was just bad luck. I carried spydercos every day for years the same way. Just turned me off of them for a while. But as I said in the previous post, I just ordered another. So...
 
smills said:
Man, I just found this forum and you made me buy that purple Paramilitary 2 already. Killing me here.


Back to the topic of this thread, though. I do have some bad blood with spyderco (who got me into knives originally and I've carried any number of them for years with no complaints). But my last spyderco EDC was my tenacious (pic below), until one day I pulled my pants up and the tip had opened out from the handle just enough to stab me right in my hip. Quite a nice wound and I still have a scar from it. Haven't carried one since. Switched to Zero Tolerance. But I do still have a soft spot for Spyerdco.
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You're quite welcome! 😂 I've been enabled quite a bit since I joined this year (over 50 total). Since my initial post on this thread, I'm up to 13 Spyderco right now, not counting a few of their smaller kitchen knives and am planning to add some more from the recent Reveal 14 and prior 13 also once those are finally available. Hopefully, I'll have a little time to recover before then.

It's strange about your Tenacious. I'm not sure why it would do that. None of mine will fall open even when I try. If your Tenacious doesn't gravity fall open (or similar) when you intentionally try to do that, I wonder if there was something else that might have caught the hole and pulled it open somehow. Also, I've found that liners vs unlined and G10 vs lightweight/FRN handles affect the resistance to opening. All of mine open smoothly, though my unlined FRN have a bit higher resistance. The only ones I can spydieflick are the lined or G10 ones. I can't do the FRN yet, though maybe that's just me.
 
TimButterfield said:
I wonder if there was something else that might have caught the hole and pulled it open somehow.
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Yeah, this is what I imagine as well. I can't spydie flick it open and it seems to stay closed tightly enough. But the huge thumb hole opener makes spydercos susceptible to snagging on things. Like I said, just bad luck. Must have gotten a bit of jeans stuck in the hole just enough to push the blade out. C'est la vie.
 
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I don't hate Spyderco knives. I've owned several and still have a few, but I seldom carry them. They're just not my style. I enjoyed the functionality of them, but I never got over the looks. To be fair, I prefer traditional style, so most modern knives leave me a little cold.
 
Like many on this thread, I do not hate Spyderco. I love their designs, their build quality, etc. I've owned Spydies for more than 30 years and will continue to purchase new ones as the opportunities arise.
 
Love spyderco knives! They are the brand that got me into knives!
Back in the early 90’s I had my first spyderco. My dad and I were in Frostburg, MD at a small sportsman’s store. They had spyderco knives in their case. My dad and I bought 2 Endura’s with the full spide edge and the old clip it style pocket clip. I miss that knife! I believe my dad still has his.
 
There are people who hate every brand. Silly. Spyderco makes some awesome knives!
 
I think its the looks at first. I for many years shrugged off and never looked at spyderco. Thought they were goofy. Then was getting tired of subpar performance from other brands and wanted more. Then lo and behold, all the hot rod steels I was reading about were being utilized by mainly one company. Yep spyderco. It took me a bit to decide to bite the bullet but the desire for performance kept me coming back to look. And one day curiousity got me. I stopped by a big sporting store and asked to see the paramilitary 2. It took all of 5 seconds for me to know it was done. I loved it and would have one. It was like putting on an old worn in baseball glove that somehow was molded to my own hand but it had never met me. And the hole? My thumb new what to do and i flicked it open as smoothly as if id practiced for a year, love that hole now. Now owning a delica and PM2 I am just glad didn't miss out on them my whole life! They have redefined knives to me. What I expect in the steel, what I want in handles ergonomics and materials and biggest of all is blade shapes. The performance of these things is wicked. I almost didn't buy a pm2 due to the "delicate tip". I was scared I'd break it, its so much thinner than my sharpened prybars I was used too. Now I'm almost not happy the pm2 is as thick as it is, the delica just slices its so darn thin! I love them. The thin flat ground blades are something that will change your perspective. Heck I'd take thinner blades still...

Moral of the story is, the people that hate spyderco are probably the folks that have simply never held or owned one. Try a spyderco, I dare you.
 
I don't hate Spyderco but I'm having some Spydie sadness lately. Part of it is just the kinds of knives I like and that some of the Spyderco design choices tend to make them "project knives" for me. That gets complicated by occasionally tricky disassembly and reassembly including but not limited to thread-locker, screws that seem easier to strip than on some other knives, issues with lanyard tubes, centering issues I've had with a few, etc.. To be clear, I don't want to overemphasize this or say that these issues always come up. Spyderco knives just seem to be a lot less friendly than some other modern brands in this department.

Another personal issue is that I prefer deep-carry clips. The deep-carry wire clip on some Spyderco models has been ideal for me. It's just all the other knives with shallower carry, clips using three screws, clips with funky attachments accommodating lanyards or pivots, etc.. (I do think Spyderco deserves more credit for keeping tip-down alive. While I like tip-up in my regular pants pocket, I sometimes carry knives in other pockets where tip-down is better and options are scarce.) I've been very happy with some of the clips from MXG and Lynch but they don't come with flush-fitting screws and I usually need to use the stock screws anyway. So I can get deep carry but with mushroom-like screw heads poking up under the loop; something that has otherwise become a deal-breaker for some as flush-fitting screws have increasingly become the norm with deep-carry loop-overs.

That said, I ended up catching an MXG clip and wrenching out a stock screw. I needed to replace the stock screw. Spyderco would not send me one, nor would they let me buy one. The best they offered was to sell me a replacement clip that came with screws. I think it was like eight bucks plus shipping. I did it but that always bugged me. In recent years, I've had Kizer send me replacement screws, a replacement clip, and even a replacement liner and they've only ever asked $5 to cover the shipping.

Maybe it's also that I had two swings and two misses in the last week. I finally got a Positron and the detent was practically a wet noodle. It could not be effectively flipped without throwing wrist into it. So that went back. Then I got a Military 2. Yeah, I know it's on washers but still... there is way too much resistance in that action. I can flick it reliably with my thumb, and it isn't much worse than my Sage 5 or Tencious on the opening. The trouble is in closing it. Pinching the compresssion lock to drop the blade just doesn't work. The added momentum needed to send it home is too close to the amount of momentum that'll cause it to bounce back up. Will it break in and get better? I feel like I shouldn't have to think this hard about a $200-something knife.

BTW, thanks to anyone who read this whole rant. Part of why I'm frustrated is because I feel like I'm actively trying to love Spyderco. After all, the Wharncliffe Dragonfly is my EDC MVP, often as a secondary blade but still. Of course, I'm still waiting for them to offer that one in a premium stainless...
 
Chronovore said:
I don't hate Spyderco but I'm having some Spydie sadness lately. Part of it is just the kinds of knives I like and that some of the Spyderco design choices tend to make them "project knives" for me. That gets complicated by occasionally tricky disassembly and reassembly including but not limited to thread-locker, screws that seem easier to strip than on some other knives, issues with lanyard tubes, centering issues I've had with a few, etc.. To be clear, I don't want to overemphasize this or say that these issues always come up. Spyderco knives just seem to be a lot less friendly than some other modern brands in this department.

Another personal issue is that I prefer deep-carry clips. The deep-carry wire clip on some Spyderco models has been ideal for me. It's just all the other knives with shallower carry, clips using three screws, clips with funky attachments accommodating lanyards or pivots, etc.. (I do think Spyderco deserves more credit for keeping tip-down alive. While I like tip-up in my regular pants pocket, I sometimes carry knives in other pockets where tip-down is better and options are scarce.) I've been very happy with some of the clips from MXG and Lynch but they don't come with flush-fitting screws and I usually need to use the stock screws anyway. So I can get deep carry but with mushroom-like screw heads poking up under the loop; something that has otherwise become a deal-breaker for some as flush-fitting screws have increasingly become the norm with deep-carry loop-overs.

That said, I ended up catching an MXG clip and wrenching out a stock screw. I needed to replace the stock screw. Spyderco would not send me one, nor would they let me buy one. The best they offered was to sell me a replacement clip that came with screws. I think it was like eight bucks plus shipping. I did it but that always bugged me. In recent years, I've had Kizer send me replacement screws, a replacement clip, and even a replacement liner and they've only ever asked $5 to cover the shipping.

Maybe it's also that I had two swings and two misses in the last week. I finally got a Positron and the detent was practically a wet noodle. It could not be effectively flipped without throwing wrist into it. So that went back. Then I got a Military 2. Yeah, I know it's on washers but still... there is way too much resistance in that action. I can flick it reliably with my thumb, and it isn't much worse than my Sage 5 or Tencious on the opening. The trouble is in closing it. Pinching the compresssion lock to drop the blade just doesn't work. The added momentum needed to send it home is too close to the amount of momentum that'll cause it to bounce back up. Will it break in and get better? I feel like I shouldn't have to think this hard about a $200-something knife.

BTW, thanks to anyone who read this whole rant. Part of why I'm frustrated is because I feel like I'm actively trying to love Spyderco. After all, the Wharncliffe Dragonfly is my EDC MVP, often as a secondary blade but still. Of course, I'm still waiting for them to offer that one in a premium stainless...
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I took like a 20 year break from knives and I come back and everyone's tip-up carry! WTH! 😅
If you like something else, why force it? For me, I don't know what happened to me but all the sudden I just like whatever Spyderco's serving. FRN? Non-stainless? SpyderEdge? Yes, please. I'm trying out all the things I was 'too sophisticated' for back when I was 19 and I'm starting to think these guys know what they're doing.

Agree a bit about the clips--the para 3 feels like it's only half in my pocket with that clip. No real issue on the other Spydercos...deep carry wire or even deep carry spoon clips would be my preference but there's always the aftermarket.

$5, $8... I'd get right over that, man--there are so many fakes out there I see their point of view on parts and warranty. If they've got a fix for you, that cost is pretty trivial...
 
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