A shot of the SPyderco UK Pen knife:
The review consists of :
The UK Pen knife was designed to allow carry in the United Kingdom which meant a blade under 3" with no lock. It has a S30V blade and a G10 handle with the same general blade and handle shape as the Calypso Jr. with a few refinements. The knife has a full flat grind and distal taper to point. The edge is 0.020"-0.023" thick and ground at 14.3 (8) degrees per side. New in box from Spyderco the edge could shave and push cut newsprint but was a little scratchy on both and tended to want a hint of a draw for smooth cutting.
The UK Pen in general cuts very well, it slices through 3/8" hemp taking just 8 (1) lbs to make a cut on a two inch draw, very high slicing aggresion, and can push straight through with just 26 (1) lbs.
The Uk Pen has a sim and acute point which achieves 217 (11) pages into a phonebook with a 50 lbs push. No heavy stabbing or thrusting was done due to lack of a lock. In order to do this without having the blade fold onto the hand, care would need to be taken to avoid any spine loads which would mean the angle of the blade would need to be sigificant above perpendicular away from the hand to insure that any forces vertically on the blade would be towards the spine and not the edge.
The UK Pen knife works well in the kitchen as a small utility and paring knife. It is lightweight, easily held in a side grip for peeling, and has a nice precise point for coring and scoring.
With the edge nice and sharp it readily cuts meats and thick animal skins, making quick work of thick pork rinds :
As a general utility blade it suffers from lack of length, as with any blade of this size, something the size of the Paramilitary is required for general food work. The steel was corrosion resistant enough to prevent oxidization from being an issue without excessive care been taken to keep the blade rinsed and dry.
The UK Pen sliced up various woods, peeled away bark, pointed sticks and carved notches. It also handles light chopping with no problems :
The thickest one of those Alders was about an inch. It could also twist split pine shingles :
However as it has no lock point drilling and digging/stabbing in general could cause the blade to fold, as well even light batoning will cause the blade to rotate, however this doesn't prevent it from being used for baton work, though it can be inefficient because much of the force is wasted moving the blade around instead of driving it through the wood.
The UK Pen does well in general cutting various materials, the only real concerns are very thick plastics or similar materials where the blade has to be worked or rocked through the cut. If the blade is constrained due to friction against the flats and at the same time subjected to vertical forces the blade can readily disengage from the fully opened position, but doe to the action resistance and secondary stop it would take an extremely dynamic and violent jerk on the handle to put the fingers in danger. It is however problematic on cutting up thick rubber for such reasons as the blade will keep popping out of straight. Much of this was noted when it was used to cut up a SUV tire alongside a few other knives. The same concern is made more apparent moving beyond cutting and using the knife as tool for light prying and torquing, the lack of a lock can limit the tasks for which the knife can be applied because the blade will simply fold back on the fingers.
The UK Pen was used for an extensive trial on cutting carpeted compared to several other blade steels and the performance was solid.
S30V has a relatively low machinabilty which reduces ease of sharpening, however the thin and acute edge on the UK Pen knife compensates for this significantly. If the knife is significantly dulled, as after extended carpet cutting, it is necessary to first reset the edge with a coarse hone to allow the final finishing bevel to be applied with the Sharpmaker in just a few passes.
The action is fairly heavy even compared to a lockback, it however is easier to close one handed (less manipulation) though it requires more force, specifically 6 lbs applied to the apex of the hump. On an interesting note, this knife is more secure than a lot of locking folders because when many locks disengage the blade swings with little to no resistance and some liners/integrals can release under very light torques/impacts.
With the UK Pen while spine whacks will cause the blade to move, it is very difficult to to past the secondary stop at 90 degrees. It certainly won't happen from light impacts such as turning accidently hitting the spine off a desk. Even holding the handle by the end and snapping it hard enough to dent a piece of birch hardwood flooring by about a millimeter, the blade only rotates a little past 90.
Compared to the Calypso Jr. the UK Pen knife has a few changes, most of which are generally regarded as improvements. The thumb ramp has grooves and isn't as pointed, the handle as deeper contours, there is no blade choil notch, and the blade rides very deep in pocket with basically no handle visible
With a high flat grind and thin and acute edge the UK Pen continues the standard set by the Calypso Jr. with several ergonomic enhancements to the grip.The lack of a lock in general has little influence on EDC use unless a lot of very thick media is cut, or cutting is in general very dynamic.
Comments can be emailed using cliffstamp[REMOVE]@cutleryscience.com or by posting in the following thread :
More information can be obtained at the Spyderco website and the following thread
| Last updated : | 12 : 30 : 2005 |
| Originally written: | 11 : 20 : 2005 |