Cheap OTF (Out The Front) Automatic Knives...What You Need To Know...

hey what's going on guys so today we're talking about cheap uh otf automatics so what is an otf an otf stands for uh out the front okay so these are knives that you know open out of the front of the handle as opposed to side opening automatics there's a ton of these on the market all right and these are very very popular because they're cool just flat out that's just what it is they're cool it's not the uh the best strongest knife design i mean by far these uh knives definitely have their limits um but uh people have been asking make a video about the cheap ones for many many years i think i've done on and off videos on some branded otfs you know obviously microtech's one of the largest brands but there's plenty of brands out there that uh you know people come to have known love uh dalton's another one of my favorites as well pro tech um you know benchmade has a couple of their otfs as well a lot more in recent years than they used to it used to just be like the infidel but now they have all kinds of otf knives some i'm not even familiar with um but today's video is not on the very expensive you know major brands this is on the cheap ones okay now all these i believe are marked tech knives okay t-a-c um k-n-i-v-e-s let me show you this logo on here but it is uh worth noting that these knives are sold under a ton of different names okay and a lot of these knives could be identical so you can have you know this exact same knife you know made overseas marketed by 50 different companies it could have 50 different names it could be you know billy bob's automatics or you know cool otf or whatever it happens to be in this case it's tech knives now if you go to tech knives website the the range as far as price is pretty common i mean something like this you know it could be like 20 bucks um you know only up to about 100 or so and of course as you look through these if you're familiar with a lot of different otf knives you'll notice that uh most of them are copies of existing patterns okay this is one of the reasons i've kind of avoided this video a little bit my opinions have gone back and forth over the years i'm still very much against counterfeits now what makes a knife a counterfeit well if it has fake markings if it's pretending to be something then it's not that's a counterfeit these like for example this giant green um otf this looks like a macora from microtech i mean it's just the design cues are just spot-on so is this a counterfeit macora no because it doesn't say that anywhere it doesn't have a microtech logo anywhere okay but it's a copy of the design so i mean you know personal opinion and politics completely out of the picture i just want to make a video talking about the quality of my experience with these knives again i've had multiple of these models from multiple companies they're all pretty much the same knife like if you've seen the lightning otf i don't currently have one that's probably one of the most popular ones um that is marketed by dozens and dozens of different dealers you have different logos on it it's all the same knife the same people overseas are making those different people are buying them and slapping their name on it okay so i mean just so you understand the brand doesn't really matter so the big question i guess for people who are interested in these is what am i getting for the 60 70 80 90 100 price tag because generally speaking some of these otfs are in that price range any from like 50 to 100 bucks you know they don't go over a hundred dollars too often um what are you getting for that well you're getting all the fun that you have in a regular otf so you can open it close it and open it close it you can open it and use the thing um what you're not getting is a quality steel now these happen to vary greatly in steel choices very very soft chinese steels i mean the best steel i've seen in most of these very cheap otfs is like a 440c that's a totally usable seal in fact most of these are very usable steels as long as you maintain them but most people don't most people aren't buying a super cheap otf and like really keeping a good edge on it okay if you're keeping a good edge on your knife you probably have a more expensive knife but not to say it doesn't happen i'm sure some out there do that it's just a little bit more rare um what you're not getting is consistency when you pay 400 plus for an otf from one of the major brands uh you're getting consistency you're getting a knife that's going to open and close open and close open close okay and it never fails sometimes with these cheaper knives you get knives that don't uh don't open all the way they'll come off the track quite frequently it becomes annoying sometimes when they break that's it you just you have no idea how to fix them and you're out you're you know 50 60 70 or whatever happens to be so lack of consistency um blade steel is definitely a huge factor there uh fit and finish it you know yeah you're definitely getting a little bit better fit and finish but to be honest some of these are they're really well made you know for the price tags um so it's not too far off as far as that you know the biggest thing i think would be of course your warranty you know if you want these breaks you're kind of sol um there's not much you could do some companies you know may help you out some companies might not but generally speaking once they break that's it when you're investing 400 plus in a microtech or something those will get fixed if you have a problem now what's kind of cool about these is that obviously some of these have proprietary hardware okay just like you'd see in a microtech so these have kind of a triangular shaped screw head you're not gonna be able to go down to uh lowe's or home depot and find that hardware but what i found with uh the brand tac knives anyway is that some of these came with the actual um you know tools that are needed to take them apart which is pretty cool because they don't care about warranty you know i mean they don't care if you're taking your knives apart as opposed to maybe microtech who gets upset if you attempt to fix your own knife you know um so i mean obviously there's pros and cons in in all aspects of these but i would say that nine out of ten people would be happy with a cheap otf if you've always wanted one and you're like i don't know if i want to spend you know four or five hundred dollars on one don't just buy a cheap one if you find that you really love the idea of uh having an otf and using it and stuff you can always go back and invest in a very good quality one all right but if you just wanted to open and close it just get a cheap one there's no there's no shame in that at all this one happens to have a damascus blade this is actually a genuine sandwich damascus all right so it's kind of cool um you know but again i mean if you look at the design here this to me anyway i could be wrong but this looks like a bench made 4 600 you know at least the overall feel of it the coolest one i have to say and it's cool because i've only had one in my life and i regret getting rid of it and they're very expensive is the one up top here okay this is a halo copy for microtech now obviously it's it's very much a copy there's no other knife that looks just like this this is clearly uh trying you know to look like a halo what's interesting about this one and if you haven't seen this most people are familiar with seeing the um double action otfs so basically our switch opens it but it also closes it okay this is old school the halo this is a single action otf all right so our button opens it but we have to retract it ourself okay so in this case this uh button features a safety within the button so you can't just push down so it's in the pocket it's not going to accidentally you know fire off you have to slide this top switch so it's even see how that moves a little bit if you look above my thumb once it's even then you can push down on the button so let's see this action so pull back push down and then you have your amazing blade a very cool package to bring the blade back in if you push the button down nothing happens right so you have to slide back on the lock push down the button grab these tabs in the back and start to retract the blade this pulls the blade in okay then you can let go of the button pull all the way in until it locks and then this is just freely moving now you can pop that back in the handle now you can see off the side i have these sheets here they come with a variety of sheets mostly you can see mostly have pocket clips except for the uh the halo but different types of sheets velcro sheets buckle sheets uh in the case of the halo it did come with a kydex all right so you can actually clip this this is a tech lock style mount you could put this on your bag belt whatever change the position so it's pretty interesting this one happened to also come with a pouch as well um and that's like about 100 knife you know so i mean 100 is not cheap but it's the cheaper option okay if you look at a real halo you'll see the uh the value in getting a cheap one um you know but of course there's two ways to look at this half the people watching this video go oh it's cool you know i don't spend a whole bunch of money but i kind of wanted to try the design or i like the idea but don't you have to play around the house obviously legality comes in play here a lot of places these are not allowed to carry so that may weigh into it you know i know people who have spent four or 500 on otf and then realized later like you know i only use this around the house i'm not allowed to carry it public and that's kind of dumb i don't want to you know have a knife i can't carry around with me so there's a lot of factors you know that play into here in my opinion i think you really should just save up and get the you know the genuine article um because you want to experience an otf in a quality sense you know i mean when you get a cheap one this happens to a lot of people too you get a cheap one and you know you open and close it a bunch you play with it all the time and then it breaks and then you're like super bummed and it just might throw you off to the design of an otf you know um obviously the quality ones don't have those problems okay and if you actually find yourself using these knives you know cutting with them all the time that's when the uh you know the blade steel really plays a role okay because most of these have very very soft steels they look great a lot of them are very sharp out of the box and you go to cuddle and they're super impressive that first cut and then you know after opening 15 20 boxes it starts to dull a little bit uh maybe you're not super familiar with sharpening you know you have this like you know thin double edge blade you don't know how to sharpen it properly and then you have a useless you know tool i will say if you have the money to buy an expensive one and you ask me hey should i try a cheap one first no you should get the expensive one okay because you're gonna have that better experience with that expensive one i'll tell you what too they retain their value even used people are usually interested in these otfs okay so unlike some folding knives uh if you do you know get one use a little bit you don't like it they're pretty easy to trade people are always looking for them um especially if you have an older model that's you know out of production or something like that they become very collectible but as far as the cheap ones go they have a purpose they have a market it's just like super cheap knives people say like oh why do you why do you test cheap knives you know who wants those a lot of people i'm telling you there's probably more people who are buying and using these super cheap otfs than people who are spending four and 500 on the good ones uh there's just a massive market for it because people want something cool and fun but they don't want to spend a bunch of money on it not a lot of people want to make an investment in a fun knife and that's what this is for a lot of people a fun knife now just to give you an example here right for people who don't know when you open an otf okay if you open the blade into something it doesn't like pierce through like magic okay it's gonna stop the blade it's not gonna have a lot of penetrating power okay so they'll give you an example here on the sheath see how it hits that it doesn't even go through a simple nylon sheath so now it's off the track when it comes off the track it just freely slides up and down if you pull all the way to the front it resets it so now you can you know open and close it again once it's locked in the open position then you have piercing power then you can actually you know put this through a cardboard box or whatever you happen to be you know doing with your knife um but i just want to make that a point because a lot of people don't understand that they think that you know if you even a piece of paper will stop the blade on most otfs okay unless they're extremely sharp um these cheap ones anyway you know if you do have a nice quality otf you could probably go through a piece of paper with it this is just an important aspect to know because so many people have sent me messages and like oh i didn't really understand how that worked i thought i'd be able to like you know shoot it through things uh if you have like a quality microtech yeah you should probably shoot it through a piece of paper and have a clean slice through and it'll lock open but generally speaking they will not go through things it's just gonna get knocked off the track and it doesn't matter how expensive or uh how sharp they are that's what happens it's just part of the design you have a spring in there that's just powerful enough to throw the blade out and lock it all right and that's it no more once they are in the open and locked position that's when you have that little bit of stabbing power but even then even on a quality otf a lot of times you're going to have at least a little bit of blade play it has to be able to move around a little bit in order to function i know there's a couple on the market that have no blade play that's a you know an exception generally speaking 95 i'll say percent plus of otfs on the market have some kind of lead play um but yeah i mean obviously you just pick the design you like you pick one that looks cool you have fun with it that's the purpose of these cheap ones but if you start to use them understand that they are going to dull out very very quickly okay they are cheap for a reason just like cheap folders i would say a 70 or 80 dollar you know otf like this has the same blade steel as a six dollar knife do you know what i'm saying a cr-13 mov or something from china and you could see i mean with this particular brand they show the blade steels on different models which is nice so you have actually know what you're getting but they're soft they are soft steels they will not hold an edge very long all right so these knives are totally for fun and that is about it okay like i said if you're very skilled at knife sharpening yeah you can get away with using these things pretty decently and sharpening all time but it's a huge pain in the butt i would just invest in something more expensive so yeah i just wanted to talk about this a little bit show these a little bit again this is just one particular brand but this represents all of them across the board these exact knives are sold under multiple brand names multiple dealers all across the uh the internet um you know it's kind of a fun thing just understand what you're getting that's i guess my biggest point is don't have high expectations when you're buying you know cheap knives and unfortunately a hundred dollar otf is a cheap knife because it's not up to par with uh you know the industry standards for a quality otf very different than folders we all know if you spend five or ten dollars on a foley knife you shouldn't have high expectations but someone might not understand hey i spent 100 on this automatic knife you have still those really low expectations it may break with use with a lot of use it will eventually break you know but you have to ask yourself is that 100 worth it for me is that worth it for my entertainment to feel cool and have an otf and play with it some people get one of these and they're like okay i get it and they move on other people get one of these and they go wow that's the most amazing knife in the world and they get more of them and then they start saving money and investing in really expensive ones and i know people with you know hundreds of very high-end otf knives as well so it's a different genre of knives you can get into collecting and using but you know for me ultimately uh the limitations legally to be able to carry them if i can just go out and carry these i'd have a lot more quality ones in my collection uh and in the future at some point when i get bored or you know maybe in the winter wins you know a snow day or something sitting around the house i'll i'll show a video of all my automatic knives in general because i know people have been asking that as well but anyway i know a lot of you guys out there have these cheapos and you have fun with them it is what it is just understand your expectations should be low just because you're spending you know 90 or 100 on life does not mean it's a good quality knife when it comes to these so that's it for now hopefully you guys have a wonderful day let me know down in the comment section if you've ever used an automatic otf knife and out the front knife a lot of you have but a lot of you haven't either i know a lot of people are really curious about them they want to try them out you know it's up to you whether you go cheap or you save up and you get some quality but that can be said for anything could be shoes you know clothes your car knives whatever some people see the value in spending those uh those extra dollars and other people don't if it's just for entertainment purposes why waste the money i guess that's the thought and it makes sense for some people so anyway that's all i am here to tell you though as a person who have used multiple very expensive otfs and multiple very cheap ones it is worth saving your money and buying the good one it's definitely worth it especially if you plan to use it then so that's it for now hopefully you guys have a wonderful day thank you so much for watching and i will see you tomorrow with a brand new video take care

Channel: cutlerylover

Views: 16,955

Rating: 4.8899083 out of 5

Keywords: cutlerylover, knife, knives, review, cutlery, benchmade, spyderco, sog, kershaw, crkt, schrade, smith, and, wesson, cheap, expensive, folder, fixed, blade, framelock, linerlock, lockback, good, bad, sharp, dull, opinion, gear, edge, test, use, titanium, g10, carbon, fiber, stainless, steel, micarta, kydex, sheath, custom, production, boker, balisong, butterfly, legal, testing, abuse, demo, demonstration, usage, defense, defensive, attack, attacker, chris, reeve, microtech, protech, dalton, brous, blackheart, curtiss, gavkoo, tuffthumbs, reeves, strider

Id: 8ZztIVdSLlI

Length: 16min 38sec (998 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 04 2020