Guardian Tactical GTX-025 Automatic OTF Knife - Overview and Review

hey guys if you're shopping for knives and gear make sure you check out the description of the video you're watching right now for links to some great online retailers there's also individual links for knives that i personally recommend thanks what's going on youtube middle complex here and today i've got another interesting knife review slash knife overview to share with you guys this time in automatic and i have an otf actually this is the new guardian tactical uh gtx 025 or gtx 25 as i like to call it it's a little bit easier to say very interesting this is a smaller knife being offered by guardian tactical as many of you know i purchased for myself the recon 35 which is their medium size and then they also have a 40 which is a larger size this is definitely the smaller one and more so and for a lot of people are pointing out it's right in between like the utx 75 or utx and utx 85 from microtech which is a size range that a lot of people prefer in an edc style otf this knife was sent to me by bladehq thank you so much bladehq for reaching out and offering to send this to me full disclosure that's where it came from that will in no way affect my ability to give this an honest review it's very important to me and i can't help but give my honest thoughts on stuff like this but i appreciate it anyway i do have links for blade hq down below so that you guys can shop there if you want to and i also of course have links for this guy and all of the different variants it does come in a couple of different uh colors like in this case we've got this battle worn sort of black wash finish it does have we do have a stone wash option uh to tone some other stuff so check those out if you'd like to thanks so much to my generous patrons for supporting me right now if you'd like to get your hands on some cool stickers and some other benefits there's of course a link down in the description you're supporting me in the world to me and please follow me on instagram let's go ahead and get a measurement of this guy uh overall length of the guardian tactical gtx 25 coming in at six point just under it's like 6.7 inches overall blade length is coming in definitely under three inches and cutting edge is coming in at about 2.6 inches overall for a lot of people you know you're going to say that's too small for an otf a lot of people want to carry an automatic knife but are either limited by you know legality stuff in their area or they just don't like larger knives there is a lot there there are plenty of reasons to carry this knife even if you are into you know medium size or larger knives and we'll get into that here in a sec let's go ahead and do some size comparisons up against the ontario rat model one the rat one is coming in much larger at 8.6 inches overall how about up against the spyderco pm2 let's go ahead and move this guy down just a bit spyderco pm2 is coming in at 8.3 inches overall how about up against the benchmade griptilian or in this case the ritter hogue ritter hogue is coming in at eight inches overall and last but not least the smallest knife that i usually carry the spyderco para 3. the para 3 is coming in much closer at seven and a quarter inches overall cutting edge will actually go slightly is it about the same has actually no the pair 3 still has slightly more cutting edge but is substantially longer than the gtx 25. let's go ahead and talk about the action here because that is the main feature of this knife in my opinion this is an otf so you slide the thing forward and it deploys and you pull it back and it goes back in um this knife other alongside other guardian tactical designs has a steel plate underneath the switch and then there are uh ceramic earrings underneath that and that makes for an incredibly smooth and fidgety action it's unbelievably easy to fire this switch uh on many other otfs you have you know a switch and a certain amount of friction that make it not not difficult necessarily just less comfortable than this the switch complements the human thumb when you are pushing it forward it's nice to have that little rise that traction point and then when you are pulling it back this extra area right here or this the way that this is shaped complements your finger really really well and it's unbelievably easy to actuate not so easy that you might accidentally deploy it in your pocket just easy enough to make sure that you don't have to you know get it at exactly the right angle we've all you know those of us who have microtech knives and other otfs have handed some of those to other people and found that you know those people had trouble deploying it because they weren't sure about what angle to push with their finger and you know there was a little bit of excess friction there obviously once you get used to those knives it's not a problem at all is this easier though definitely this is the easiest to deploy style of otf that i've ever handled it translated perfectly from what i remember feeling in the recon 35 it's just wonderful despite it being small it's still plenty easy to just engage it doesn't even really matter i can lay my thumb down on this and the meat of my thumb catches that area and it's great um a lot of people ask about blade playing these otfs there are uh very few otf knives out there that have no blade play uh the the harkin the um it's the the deadlock otf has no blade play i think there might be one or two other designs every time i do a video like this people are like my benchmade infidel doesn't have any blade play i don't believe you i'm sorry um it's very common in ultra high end production and even custom otfs to have a slight amount of blade plate so there's a certain level that is acceptable to me and this is right on that mark it is incredibly similar to all micro tech knives that i've ever handled there's a little tiny bit you can hear it shake just a little bit in my experience every single benchmade infidel that i've ever felt has way more blade play i'm i have a local dealer i've handled probably eight or nine of them new ones old ones they're all about the same my microtechs have substantially less blade play and these guardian tactical knives now having handled this is the second one they they're just as minimal so it's perfectly acceptable i have no problem with that whatsoever i believe they also have a little bit of a unique chassis the way that it is held in place and then you know what it's it's much more frictionless on the way out that's interesting i don't know as much about that but i figured you guys might want to know let's go ahead and talk about carrie's profile so thickness of this guy up against the para 3 it is actually a little bit thinner than the pair of three which is nice otfs tend to be a tad thick this is not the case here and how about length and height up against the pm2 and pair three because they're a little bit awkward dimensionally is nowhere near as tall and it is nowhere near as long as either of them honestly you should be pretty much okay with this knife and i mean obviously if it's legal in your area check your local laws but yeah this is going to be comfortable to carry in athletic shorts you know skinny jeans leather pants regular you know regular fit relaxed fit jeans whatever you're gonna be just fine um the blade stock thickness on this guy get my calipers here real quick blade stock thickness is coming in at uh 127 thousandths not i mean it's pretty standard you're looking at benchmade griptilian territory not a tall blade not a lot of room to drop towards the edge we'll cut about we'll cut about that we'll talk about that later uh weight on this guy we're looking at aluminum 6061 t6 aluminum steel for the chassis and then l max for the blade not a long blade not a thick blade so your weight comes in at a totally reasonable 2.3 ounces that's really shouldn't be enough to bother anybody and it's right on that ounce an inch marker actually a little bit under it so that's going to make a lot of people happy let's go ahead and do a hardware check get out my tools here you can check out my tools and my flashlight down in the description uh i think i'll be linking them both at the bottom um no we're looking at t6 here which is more often the case with otfs it's either it seems to be either proprietary or it seems to be t6 um so at least this isn't proprietary you can get into this knife yeah these are all going to be t6 there's only four of them though and then we have we do have a t8 pocket clip screw though so that's nice which is most of the time that's the only screw you're gonna have to mess with i wouldn't recommend taking apart an otf but some people do check with check with their warranty if you're gonna do that if you've got an issue with your knife and you want to take it apart or you just want to clean it whatever check with guardian tactical there they have the final say in that if you you know purchase their their knives you know uh you know and you are considering taking it apart check with them first um let's go ahead i think we're past everything we need to do there so let's go ahead and talk about the anatomy of this knife the uh shape of this you know is very similar to other otfs there's just it's the uniqueness in this one is the you know the plates the bearings the switch and some of the texturing and design um you know choices here but yeah the shape of it is much the same as other otfs so if you like you know the shape of the utx 7585 the lightning otf the uh the scarab from microtech or the ultratech you know it's it's kind of right around there it's not overly thick but it's big enough that it doesn't feel skinny it feels nice in the hand this little area right here that's textured offers just enough traction where if you're going to hold it like this it feels good but in the standard position you know you're really only interacting with your index finger i don't know i mean in terms of a utilitarian benefit there's not much there but it does look nice and it's something different the thing that i like is ergonomically this thing just feels really good it's not a lot of object right but you have this area right here some texturing some more texturing here and some texturing here when i lay my fingers down naturally i realize yeah it's 100 intended to give you a full purchase despite being really small it's a benefit of a large rectangular body with not a lot of crazy lines as it's not really forcing your hands into a specific area but you know you have just enough room in my case you know i wear an xl glove just enough for him to get a full purchase and it is comfortable you know not that i would be in a situation where i'd really need a full four finger purchase so that i could really bear down on this i'm sure it's made well i'm sure it can stand up to some abuse but uh it it's just nice to be able to have that option and you know to for it to be comfortable you know even when i am sort of crammed into a small handle so i really like that everything is knocked down there are no sharp edges the pocket clip is comfortable everything's fine there's a glass breaker on the back of this which is really just the end of it comes to a point and they've just nested a little uh steel uh bearing in there and that's a nice way to do a glass breaker i don't like glass breakers because i don't find myself breaking glass ever like literally never but i guess if you're in a situation where you need to do that that's a nice way to do it without it being obtrusive or pointy as you're jamming this back into your pocket oftentimes you brace the knife up against your palm and uh if it's a really pointy glass breaker that we've like we've seen on some designs from the past then that kind of sucks but they find they found a nice way around that without making it in my opinion aesthetically ugly the blade on this guy is lmax which is definitely not a steel that we see enough of in today's knife world uh what is lmax check out knife steel nerds for a much better breakdown on that steel than what i'm about to give you lmax is considered by most to be a super steel uh it is powder formed it is a steel that will hold an edge really really well it's not a nightmare to sharpen it's definitely going to be tough and it's definitely going to be stainless it shares a lot of the same qualities with other steels that we see you know this to me it kind of falls somewhere in between s35vn and cts xhp obviously it depends on the geometry and the heat treat how capable the blade is right but i'm not a professional i'm not a metal or just so go check out knife steel nerds for that information they do a way better job and they are actually professionals um the uh and i say they i think it's actually one person but anyways um this is the black wash finish and it's heavy it definitely gives the impression that the knife has been used uh it translates to the pocket clip some people are really going to like that especially if you're going to take this out and use it right dlc finishes you know oftentimes sort of fade away over time and this is custom faded to steal the line from the transformers movie some people really like that this this wouldn't be my first choice i kind of like how they did it it's okay you know but i would have just chosen tumbled i like their sort of dark concrete tunnel but they've got a few different options out there so you can kind of pick what you want as far as i know it only comes in black aluminum maybe they'll do some different colors down the road i think they did with the gtx or i'm sorry the the recon 35 i think but you know i don't know you can pick the the finish you want from the ones that are available we have a flat that carries out about 85 percent the length of the blade carrying some pretty meaningful thickness out there it is not unbelievably thin down behind the edge i believe this is yeah this feels hollow ground it does get thin enough to do your regular edc test this is the style of knife that i would i mean if i wanted to carry an otf you know uh like if i was looking for a light otf or just general edc tasks this would be a great choice it's going to do what you need it to do it's not a you know a blade design that's going to excel particularly at any one thing it's a nice simple drop point blade i think they did a nice job with it i don't have an issue there's really just not much to say it's well done these holes i heard described as weight reduction holes these are tactical speed holes and a little bit of a gunk trap i don't necessarily like them on an otf because if you're cutting something and crap gets you know lodged in there and then you pull it back in then now all that stuff is on the inside um you know it adds some aesthetic flair to a blade that would look pretty much exactly the same as any other drop point blade that's on an otf so they added you know some uniqueness to it some it looks overly tactical right some people really really like that uh long-term use i really don't want them there so judge from that what you will i consider that a bit of a flaw the edges surrounding them a little bit sharp they're sharp enough that they're definitely going to hit stuff but up here this area up here is nicely knocked down and the edge is done well right everything else looking just fine here so uh take that for what it's worth the pocket clip is a great design um you can see we've got the serial number here this is number 67. uh the pocket clip has kind of a combination bill swoop but it does a good job getting over the pants pocket and the knife carries deep enough for me so that's fine guardian tactical's font looks like a halloween font um it's kind of it's kind of corny um but okay you know whatever it's just a font it's not really hurting anything it just has always looked goofy to me there's not a lot of excess on the blade i mean it just says l max and then up here on the frame it says gtx 35 so that's fine um all the way around you know aside from a couple little quarks you know things i can complain about really the biggest thing for me are those holes there i really don't like and i know a lot of people you have that you know combat true it on hellhound that's got holes in it it'll be the same thing and you always talk about how much you love that you know yes for for some people it is going to be a thing that is aesthetically pleasing and they just love it for what it is right but if you if i really plan to go out and use that combat troodon with the hellhound blade and all the holes in it and i was going to get it dirty that would definitely cause a problem over time you know it's just stuff coming in and out all the time depending on what you're coming or you're cutting you know it's just i i don't really uh oh my word choice there was so bad but depending on what it is that you're cutting that blade coming in and out of the uh the frame all the time you know yeah it's definitely you know it's going to be something that's it's going to cause a problem over time it's the same thing with this but does that mean you shouldn't buy it does that mean it's not worth the money no that's in an extreme case of use over a long period of time unfortunately you can get into this knife if you choose to and it is definitely made well the nice thing here is that this knife is made in the united states and it is priced very competitively um i feel like these knives you know their direct competitors are microtech and i love microtech knives there are a lot of microtech knives that i'd rather own than this but it's mostly for aesthetic reasons this knife is built just as well and there is definitely a benefit in that switch maybe it's just in fidget factory you know maybe it is the convenience makes it a little bit better in some situations i don't know but that's something that i very much appreciate you can pick these up for about 240 dollars i have no problem with that price for a u.s made automatic but you can get chinese automatics for so much less i've handled a ton of those i've handled a ton of chinese-made otfs they're cool i'd rather spend more money and get something like this honestly that's my honest thought on that i don't think that the automatic knife world in terms of the chinese-made ones are quite where the us automatic knife world is right now versus you know like talking about the manual folding knife world i think you know chinese manufactured knives really give us manufactured folders are run for their money in a lot of cases they're justifiable in terms of quality right otf game not so much handled a ton from both sides in my opinion it's better to spend more money and get a us otf in in pretty much every circumstance this knife is going to be going in my most recommended knives playlist i very much like this but it is specifically going to be for people who are looking for a smaller automatic knife and want to make sure that it has the quality and it's easy to use right if you're looking for a bigger automatic knife then yeah then you may not like this because it's not a big knife but anyways yeah very much very much recommend this knife thanks again to blade hq for sending this guy along please follow me on instagram guys that's going to be pretty much it for today's video if you enjoyed this video if you were mildly entertained by it or if you're just feeling generous please leave a like if you like to check out my other content i do of course have lots of videos of knives that are either expensive or inexpensive that i do or don't like so check those out and if you enjoy all my content go ahead and click on that metal complex they'll go right there and subscribe because there's definitely more coming thanks again for watching everybody and have a great day

Channel: Metal Complex

Views: 2,526

Rating: 4.8811879 out of 5

Keywords: guardian tactical otf, guardian tactical gtx 025, guardian tactical gtx025, guardian tactical gtx 25, new guardian tactical knives 2020, guardian tactical recon 035, guardian tactical recon 040, guardian tactical recon, guardian tactical recon 035 vs microtech, guardian tactical vs microtech, guardian tactical recon 035 test, guardian tactical recon elite, guardian tactical otf torture test, guardian tactical otf 040, guardian tactical gtx-025, guardian tactical otf review, edc

Id: tjX4t8iH17g

Length: 18min 39sec (1119 seconds)

Published: Mon Aug 03 2020