Cold Steel Grik: An Amateurish Knife Review

I have a friend who is quite the knife aficionado. Last time I visited him, he insisted I take home one of his recent acquisitions. Meet the Cold Steel Grik.

The camera flash seems to make the blade look black here. It is not. I will forego the flash for the rest of this post.

The Grik features the "Patented Tri-Ad Locking System" based on a traditional lockback style, while my prior EDC (everyday carry) long-discontinued MTech has a liner lock. I like the one-handed ease of spring-assisted opening and a liner lock, but the MTech is cheap, and the pivot is not very secure. The Grik can be opened easily enough with one hand thanks to the textured plastic thumb stud, and while it requires two hands to close, it feels like a much more secure lockup. I am inclined to believe the hype for its mechanism.

The MTech should look more black than this. I just can't win, I tell ya!

Speaking of that thumb stud, it exhibits one of the details I like about this knife. There is a small roll pin through a hole drilled down into the spine of the blade. It appears to be a permanent way to make sure everything stays in place. This extra machining step and assembly step suggest it was built for long-term durability.

A T10 Torx is all you need to replace these.

I was initially prejudiced against the pure polymer in the hilt, but I am cautiously optimistic. The Grik also includes pocket clip "scales" than can be mounted on the left or right sides, and a small cap piece for the opposite side. I elected to add the clips to both sides, and I will keep the cap pieces in case I decide to revert to a single clip after I see what I like. If anything, I think this knife feels too narrow with only one clip in place. The plastic certainly trims the weight of the knife, and despite its meaty blade, it weighs very little.

The Buck almost looks antique. It's a different design philosophy altogether.

In comparison to the classic Buck 110, you can see the Grik is shorter and broader in profile. Note the Grik's spear point compared to the Buck's clip point. I do like that arc cut into the spine of the blade, too. It offers a nice index point for the index finger should any delicate cutting arise. It might even be a decent whittling knife.

As for the steel, AUS 8A is not a bad choice. It's not the hardest, and debates of stainless vs. carbon steel never end, but this seems like a good balance to me. The specs I found say it contains 0.7%-0.75% carbon, 13%-14% chromium, 0.5% manganese, 0.1%-0.3% molybdenum, 0.49% nitrogen (?), 0.04% phosphorus, 1% silcon, and 0.03% sulfur in the alloy. For comparison, the Buck 110 uses 420HC steel, which apparently includes 0.46% carbon, 0.3% vanadium, 13% chromium, 0.4% manganese, and 0.4% silicon. The Grik thus has a higher carbon content, similar chromium, and different trace elements. At any rate, it promises decent edge retention with good rust resistance.

I intend to make the Grik my regular EDC knife, and we'll see how it works out. I won't be doing much heavy cutting. After all, even that crappy MTech has worked out OK so far. I like the idea of a pocket clip that won't be scratching the hell out of anything I bump or lean against, though. I'm just not sure how I'll like the slab of green plastic hanging out of my pocket. We'll see.

You may also like my Swiss Army Knife post from several weeks ago.