i know this is OLD, but i just got one of these, and i love it

Skall idek how you do it. I have zero interest in knives and swords yet I'm addicted to your videos. So strange.. you're the best.

"near the tip... where it counts" ... "the spine is very thick, and in fact the entire [REDACTED] over all is pretty beefy" are we still talking about the knife?

That Vallatton looks like trophy display knife. Beautiful piece of art

Skall, this is truly one of the nicest folding knifes ( in my opinion ) that you have reviewed. I usually prefer fixed blades, but this one is pretty cool for what it is.

I love your videos so much because you stick to the knife/sword you are talking about without going off on any tangents. I really appreciate that as I hope others do as well.

I own one its a gentle men's knife also a good conversation starter.

I don't disagree with any of your review points , but I still love it and it's been in my regular edc rotation for some years , it's a big thick heavy chunk , and I love it! Great review

I had to choose between this knife and my Assisted Opening Benchmade Barrage. I went with the Barrage and have no complaints. I plan on getting this knife soon.

Finally; a Spyderco that isn't butt ugly.

Ooh folders, my territory. Please do more of these.

I usually dislike folding knives but somehow this seems to be just what I want.

I agree with Skall! The only thing i don't like in this knife is that liner lock(it just misses the whole point of the thick blade and also gets in the way of the "sub hilt" and makes it less useful) ! It should have been lockback! If they change it i'll buy one! Keep up the job Skall!

So regards the knife being thick on the backside, as a woman with very small hands, I would tend to use the hole to loop my first finger through and put my thumb on the back for added strength and precision on a largish folding knife like this. Having a wider back is an advantage to me, so my grip would be secure and more comfortable for any heavy whittling or paring I might do with this size and kind of a knife, especially if I needed it for detail work. JMO :)

Hope to see some more rambling videos, really nice to watch.

Great review, Skall. I found it very enlightening and I would have to agree with your assessment of the knife. That knife would be perfect for me if it were a bit thinner and if that nice finish was textured for extra grip. Build quality seems about right for the price and you gotta love that the blade actually comes shaving sharp.

Hell, the thickness is perfect for me. I have large hands so this knife would fit me well.

I love mine. It’s a toss up between which is my favorite the Vallotton or the benchmade crooked river

This was a really, really nice knife rewiew! About the thickness of the blade, first I thought, no way, that is definitely too much, basically nonsense. But as the whole knife did made quite some sense there clearly must be a specific reason for that. There is this trick to open folding-knives with a sharp flick of the wrist, and for that the added weight comes in very handy. To present your blade that way also seems to be state-of-the-art in modern self-defence with a knife based on the fact that automatic-opening folders are illegal mostly everywhere. So just try out how it works.

Love my Vallotton it is like Jack the ripper with an Italian accent and only becomes EDC when I am wearing a suit.

If I had to hazard a guess I would say it's probably more on the thick side to appeal to amateur knife enthusiasts. A lot of the ones I have spoken to about the subject tend to have this impressions that a thicker, heftier blade is a sign of a superior knife and/or sword. Most of them don't seem to realize that different knives are generally meant for different purposes, but like I said that's just a guess.

First, this is only 175 on Amazon. I would not recommend Knifecenter under any circumstances. Regarding the knife - not very practical for anything at all, but very nice looking, well done and a good collectible item.

Overbuilt is just trendy right now.

List of Spyderco knives I WANT: Spyderco Manix 2 XL - hd edc Spyderco Grasshopper - Keychain edc Spyderco Tatanka - why not? Spyderco Szabo - hypothetical combat Spyderco Centafonte 3 - edc

I have the same knife but the blade is 690 stainless steel ,. The knife is from Taiwan. Bought it in excellent condition used at a gun show for $65 👍. It is an awesome knife and the steel takes a wicked edge. The son of a b**** is built like a tank. Which I love for heavy duty outdoor work.

Damn, that knife looks beautiful!

Dig the look of this one. I want the Matriarch 2 though. Pure gnarlyness.

It's an extraordinarily thick knife from Spyderco. Up there with Benchmade Adamas

Still one of my favorite knives.

unlike cutlerylover you open up the knife right away thats why I like watching you videos but I also like cutlerylover

*Spyderco* EDC: Endura Lightweight ; fightingblade: Warrior ve both and both are awesome ; my edc knifes are a pohl force alpha 2 and the endura lw

You can always tell if someone is a knife enthusiast. Weird bald patches on arms. ;)

Hey skallag, could yopu make a video on different kind of grinds ect. i hear you using those words alot. and i can see what they stand for but not the pro's con's ect.

you heard of Benchmade 940 Osborne I love it really fun looking too green aluminum handles purple spacer and reverse tanto really sweet I love mine

This is my favorite knife I carry it every day

Beautiful knife! I have the Spyderco Bushcraft UK fixed blade with the polished G-10 and it has a great grip. Maybe it's because the shape is different and more ergonomic than this one. Thanks for the review! I agree it's really a collectors safe queen. I buy Spyderco's, Benchmade's and many other brands to use not for show.

I would love to see you review the Spyderco Matriarch 2!

I love the knife, but I would have wanted the handle to be MUCH thinner. Like each side be about half as thick. The black areas made much more textured or textured carbon fiber or Terotuf would be good alternatives. I really like kraton but it might be too grippy with the pressure on the clip to get in and out of your pocket without both hands, and the blade steel in S110V. I'm ok with the thick blade, but making it a little thinner would help too. All in all, I love the idea of it, but it just seems like it could have been executed much better

this knife look awesome.great vid man

Thanks for the review. But I don't care about how thick it is, that is a bad ass knife. I wouldn't mind if you reviewed Spyderco's Karambit. I wonder if that item is also as thick. But damn.... That build quality is awesome for the price.

In my experience Spyderco was only ever helpful if you merely needed a replacement pocket clip & clip screws. That's it. Now, because I carry my knives so much and use them so hard, I routinely inspect and re tighten all screws on my folding knives so they don't loosen up, or possibly have a screw fall out (which I've seen happen on other guys knives in my police department). Furthermore, I don't take my knives apart because I know this voids most makers warranties however simply tightening screws back down does not. I digress. When one of the frame screws stripped on my Endura 4, they gave me a nonsense excuse that because most of their knives are made over-seas now, they couldn't fix my knife or get a replacement frame screw....(Even though the Endura 4 happens to be about their single best selling model knife mind you!). So she was trying to tell me that even if I sent the knife into them for repair, that they were unable to get replacement frame screws for the Endura4 because all knives and parts are made overseas, and not in the USA, therefore they don't stock any parts for their overseas made knives except for replacement pocket clips and clip screws.... So after that nonsense, I shared my experience on all of the major forums, and once Spyderco caught wind of the fact that I was making my miserable experience known to the world, they magically decided to fix my problem.... But any halfway intelligent person would be able to see that Spyderco was merely doing this as a means of damage control and not because they actually gave a darn about me, their customer. How do I know Spyderco was merely conducting damage control you ask? Because if it wasn't simply a means of damage control, they would have fixed my issue when I initially had the problem to begin with...NOT after I start sharing my piss poor experience on the forums! They just wanted me to stop the bad publicity! Then after speaking with the rep, they actually tried to put the burden on me by saying, that if I had issues with customer service, I should have asked to speak with a manager. I took offense to this stating, why should it be MY responsibility to ask for a manager when YOUR customer service department can't properly do their job?! This just demonstrates poor customer service to begin with! And that's not MY responsibility or MY problem! At this point it had been about a month since my initial contact with Spyderco about my problem. During this time since Spyderco would rather dick me around than be of any help, the vendor of the cutlery I bought the knife from wanted to replace my knife after he found out what was going on. I know him rather well and he felt bad considering he was the one that recommended I buy the Spyderco from his store. This wasn't the end however. Once I got my new knife, I immediately realized that the lockup was off (the lock bar protruded about 2mm above the base of the blade where lock bar and blade meet when open) and that this also caused the knife to have a VERY scratchy, gritty feel when opening or closing the knife. This is because someone did a shotty job milling the knife, and left all sorts of grinding grooves in the steel. I informed the Spyderco rep that the knife I had initially contacted them about had already been replaced, and then explained that the replacement knife is defective. So she tells me to send it in and they will "take a look at it". About a week or two later, I get an email from the rep stating that they "examined" the knife and deemed that it was "within their tolerances", but that they would replace it for me anyways. (Mind you, any asshole could have picked up that knife and immediately come to the conclusion that it was all fucked up and defective). At this point I was like, "Don't do me any fucking favors! You guys can keep the fucking knife for all I care". It was plain as day the knife was not up to spec, however they just wanted to be assholes about it but then make it seem like they were making this big fucking exception replacing this obviously defective knife for me, like they're doing me some giant fucking favor! Yeah right! I just couldn't believe how unwilling they were to ever own up to ANY of THEIR mistakes, and if that weren't bad enough, they always were trying to find a way to flip it around and put the burden or blame on the customer! NEVER have I dealt with such a scumbag company!Anyways, after finally getting my knife back from them, I was angry, hurt, offended, and just plain old disgusted! I'm all done with Spyderco! After my experience, I did some homework and started to find lots of other people were having bad experiences with Spyderco as well, some even far worse than mine! So apparently it wasn't just a freak event or something. Either way, I'll never be doing business with Spyderco again! Their knives are nothing more than over-priced, foreign made junk with "Made in USA" price-tags. And they're ugly to boot!

Good review. I was thinking about getting one, but after this review I'll go with a slimmer knife. The pictures online don't give a good indication about how beefy that thing is.

Cool to see a knife review from you. Would love to own this knife as a part of my collection but it wouldn't be something I EDC every day. Just bought a Benchmade 710 that's about the same overall length and much more suited for every day tasks.

wow its beautiful great looking knife

skallagrim should be in the next skyrim and be a blade master because he's a badass

Excellent review! Thank You Sir!

Been using Massdrop a long time, great service!

not a big fan of spydercos except the delica i love that knife and i was interested in this knife because i thought it was carbon fiber and alot slimmer then what it actually is this knife reminds me of some long italian switch blade maybe that what they were going for but i agree its deffenately a collector knife

So we know people have made changes to their products based on Matt's suggestions at Schola, but has anyone done the same with your suggestions yet? I think a lot of these knives and so on would really benefit from doing so.

It's a beautiful knife.

You should make a video, reviewing some budget but effective pommels, I'm low on money, but one has the desire to end their opponents rightly.

Ever considered being a hand model? You seem to have steady hands and patience.

This is probably the best looking Spyderco I have seen. Too bad its so expensive and kind of pointless.

If I had to guess, in my opinion it's a self defense knife, and the slippery handscales are a design error. I'm no expert on knifes (in fact i know between nothing and jack shit), almost all i know was learnt in Skall's videos, but given how thick it is for a folding knife and the point shape/grind/geometry, it sounds like the most logical assumption.

Not really a fan of folders for anything other than opening boxes, but that is a really nice one.

If you take it and stab it into something the thick spine makes a giant triangular shaped hole. Makes me think of a rondel dagger or a stilleto lol. Also yes its smooth but if you have large strong hands its no big deal. If you put your pinky behind the butt while gripping it there's no way you can slip even if you have weak hands.

Not a fan of Spyderco knives, but this one looks really nice.

It's on my "to buy" list, but I'll have to get the Roc and a Yojimbo2 first. I love Spydies ^_^

I just started to look at Mass Drop, they have some pretty cool deals from time to time. The Vallotton is a very nice knife, and I have considered getting one from time to time, but in the end, I guess it is just not quite my style.

Couldn't help but think of my ZT 0452CF as I watched this. Skall, if you see this I'd love to hear your thoughts because it seems like it might have a few qualities that you would have liked in that spyderco. Still a great looking blade though.

Hey Skall, I've been wanting to get a Spyderco folder for a while now and I'm torn between the Vallotton and the Manix2 XL. I'd like a functional edc knife, that is durable, is relatively easy to maintain, and that is pleasing to the eye. These two are my finalists, and I thought that I'd get your input on it (since knives/swords/firearms seem to be your forte). Thank you in advance for any advice that you choose to give me, and I love your videos!

I will have to disagree on one thing, I don't like multi position clips on hunting knives, it give holes for blood to get into and poking out 9 holes every time you get home isn't the most fun. I currently use a buck 110 as a hunter, no holes, but when choosing a knife, little blood collecting areas are things I like to avoid.

Eh... it's okay I suppose. When it comes to folding knives, I'll never go with anything but a Cold Steel knife with the Tri-Lock locking mechanism. You simply can't beat Cold Steel for folders.

warriors and wonders is like crack for me. I used to have a Hungarian style spyderco that was the same price as this one but it fell out of my pocket somewhere. also had a spyderco that had the hook on the top for opening on your pants pocket as you take it out also fell out of my pocket. since got rid of those jeans.

Why not have a big ol’ thick knife? The fact the spine is so thick is what makes this one of the only Spyderco knives I like. It is old school meets new... Stop thinking all knives have to be the same.

dude you should totally review cold steel espada xl

I would love to hear a Kiku Matsuda knife review :)

It has a "too thick blade" and is "overbuilt" for a reason. It makes the knife a work of art FIRST, a cutting utensil = second. This is one of my top knives out of over my 250. As you stated it is as good as it gets for production type knives. Its fit-n-finish = flawless. I disagree it should have clip holes on the bolster sides. It takes away from the beauty. Pretty bolster, but ugly holes, my only negative about the thing. Not all knives need to be practical. Like a pink cadillac, we'll just park her out back and stare. I do agree that, I too took the clip off. So if you took yours off also...why have FOUR possible positions? It just adds ugly holes, where 99% of people arent going to carry it tip-DOWN anyway. and 75% SHOULD take the clip OFF like us. Nice review in general though.

It's so thick and strong, except for the tiny linear lock.

Skaaaaall. I know you're not a fan of Cold Steel, but could you do a review of their Tai Pan 3V? Looks like a nice knife.

skalla, i suggest you the buck tops csar. it is a great folding.

Very handsome.

this knife is now around 240 us and not in stock ANYWHERE

I don't like spyderco but this one look great!

Hey skallagrim did you ever a good mold to use that ballistic gel ?

Got it, love it. i collect spydercos

Definitely needs some deep texture on the scales before I would consider carrying it for a fighting knife.

As of 31/08/2015(Aprox.) Massdrop doesn't ship knives to Canada, or outside of the USA at all for that matter. Super disappointing, as I had just started buying knives from them right before they changed their shipping policies.

You should try the Spyderco yojimbo.

Can you do a vid on carving. I wanna learn how to do that so I can make my own wand.

nice blade

As much as I actually love this knife, its price point for a knife made in Taiwan is bothersome. Especially in 2022 where its getting close to $300

dude if you get a chance try the spyderco para3. It does cost as much as the hanwei blunt norman sword but imho it was worth it!

Please do a review on a Bob Kramer knife!

i expected a better polish on the blade at least 2k-3k grit if you want you can polish it, i polish all my blades i like them shiny :D

next knife review could you review a kramabit if you haven't already

would you ever consider reviewing something like a Mora knive a or a cheaper buck, reason I ask is two fold A as a potential starter I'm gonna go for.. wel starter knives. B because something like a Mora Companion Heavy Duty or a BuckLite MAX Large are realy the only starterblades you can get over here in this part of europe other than the always present cold steel.

So the verdict may well be to wait for the inevitable mini version?

it's beautiful

Spyderco knives are generally rated as hipster knives for me. Fancy materials but faced with some serious work they fail and break.

Do a review of the HF blade

who makes your favorite folders n what are your some of the favorites you've owned

Have you thought about doing a few firearm review videos that are similar to your knife reviews?

Pocket knives aren't big enough to make effective covers anyway, what good would a guard do you in a fight?

I just wish Spyderco knives weren't so ugly!

Would it be fine if it was so thick but was fixed blade knife? From what i undestand it's that if you want folding knife you don't want thick ass blade right?

I got a clone from China, to risky with our customs apart from the scales (which are less slippery than the original) its virtually indistinguishable.

I will give you citizenship in freedom land for that blade.

Hey Skallagrim, I am looking for a nice sharp pocket knife that's not to expensive. What knife would you recommend for a max budget of 50 - 60 dollars?

@Skallagrim you're still working on that caveman bat?