Cold Steel Rajah II

[Richard Simmons]

Pretty much impractical in the extreme but couldn't resist a bargain. Stopped by a little antique mall today, besides the usual stuff they have several vendors that tend to have knives on a regular basis and found a CS Rajah II, LNIB for $45.00.

I'm not a big fan of Cold Steel but given that this model sells for close to 2x that much I figured it was worth checking out.

http://www.knifeworks.com/coldsteelrajahiigrivoryhandleplainedge.aspx

Don't have a camera at the moment but the link posted above will give you some details.

This think is huge!. The handle allows for several grip variations. It's a bit awkward to open one handed but once you do it's rock solid with no bladeplay. Mine shows virtually now wear at all though it won't cut paper smoothly. It's either been used enough to dull it or wasn't sharpened well from the factory. Edge doesn't show any signs of sharpening other than factory edge.

More or less a folding Kukri. Will it end up in my EDC rotation? Probably not. Likely it won't see much use though I will get the edge up to par by the end of today. Still it is pretty cool and for the price I do think it was too good to pass up. Part of collecting, at least for me is variety and this is definitely that.

[Solidus-snake]

Looks like a more practical version of their Spartan knife that my brother owns and EDC's. His knife is just plain riduculous, but it matches his personality lol

Have you by chance handled or bought their AK47 folder?

[Richard Simmons]

Looks like a more practical version of their Spartan knife that my brother owns and EDC's. His knife is just plain riduculous, but it matches his personality lol

Have you by chance handled or bought their AK47 folder?

Not yet. I've seen some good reviews on it but haven't handled on yet. The first Cold Steel I bought wasn the American Lawman. The blade was profiled at two different angles and it didn't fit my hand very well. I corrected/reprofiled the edge and gifted it to my son inlaw.

Used the magic marker trick on the Rajah II and found that it too has the edge set at two different angles so It's getting reprofiled as well. Only two knives so far but CS needs to look at their QC when it comes to setting the angle on their blades.

[AK-J]

I had heard that Cold Steel had some issues with QC a couple of years ago. It sounds like you might have stumbled upon some of those. However, my older knives from them (a decade or more) and my newest knife from them (bought last spring) have been scary sharp from the factory.

The knives I wasn't happy with how they profiled the edge (looked like a drunken ape was working the machine) were a Ontario Knife Company USMC Bayonet and a Pro Tool Company Camp Utility Knife. Both are made of good steel in the USA, and now both of them have very keen edges that stay that way for a long time. It's just that if I was going to have to re-profile the edge, I'd rather work with something that didn't have the edge on it from the start.