Flare Folding and Pocket Knife Assisted Opening Tech Knife w/ 3.5 Inch Stainless Straight Edge Blade & Tactical Knife GRN Grip (FLA1001-CP), Black

Ok I ordered two of these after reading some of these reviews. After testing both and comparing them they fit the bill for what I was looking for. First of a lot of the cons people list I would say are very subjective on what you want the knife to do. The (GRN) glass filled nylon is extremely tough and chemical resistant this is not standard nylon or plastic. I wanted this feature because of the durability of it but mainly because of the weight. I have many other knives of higher quality but I wanted something that was a beater that didn’t weigh much. This knife is so lightweight you won’t notice it in your pocket even in your summer shorts. The deep pocket clip works great and the overall knife is durable. The locking feature is nice as a work or edc knife. You can deploy the knife easily with one hand closing it one handed is possible but not easily done compared to other knife designs. I’m personally ok with this as I don’t need one handed knife operation on the close so long as I can deploy it one handed. The blades were fairly sharp out of the package, but if you want razor sharp it will require sharpening. I know some guys feel the need to have the sharpest blade possible right out the box personally I don’t on my beater knives. The size of this is comparable to my Ontario Rat 1 my favorite pocket knife I can get a full grip on the knife and it has a 3.5 inch blade my preferred size on a pocket folder. Also I see a few reviews below that complain that they pressed the button and the knife didn’t deploy, let me be clear this is a axis lock that is not a button for automatic deployment. This knife is spring assisted so when you push the stud on the blade it deploys quickly and with authority. The ability to lock it is a nice feature and worked great on both knives I received. I also saw many people felt the handle was cheap and not durable I would argue the opposite and recommend you read a bit more in depth about glass filled nylon. I would say the biggest selling point really is the handle and how lightweight it is and at the price you won’t be upset if you break this , lose it or it’s stolen by your buddy or co worker. All in all I give it 5/5 stars as a great cost effective EDC or work knife.

This has been my everyday carry knife for several years now. Inexpensive but good quality

I bought this when I lost my first one. I figured that was the best way for me to find the missing first one. It took two weeks, but my method worked and now I have the old one for backup for when I lose this one. As mentioned in the title, the lock sucks. It loves to turn itself on when it's in your pocket. Sometimes you'll look before you try to open it, and it looks like it's off, but it's on. You go to pull out your knife and get to work... but the lock is on and you're standing there fumbling with your knife. I probably need to push it into the unlocked position and drop some glue in there, but I'm afraid to break it. I guess I could try that on my older one. Based on my observations on this one and the old knife, the problem will get worse with time. My guess is I'll get around to taking the 10 minutes to defeat the lock after stewing over it for a few more years. Now... that said, the knife is actually pretty great. For the money. I comes with a nice edge. It will take and hold a nice edge if you dull it up using it to cut just about anything you want (sealed amazon boxes, steaks, rope, salami, fuel lines, hard cheese.... hmm... maybe it could use a cleaning here and there too). I like the action on the assisted opening. It has a audible snap when it opens and there is no doubt about it being fully open. It doesn't open unless you want it to (assuming you checked the lock and turned it off even though it didn't look like it was on). Seriously though, I've never had it open when I didn't try to open it. Put your thumb on the stub, a quick little push, and it opens in a flash. All my complaining about the lock aside, if I lost this one (and the old one), I'd order a new one the same day. Heck, then in a couple weeks I could have THREE of them. I'll note that I bought the first one to replace a Flash II that I carried for many years. The Flash II was discontinued for some reason, but this knife is very similar and about half the price... though I never had "lock" issues with that Flash II. In case you were wondering, buying this knife will not help you find your old Flash II.

great knife, shape out of box - tight action will buy again

The good: Conceal carry: Like my other SOG knives (Salute, Salute mini, Traction), this one sits very deep in your pocket and the pocket clip is quite high. When you clip it on your pocket pretty much the only thing you can see is the pocket clip and the knife itself is invisible. Light like a feather: For how big this knife is, its weight surprises me. The knife is quite thick to say at least. However, it feels much lighter than most of the smaller knives with the same blade steel. I gotta hand it to that GRN handle and the simple internal structure. It doesn't drag down your pocket like many other knives even of smaller sizes. Just for reference, this knife feels like nothing (weight) when you compare it to Kershaw's CQC-4K and SOG's Salute Mini. The bad: Too stiff, typical SOG: As I mentioned before, I previously owned 3 SOG knives. All of those knives feel tight as hell when out of the box. I was hoping the assisted feature on this one improves that. Nope, unfortunately, not at all. When I got it out of the box I felt the same stiffness I felt on my other SOG folders. The only difference is the SAT feature does help to open the knife completely as soon as I overcome that initial opening resistance. Judging by my past experience with other SOGs, I have a hunch this one just has the same long break-in period, which I really hate for a knife. Again, my Kershaw CQC-4K run like butter out of the box and I needed no adjustment. I can accept a break-in period for a gun, you can go to the range and just shoot hundreds of bullets, but for a knife? Seriously, just open Netflix and watch at least 5 movies, and while you are doing that, keep opening and closing your SOG Flare. It should be half-way broke-in after 5 movies. Oh also, the stiffness really makes closing this knife harder than it should be. The size+the stiffness makes operating this knife out of the box by one hand quite challenging. Needs sharpening: This is kinda expected to be honest. I had to sharpen all of my SOG knives out of the box. It can cut paper, open boxes or do the job just fine. But it doesn't meet my standard for this price range, especially compared to other knives from other companies. The ugly: Blade play! I knew SOG has a bad reputation for having bad blade play. However, I have yet to experience that with my non-assisted SOG folders. Nevertheless, this one had quite a noticeable blade play when I opened it. I'm not sure if this is caused by the arc lock mechanism or other factors in the knife. I'll try to fix this issue by myself, but for an out of the box knife, this is unacceptable for this price. Frankly, I've owned some much cheaper knives by TAC Force and Mtech, and even those knives never had blade play. This knife, unfortunately, broke my "blade play virginity". MADE IN CHINA! Just kidding, I don't care where it's made. Knives labeled Made in China could be very good as well. BUT, keep in mind this knife, in particular, is by far not the best quality "Made in China" knife. Arguably not even a "good" "Made in China". About slightly below average quality for the price. Just my two cents. Hope this helps you guys as a reference before you buy it.

Perfect weight and can take a beating. Best bang for your buck knife. Fast opening and satisfying click.

holy moly. sog has been a trusted brand in the past. they should be embarrassed for the low quality of the mechanisms in this knife. will not even open one handed. tried using wd40 to no success. it is cheap and feels that way. one good thing. it is very light. and blade seems fine in a crunch. feels good in hand also. anyway returning it. but the price is okay for this low quality i guess.

Excellent pocket knife, very well made and sharp. I liked so much, I purchased 4 more for my son and 3 grand sons. It functioned very well using it to work on my camper and skin a deer.