{"id":29342,"date":"2025-04-30T00:01:43","date_gmt":"2025-04-30T07:01:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/?p=29342"},"modified":"2025-03-20T06:13:54","modified_gmt":"2025-03-20T13:13:54","slug":"bucks-cold-steel-and-chinese-vs-us-quality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/2025\/04\/30\/bucks-cold-steel-and-chinese-vs-us-quality\/","title":{"rendered":"Buck, Cold Steel, and Chinese vs US Quality"},"content":{"rendered":"
By Joe Berk<\/h6>\n

The pocketknife craze continues unabated, and I am finding that in my collecting I am stabilizing around the idea of the large folding hunter style knife.\u00a0 These are commonly referred to as a Buck knife, even though many similar available knives are not manufactured by Buck.<\/p>\n

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A Cold Steel Ranch Boss II (top) and a Buck 110 (bottom). The Cold Steel is a big knife.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Don’t get the word Buck confused with deer hunting, as if someone armed with a Buck knife is going to chase down Bambi for a knife fight.\u00a0 The “Buck” in Buck Knife is actually the name of the man who founded the company, and that company is in Post Falls, Idaho (a stone’s throw from the Canadian border).\u00a0 I know that because I recently chatted with a guy there.<\/p>\n

What most of us think of when we think of a Buck knife is the Buck 110, the classic folding hunter knife style.\u00a0 \u00a0The idea Buck had back in the early 1960s was to create a folding knife (like a pocketknife) that could do the same thing as a fixed blade hunting knife.\u00a0 Buck envisioned a folder with a thicker 3.75-inch-long blade that locked securely in place when opened.\u00a0 The concept was that it would be able to do things a hunting knife could do (like skin and dress game animals).\u00a0 The Buck 110 style (the large folding hunter) has been widely copied and the term “Buck knife” is often used describe any large folding knife (like Kleenex is used for tissues and Xerox means making a copy).<\/p>\n

I like the Buck 110 a lot and I’ve written about my custom Buck<\/a> before, so when I recently saw an ad for an “automatic” Buck 110, I was hooked.\u00a0 An automatic knife is what we used to call a switchblade.\u00a0 You know, like in West Side Story<\/em>.\u00a0 That would be cool.\u00a0 I liked that movie and I always wanted a switchblade.\u00a0 The automatic Buck 110 would scratch that itch.\u00a0 \u00a0When I received an email from Chicago Knife Works offering the Buck 110 automatic for a measly $153, I was in.<\/p>\n

A week later my switchblade arrived.\u00a0 I wasn’t happy with it.\u00a0 The bolster cutouts around the blade lock had tool marks.\u00a0 They weren’t mirror polished like they are on my other Bucks.\u00a0 It bothered me, so I called Buck Knife’s customer service.<\/p>\n

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Tool marks on the Buck 110 automatic. You might expect this on a cheap knife, but not on a Buck.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The guy I spoke to at Buck knew exactly what I was talking about.\u00a0 Buck changed their manufacturing process to remove cost and that’s why the tool marks were there (evidently, I wasn’t the first guy to call with this concern).\u00a0 I get it.\u00a0 I’m a guy who spent a career finding ways to reduce manufacturing costs in products ranging from bombs to biomedical devices, so I understood.\u00a0 But there was still this nagging problem:\u00a0 I spent $153 on the Buck and I wasn’t happy.\u00a0 The Buck guy understood that completely without my being a dick about it.\u00a0 “Send it back in to us,” he said, “and I’ll get it polished out.”\u00a0 They’re going to engrave my initials on the blade, too.\u00a0 That’s cool.\u00a0 A personalized switchblade.\u00a0 I felt even better when I went on the Chicago Knife website later that day and learned they had bumped the price of the knife I just bought from $153 to $199.\u00a0 Wow.\u00a0 It’s those Idaho tariffs, I guess.<\/p>\n

The fact that I like pocketknives is out there now.\u00a0 Siri has been listening and I’ve been on a lot of knife websites.\u00a0 I get emails every day from companies selling knives.<\/p>\n

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The Ranch Boss<\/a> II knife. It has a nice look and feel. I like it.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

One of the emails that caught my attention was from good buddy Jeff Bezos.\u00a0 It was for a Cold Steel Ranch Boss<\/a> II that looked a lot like a Buck.\u00a0 I guess I missed the Ranch Boss I (I came to the pocketknife craze late in life).\u00a0 The Ranch Boss<\/a>.\u00a0 I like the name.\u00a0 I especially like the price: $39.\u00a0 \u00a0Cold Steel.\u00a0 I like that name, too.\u00a0 There is a unit in the US Army (Charlie Company, 1st Battalion, 6th Infantry Regiment) called Cold Steel Charlie, so named for their heroism and lethality.\u00a0 The marketing guys at Cold Steel ought to get a raise for that bit of branding genius.\u00a0 It sure worked its magic on me.<\/p>\n

Amazon didn’t try to hide that the Cold Steel Ranch Boss<\/a> II is manufactured in China.\u00a0 That didn’t bother me.\u00a0 I know from my CSC days and my many visits to Zongshen, Zebra, and other Chinese companies that there are companies in China making good products.\u00a0 The Ranch Boss<\/a>.\u00a0 It has a John Wayne vibe.\u00a0 I could be a Ranch Boss.\u00a0 The Marlboro Man theme song played in my head.\u00a0 Ranch Boss<\/a>.\u00a0 Yep, that’s me.<\/p>\n

In the email and on Amazon, the Ranch Boss<\/a> looked like a big, heavy folding hunter.\u00a0 $39.\u00a0 Complete with holster.\u00a0 Man, $39.\u00a0 That’s a sandwich with a beer these days.\u00a0 Buy now, and I could have it the next day.\u00a0 Yeah, it’s Chinese, and a real Buck is made in Idaho, but hey: $39.\u00a0 Buy now, Baby!<\/p>\n

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The Ranch Boss<\/a> II knife is sold with and without the case. When I bought mine, the price with the case was a few bucks cheaper than the one without the case.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

My Cold Steel Ranch Boss<\/a> folding hunter was on my doorstep when Susie and I returned after our Jameson Motorcycle Museum 800-mile weekend.\u00a0 That’s one the porch pirates missed.<\/p>\n

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The spring-loaded liner lock. When the blade is opened, the liner lock moves over to prevent it from closing. To close the knife, the liner lock is pushed out of the blade’s way. You need to be careful when doing this.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

You know, the Ranch Boss<\/a> is a nice knife.\u00a0 It looks and feels good.\u00a0 It’s actually slightly larger than the Buck 110.\u00a0 It uses a liner lock instead of the Buck 110 lock design.\u00a0 The thing is sharp, as in razor sharp.\u00a0 I like the looks of it.<\/p>\n

The finish on both the Buck and the Ranch Boss<\/a> is brushed stainless steel.\u00a0 I like that look.\u00a0 The Buck has polished brass bolsters; the Ranch Boss<\/a> bolsters are the same brushed stainless steel as the rest of the knife.<\/p>\n

The Buck 110 scales are real ebony wood.\u00a0 They are riveted in place with brass rivets.\u00a0 \u00a0The Ranch Boss<\/a> scales are fake sawn bone.\u00a0 I imagine there’s a single supplier providing this material to several knife makers.\u00a0 I recently picked up an ultra-inexpensive pair of Old Timer Chinese-manufactured pocketknives at (where else?) Walmart.\u00a0 They were only $25, and the scales on those two knives look identical to those on the Ranch Boss<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Walmart Old Timer pocketknives, sold as a set for around $25. That little one is in my pocket all the time now.\u00a0 The scales are identical to the Ranch Boss.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I like that the Ranch Boss<\/a> scales are secured with little Allen bolts instead of rivets.\u00a0 If I want to craft a set of custom scales of maple or walnut to match one of my six shooters, it will be easier to do than on the Buck.\u00a0 A real Ranch Boss has to be properly attired, you know.<\/p>\n

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Cold Steel’s SK-5 blade material. The steel is Japanese; the knife is Chinese.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Buck’s standard blade material is 420HC, a tough, corrosion resistant steel that takes a good edge and is easy to sharpen.\u00a0 The Ranch Boss<\/a> knife blade is SK-5 steel, a Japanese steel that is well suited (or so I’ve read) for knife blades.\u00a0 It has good durability and abrasion resistance, and is generally corrosion resistant.\u00a0 The SK in the designation stands for steel kougu<\/em>, which translates from the Japanese to “tool steel.”\u00a0 For my purposes, the differences in steels between the Ranch Boss<\/a> and the Buck are moot.\u00a0 I just like looking at the things.<\/p>\n

Both the Buck 110 and the Ranch Boss<\/a> are big knives, with the Ranch Boss being a bit larger than the Buck.\u00a0 \u00a0These are not really knives you carry around in your pocket.\u00a0 They’re cool.<\/p>\n

The bottom line here is that I like both knives.\u00a0 The Cold Steel Ranch Boss<\/a> II, at $39, is a lot of knife for not a lot of money.\u00a0 The quality of the Ranch Boss is better, in my opinion, than the Buck.\u00a0 But Buck is standing behind their product.\u00a0 I’m eager to see what my Buck 110 Automatic looks like when it is returned from the factory.\u00a0 I’ll let you know.<\/p>\n

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