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Spyderco is a company, founded in 1978 and based in Golden, Colorado, U.S.A., that produces a wide variety of high quality knives, including, but not limited to everyday carry pocket knives, rescue knives, diving knives, combat knives, kitchen knives, and sharpeners.
Products
Spyderco knives are regarded as high quality, heavy duty knives made for professionals. Spyderco knives are designed by the founder of Spyderco, Sal Glesser, his son, Eric Glesser, as well as many custom knife makers with which Spyderco has collaborated. (See #Collaborations.)
Spyderco knives are considered "purpose-built knives" and are made with the customer in mind, using high quality steel and materials. Due to the fact that Spyderco knives are purpose-built, they tend to cover a vast array of knife configurations, blade types, and use of steel.
Many Spyderco knives find their way into the hands of law enforcement officers, firefighters, emergency medical services, military personnel, and people whose jobs include the use of a knife like fishermen and technicians.
Most Spyderco knives are folding knives, with a variety of locking systems, including the compression lock, front lock, back lock, liner lock, and ball lock. However, Spyderco also makes some fixed blade, self-defense, and combat knives, as well as kitchen knives. Spyderco's standard folding knives are the company's most recognizable product. These knives are typically single-bladed knives, capable of being opened with one hand. Spyderco pioneered and trademarked * the now popular concept of a hole in the blade of the knife, which allows the catching of one's thumb against the hole in order to open the knife.
Additionally, Spyderco was the first company to produce knives with a pocket clip, allowing the knife to be attached to the edge of a pocket for easy access.
Most of Spyderco's knives are made with a "plain edge," a "combination edge," or a serrated "Spyder Edge" (the company's serration pattern, incorporating two small serrations for every one large one) configuration.
Clipit Models
- C01 Worker--first made in 1981
- C02 Mariner--first made in 1982
- C03 Hunter--first made in 1983
- C04 Executive--first made in 1983
- C05 Standard--first made in 1984
- C07 Police--first made in 1984
- C07A(Aluminum handle)--made in 1989
- C07Ti(Titanium handle)--made in 1992
- C07BK(Black-Ti coated)--made in 1992
- C07ATU(Aluminum handle coated with Tufram)--made in 1993
- C08 Harpy--first made in 1987
- C09 CoPilot--first made in 1987
- C10 Endura--first made in 1990
- C11 Delica--first made in 1990
- C12 Civilian--first made in 1990
- C13 Pro-Hunter/Pro-Venator--first made in 1991
- C14 Rescue--first made in 1990
- C15 Bob Terzuola--first made in 1990
- C16 Wayne Goddard--first made in 1991
- C17 Catcherman--first made in 1992
- C18 Wayne Goddard Jr.--first made in 1992
- C19 Bob Terzoula Jr.--first made in 1993
- C20 Baby Wayne Goddard--first made in 1993
- C21 Merlin--frist made in 1993
- C22 Michael Walker--first made in 1994
- C23 Renegade--first made in 1995
- C24 Black Hawk--first made in 1993
- C25 Frank Centofante JR.--first made in 1994
- C26 Snap-it--first made in 1993
- C27 Jess Horn--first made in 1994
- C28 Dragonfly--first made in 1994
Collaborations
Spyderco has collaborated with numerous custom knife makers, making it possible to own a custom made knife at a fraction of the cost.
Steel Pionneers
- Spyderco is the first company to use Powder Metallurgy Steel from Crucible (S60V) in a production knife since 1994.
- The use of cobalt (1.5%) vanadium steel VG-10 on their japanese high end knives. First seen on their Bill Moran collaboration back in 1995.
- Spring run knives with the new ZDP189 steel, a 3% carbon steel provided by Hitachi.
- H1 steel is a nitrogen self hardened steel impervious to salt water and with a hardness of 68HRC measured on the serrations.
List of Collaborators
- Tim Wegner
- Peter Herbst
- Tim Zowada
- D'Alton Holder
- JD Smith
- Eduard Bradichansky
- Massad Ayoob
- James A. Keating
- Bram Frank
- Ed Scott
- Warren Thomas
- Bob Lum
- Ed Schempp
- Bob Terzuola
- Wayne Goddard
- Michael Walker
- Frank Centofante
- Jess Horn
- Michael Walker
- Jot Singh Khalsa
- Howard Viele
- Fred Perrin
- Tim Wegner
- R.J. Martin
- Laci Szabo
- Alexandru Diaconescu
Sprint Runs
Spyderco often produces limited edition models, referred to as sprint runs. These limited runs are generally versions of discontinued models with different blade and handle materials, though some are completely new models, such as the Kopa; a "dress knife" with several variants, each with a different handle material such as micarta, evrina, and tiger coral.
Sprint runs are generally no more than 1500 pieces and become highly sought-after collector's items.
Byrd
Because Spyderco knives are not "cheap" due to design and use of materials, Spyderco decided to design and produce knives under the Byrd brand. These knives use slightly lower quality materials than the "mainstream" Spyderco knives and are manufactured in China, allowing much lower prices while retaining most of Spyderco's quality. To differentiate the brands, Byrd knives have a "comet" shaped opening hole in the blade, rather than round hole found on Spyderco models.
To date, Byrd knives have featured 8Cr13MoV exclusively as their blade steel. Early Byrd knives were marked 440C, but tests found that the steel was something entirely different from American 440C. This steel was closer to AUS-8 than American 440C, and also went by the name 8Cr13MoV.
The first Byrd models, the Cara Cara, Meadowlark, Flight, Pelican, and Crossbill, initially featured stainless steel handles. This is likely because company owner Sal Glesser believes "'basic stainless' is ... the best way to test a 'pattern design'. Function and * are easily determined without the 'influence' of material." Newer Byrds have featured aluminum and G10 handles.
External links
"Spyderco"