Karen has been after me to check some of her Outdoor Edge knives for a while. Finally, I met up with her at the 21024 SHOT Show, and she showed me their line-up. Karen has been around the Outdoor World for a good while and does the marketing for a lot of outdoor companies, one of which is Outdoor Edge.
I haven’t done anything with Outdoor Edge, I bet, in maybe 10 years, so I was glad she invited me over to check them out. As you can imagine, they have some new knives since I last dealt with them.
I picked out three knives to test, so over the next month or two, I’ll be doing Product Reviews on them. Today, we’ll start with the first one, which is their 2.5” RazorEDC Lite. Let’s go over the features that it offers and see how it tested out.
Outdoor Edge RazorEDC Lite 2.5″ Knife
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If you like small EDC folders you ought to check it out, especially if you’re challenged on sharpening knives because it utilizes a replaceable blade system. Let me begin with a word of caution. Razor blade knives are super sharp and always slightly scare me. One slip, and it’s a cut to the bone. Now that I‘ve scared you to death, let’s proceed to the Product Review!
Let’s start with opening the box. Mine came with one extra blade. The closed knife is 3.5 inches long, the blade is 2.5 inches, and the overall length when open is 6 inches. It is opened by using thumb studs. Be careful when opening it because it will take a second push to open the blade so be sure your thumb doesn’t push against the backend of the blade in the opening process.
It is a smaller knife, but when opened, I still feel like I have a good grip on it due to the following features.
- Finger groove on the front of the handle.
- Slight finger groove on the back for your little finger.
- The thumb grooves on the spine, along with the thumb studs, further enhance your grip on the folder.
- Even though the handle feels smooth, for whatever reason, with the handle being constructed from glass-filled nylon with TPR (Thermoplastic Rubber) inserts it seems to offer an effective grip.
The blade has a drop point type of design. A little too much so for my taste for an EDC, but that seems like the trend nowadays that a lot of people favor. But the end of the spine is slightly tapered down, so it does have a good enough point for your stabbing jobs, which you encounter daily and need to perform with your EDC.
And of course, being a razor blade knife, it is therefore a replaceable blade knife. Mine came with one extra blade. To remove/replace the blade is simple. Push the button on the front left side of the handle and pull off the blade. Replace it with the new blade and push it until it snaps into place. It goes without saying that the blade is sharp as…. well, a razor.
Due to the heavier spine, you are not as likely to snap the blade as fast as on a Havalon knife. The Havalon blade is less supported and maybe thinner and can snap in half in the blink of an eye. I like that the Havalon blade is thinner because that makes it a better caping knife, but that is also the same characteristic that makes it snap easier. So, the 2.5 Outdoor Edge Razor Edge Lite is a better option if you want a smaller razor blade EDC.
The blade holder is crafted from black-oxide coated 420J2 stainless steel. This coating helps add protection against wear and corrosion.
The Outdoor Edge 2.5” RazorEDC Lite folder uses a backlock system to lock the blade in place. Mine locks firmly into place, and there is no wiggle room.
It has a one-position pocket clip that carries the knife point down. I noticed that on one of my larger Outdoor Edge folders, the pocket clip is reversible but it can do so since the clip is positioned to carry the knife tip up. Due to the curved design on the Outdoor Edge 2.5” RazorEDC Lite, it is not possible to place the pocket clip so it carries tip up. And it can’t be reversible being tip down because of the push button blade release. The button is in the way and prevents this from being possible.
If you’re in the market for a smaller EDC, then you ought to check out the Outdoor Edge 2.5” RazorEDC Lite especially if you can’t sharpen a knife and thereby need a replaceable razor-bladed knife.
The MSRP on the Outdoor Edge 2.5” RazorEDC Lite is $24.95 and as is usual, we will close with the specs.
SPECS
- Blade Steel: Japanese 420J2 stainless
- Blade Holder: Black-oxide coated 420J2 stainless steel
- Handle: Glass-filled nylon with TPR insets
- Blade Length: 2.5 in
- Overall Length: 6.0 in
About Tom Claycomb
Tom Claycomb has been an avid hunter/fisherman throughout his life as well as an outdoor writer with outdoor columns in the magazine Hunt Alaska, Bass Pro Shops, Bowhunter.net, and freelances for numerous magazines and newspapers. “To properly skin your animal, you will need a sharp knife. I have an e-article on Amazon Kindle titled Knife Sharpening #ad for $.99 if you’re having trouble.”
