Hey you piece of Crap!
What?
How’d you like a real knife for a change!
Instead of whatever titanium boutique bull turd you’re carrying to open inter office
correspondence at your desk.
What?
Do some work for a change!
Check out the Broken Skull!
Endorsed by the Texas Rattlesnake, Stone Cold Steve Austin!
You have something to say to him?
Featuring 4 inches of S35Vn super steel for under $100!
What?
A Kaleidoscope of expressive yet badass grippy G10 handle colors, the kick in the nuts power
of a Tri-Ad lock, a Jacked-AF ambidextrous stainless steel pocket clip, and they call
it the broken skull because it comes in at a Skull crunching… wait 3.28 ounces?
(Voice changes, music track stops).
That’s light….
(Voice in the distance) Ok man, they call it the broken skull because that’s his ranch.
But if you tell anyone I’ll break your skull.
How much land do you own anyway boy?
So the Cold Steel Broken skull in the most basic terms… translated for the sorts of
dudes who would watch a sort of dude like me review pocket knives… is a light weight
knife with a big ass blade made from high end steel.
Made for uhh… cutting things, like knives tend to do.
But how big and light you might ask, guy who’s favorite part tends to be the dimension part…
why let’s take a look at the overall length and weight.
It’s a Cold Steel that doesn’t carb load or take protein supplements.
Blade size and cutting edge.
Just your average bro who just uhh works.
A working man.
If you will.
Handle Size and grip area.
Not to be confused with the other Stone Cold Steel team up the Working man.
Spine Thickness and Handle thickness.
Totally different knife.
I’m just saying the Broken Skull is designed as a every day carry knife.
Tallnesses.
A knife for people who do non influencer related work.
First up the blade.
This isn’t a small knife.
However a fun fact you may not know is that Cold Steel does make small knives like the
Tuff Lite.
Although I wouldn’t want to spoil your big ass knife experience with something slightly
less than 100% whoop ass, so back to the Broken Skull.
It features a black coated 4 inch clip point blade that’s flat ground.
Now you might say Blade HQ says hollow.
And Stone Cold might say shut the hell up blade HQ.
I slid into a DM with CS and they confirmed my eyes were seeing a flat ground blade.
It used to have a CTS-XHP blade but now it’s been upgraded to S35VN.
Both are great steels, but I did see some internet complaining of people who loved the
CTS-XHP.
If you’re idea of a good time is reading Internet forums you can google S35VN vs CTS-XHP.
Or just watch the Cedric and Ada shootout between the two steels linked at the end and
in the description- both Cold Steel uhh steels.
XHP holds it’s edge a little longer and S35VN is more rust resistant.
It’d be nice if the Broken Skull were available in an uncoated blade hint hint.
Clip points are a very useful blade shape because of their piercing ability when skinning
possums.
The Handle and lockup.
The Broken Skull is so light mostly due to it’s handle design.
It is fairly thin handled, and linerless, the Tri-Ad lock sandwiched between two slabs
of grippy G10.
G10 you know is a fiber glass sort of material- or is a fiberglass material, that is strong
and can be textured to reduce slipping.
A thin handle rides in the pocket nicer than a thick handle, but some bros prefer big think
handles on their knives.
Often called palm swell.
The handle is large and ergonomic.
The G10 on the bottom edge is a little uhh, edgy, so you might want to knock it down a
touch with some fine grit sandpaper.
The Tri-Ad lock is the what the hell do you want?
Lock of knife locks.
It takes a pounding and whoops all the other locks asses, especially knife locks named
Vince McMahons.
After that it proceeds to drink all the beer in their fridges and burns down their houses.
Methaphorically speaking of course because assault, arson, and drinking beer that isn’t
yours are all crimes.
Tri-Ad locks are stiff to disengage, but are basically as reliable as the stunner at shutting
up all the shit talkers.
I’m sorry I don’t know what any of this really means other than I’ve been watching
a lot of Stone Cold on Youtube.
So flick open with a thumb stud, mash the damn button with your thumb and give it a
little flick down.
Truth be told I have been breaking in the lock quite a bit, and I loosened the pivot
a bit, and then put a few drops of a pivot enhancer to get it to fall down a bit better.
Since all the steel parts are coated with black paint, it does take a little usage to
get it broken in to rub off some of the paint.
The pocket clip.
Let’s set the scene it’s the 1996 King of the Ring Tournament and your pocket is
Jake the Snake, and Stone Cold is the pocket clip.
Normally the assistance of Gorilla Monsoon is needed to break apart those two objects,
but a good hard tug will do in this case.
You could run a touch of sandpaper under the clip or remove it and do some bending.
Or just deal with it like a man, and not worry about messing up your fancy little clothes.
The knife can be configured to the right or left pocket in a tip up fast deployment tactical
as hell configuration.
Comparisons.
First up a big old can of whoop ass.
However a light sorta compact for it’s size can.
A manageable can of whoop ass, if you will.
Good for large hands, medium size hands, and even small hands if you don’t whine about
every little thing.The G10 has a nice grippy hand feel, even in the wet.
Alright.
Now the AD-15.
The AD-15 is a great knife it’s much heavier though, like over twice as heavy and the Broken
skull technically has the longer blade and a strong lock, which would come in handy when
wrassling wild hogs to the death for your dinner.
For most people the Broken Skull is the best choice, although the AD15 looks cooler.
A lot of the broken skulls ability comes from the point multiplier the words broken skull,
cold steel, and Steve Austin give a knife they’re written on the blade of.
Sorry AD-15.
Now the Tuff Lite, small and legal more places because of it’s blade size.
This is a good compact every day carry, maybe you are opening envelops, and packages there’s
nothing wrong with bringing a knife like this- to keep from frightening co-workers.
Now the Benchmade Mini Onslaught.
This one is ok, still nice.
The handle is a little smooth and awkward, not bad, but I figured I needed something
else other than a Cold Steel in the Cold Steel video.
What else?
Cold Steel Spartan.
I don’t know which sounds more tactical honestly, I prefer the Broken Skulls functionality.
Are we good, we’re good.
Wrapping it up.
The broken still is a pretty freaking good every day carry blade for the money.
Cold Steel according to Cedric and Adas blade steel retention tests has a pretty solid performing
S35VN, and at a price point under other s35Vn offering from other knife makers.
The knife is also light weight, and a fairly decent slicer too.
The pocket clip is a bit tight for my tastes, and the broken skull prefers actual work to
fidgeting bullshit… as in there are faster deploying knives and easier knives to close
one handed… but it still ain’t bad.
As far as EDC point lock backs go there are a few others I own that are popular.
Like the Buck 110 which in the Brass in handle department always wins.
People like this, but I’d rather not carry a knife on my belt.
There’s also the Spyderco Endura 4.
I’m a little more partial to the aesthetics of this knife… but the Cold Steel has a
better steel.
Anyway thanks to Cold Steel for donating this knife to the channel for review.
Out of any Cold Steel I have- this is the most in line with my every day carry preferences.
Over 3 inch blade and under 4 ounces.
A grippier handle than the code 4.
So like subscribe, comment, thanks for watching.