Benchmade 950 RIFT: "Osborne Greatness" by Nutnfancy

The Rift should last a lifetime. It's an extremely well-made folder featuring a reverse tanto 154CM steel blade. Expect outstanding cutting performance from it: it penetrated 20 layers of cardboard with ease and had lots of edge left over afterwards. The steel is still an excellent choice these days and wears extremely well (especially with the perfected BM heat treat). Most steels have some limitations and this one's no different: 154CM steel will show rust in wet environments if it's neglected. The tip on the 950 Rift is strong but still capable of some precision work and the reverse tanto has surprisingly effective stabbing capability. The blade is handsome and provides outstanding belly for pretty much any task. My favorite finish of the Rift line is shown, the 950 model: the satin finished blade and black and charcoal sculpted G10 handle scales give a striking appearance. It has been offered in pure black G10 handles, with a combo edge, and BT black coatings. But the Rift shown is one of the coolest looking out-of-box folders I've seen. Overall ergonomics are good but take a few hits: the handle scales come with sharp shoulders (sanded and radiused in the knife shown), there is no jimping anywhere, the design lacks a meaningful thumb ramp or deep finger guard, and the handle scales offer only medium traction. In my book these design misses relegate the Rift to EDC and utility use where it will give great service. But many upsides combine to allow this Osborne design to achieve lasting excellence: the thumbstud is perfectly designed, easily accessed, and ambi; the knife deploys wicked fast (the previously-reviewed 950 SBK was an exception), lockup is tight and reliable even after much use, the long-wearing Axis lock is a joy to use and helps the speed, the knife comes out with a solid thwack (love that), open pillar design doesn't hold debris, a reversible and strong, blackened pocket clip (that thankfully is oriented tip up), pefect blade centering and in-handle retention, and the huge stop pin are all impressive. Weight is 4.8 ounces which is heavy in the EDC role (some competitive offerings are half that for same size blade). It could be made lightet by BM: like the 710 McHenry Williams should feature drilled out liners from the. The 950 Rift shown features my milled out liners to save about .4 oz (a factory job would save more); it was a disproportionate amount of work and the hardened 420J liners broke a carbide drill bit in the process! Value is moderate and like many other Benchmade knives the entrance fee to the Rift is relatively expensive. But Benchmade fans will understand the value which becomes more apparent, year after year, as the knife continues to soldier on without any problems and never wears out. ////////////////////////// Nutnfancy Likablity Scale: 8.5 out of 10 (with milled liners, aggressive jimping, priced less: 9.5 of 10) ////////////////////Music: www.partnersinrhyme.com

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[fatum77]

For some reason most of your videos have not been coming in my subscriptions and I just checked your home page to see if anything was new. The last 10 or so videos didn't show up. Funny thing is I ordered this knife (its still in the mail) and just found your review of it. Writing this while the video loads but just reading the description I think I made a good buy. Video is loaded now I will see for sure.

[nutnfancy]

@fatum77 We keep hearing that from people, and according to YouTube help, they are aware of the problem. Hopefully, they will fix it soon! -- Veri

[DutchOvnnn]

Hey nutn, I'm an ex-machinist, and I just wanted to give you a heads up that carbide drills are not meant to be run slow. They are hard, and brittle, they need speed to cut properly. And typically without lubrication because of heat shock. Lubricating carbide can be like heating up a piece of glass and tossing it in a bucket of ice water.  Looked like about a .5" bit, run the RPM at around 500 and take small, tapping pecks, should eat right through that hard stainless. Do not pre-drill.

[f0xmuld3r]

Regarding "jimping": I would say its more important that your finger under the blade can't slip? I mean: if you slip on top of the knife it's not that big of an issue as it it isn't sharp. But your finger slipping on the blade side? ouch!!

[Kylef7735]

@LWRCftw He said in his shot show review that he really digs the knife.

[IMBW89]

I love the Nutnfancy talking points, but the ONLY area where I would disagree with Nutn is on every knife needing jimping. Sometimes a knife is just built to fit your hand a certain way and jimping won't actually add anything useful to the design.

[LWRCftw]

hey nutn any thoughts on the Benchmade Bedlam plainedge?

[meuberepic]

if nutn made a knife that was under $200 i would buy it without any thought.

[AuthoritativeClick]

$160 / CF M4 2012 Forum Knife. $160.00 / 300 min order.

There is a Bencmade Forum knife going on right now Nutn, just a heads up.

[drmodestoesq]

@DutchOvnnn What about cobalt bits? I've had some success drilling through sheet stainless with cobalt bits. In addition, how about drilling a smaller hole and working your way up to your final diameter?

[Kylef7735]

@rogermaassen018 Same as this but in an auto version. the review would be the same.

[Kylef7735]

@f0xmuld3r Everything keeping your hand from moving foreward is important, that jimping up top helps keep your hand from moving on the bottom too.

[MaverickX87X]

I have been thrashing this knife for about a year now and its held up admirably. still rock solid lockup. I've bent the clip on it twice, but their service is awesome and they replace it and tune it up to spec for cost of shipping. This knife is definitely worth the cost. I've seen what osborne can do now, so I'm thinking about getting a 940 for carry when I'm not working.