Boker Plus 02BO270 Gnome Fixed Blade Knife with 2 in. Straight Edge Blade, Green

Boker Gnome knife review by J. SawberryThis is a review of the Boker Plus (Voxknives) Gnome Knife with the green micarta handle, Boker model number 02BO270.What do I think of the Boker Gnome Knife? Love it, love it, just love it! This is the fabulous little brother to the fantastic Boker Rhino knife (see my review on it). This is now my new EDC neck knife and I wear it everyday.I think the first toy my mother must have given me as a baby was a knife for I have been playing with and using knives for as long as I can remember. (No, my parents did not really give me a knife as a baby, but I did have one by the time I was in grade school.) Growing up in the country I was raised to use a knife as a tool and became quite skilled with knives early on and now I would be considered highly skilled with knives.Now the reason I tell you this is not to brag but to qualify the following statement. I feel the Boker Gnome knife due to its size and potential for sharpness should only be used by a skilled knife person due to possible injury to oneself. This knife is sharp, has a very small handle and can slip out of your fingers if you get careless and cut you real bad very fast! Whew, it feels good to get that warning off my chest so now if you cut off your finger with your new Gnome knife and I can still sleep well at night.Now don't get me wrong, as I said I love this knife and would buy another one in a New York minute. So let's get down to the meat and potatoes of the knife.Fit and finish: The Boker Gnome knife I received was just simply a work of Art. The fit and finish was nothing less than Outstanding! It came shaving sharp right out of the box and the knife retention in the kydex sheath (second generation) was perfect (not too loose but not too tight). Now I know that others including myself have received poor quality Boker Voxknives (see my review on the Boker Rhino knife) but the "quality control switch" must have been turned on the day they made my Gnome knife for it is nothing less than a five star knife.Product Description and Specifications: As far as this goes Amazon they got the specs right on this knife in the description. The 12C27 stainless steel is a very good steel and has a Rockwell hardness of 58c-59c. The hollow ground blade measures 1 and 7/8 inch long for the cutting edge and is 1 and 1/16 inch wide at its fullest right in front of the blade guard. The blade along the spine at the handle/ blade junction is approximately 1/8 inch thick. The blade is highly polished and nicely done with the hollow ground part having a satin finish which compliments the overall look and is nicely done as well.The (notorious?) handle: Its two fingers small with "medium" fingers. (Sausage fingers need not apply; just get yourself an ESEE Junglas instead for Pete's sake. A big man needs a big knife!) The handle measures a whopping 1 and 3/4 inches long and is 7/8 of an inch at its widest point and is only 1/2 inch at its thickest point. If not for the substantial finger choil which takes up half of the small handle of this knife it would go flying out of your hand faster than a greased pig at a country fair! So, I hope that sums up handle size problem so let's mosey on to the scales themselves.The scales are nicely done in green canvas micarta with red spacers that make for a very attractive accent to the handle. The green micarta scales are pined on to the full tang blade by a set of two steel roll pins. Fit and finish of the pins were excellent. The larger end pin provides a great attachment point for a lanyard which I feel is a must for this small knife for much needed extra control of the knife. (Why Boker did not include a smaller version of the lanyard that comes on the Boker Rhino is beyond me.) I solved the lanyard problem by attaching a simple Chris Reeve style lanyard made out of safety orange colored (helps to find the knife should you lose it) paracord (four and 1/2 inches long including tail) to my Gnome knife and it really made a big difference in the control of the knife. (Tying instructions for a Chris Reeve style lanyard can easy be found by searching for it on the web.)The sheath: The black kydex sheath I received with my knife was of the second generation type and comes with a black ball type neck chain. It is more streamlined than the original version sheath and does not have the over retention problems found in some of the earlier versions. The sheath is of high quality construction and measures 3 and 1/8 inches at its longest and 1 and 7/8 inches at it's widest. The sheath is of the fold over sheath design and is fastened together by four grommets running the outside edge. The grommet holes will work with the Boker Mini Tek-Lok Belt Loop System. (I have one mounted to my Boker Rhino sheath and compared the alignment with the Gnome sheath.) It should be noted that the Mini Tek-lock is almost as big as the Gnome sheath should you choose to purchase one. The only down side to the sheath is that it has no drain hole. The same goes for the Boker Rhino sheath as well (Forgot to mention this fact in the Rhino review, sorry guys).Well, just like a warm blanket on a cold winter's night I think that covers things. I know this review was "Nutnfancy" but I hope you enjoyed it. Thanks for taking time to read it. I enjoyed writing it for you and as always check your local laws before you carry a knife. It's always better to stay out of trouble than to get out of trouble. Thanks again and have a great day!

I bought this Gnome because it was the least expensive way to get a kydex sheath for my Decade Edition Gnome. The sheath is a perfect fit.This 440c steel version is also worth every penny and I'm glad I own it. I put this one in the leather sheath the Decade Edition Gnome came with and put it in my pickup glove box. It has split quite a lot of shrink wrap and cut quite a lot of bailing twine. The edge is holding up better than expected. It arrived razor sharp and after cutting the shrink wrap off maybe 125 pallets of goods and opening maybe 300 hay bales, it touched up on a ceramic rod to a nice fine edge again in well under a minute. The short handle and the necessity to use the lanyard for grip takes some getting used to, but the Wharncliffe style blade is a great for general utility work.The Gnome knives are tiny. I normally carry a much larger blade, but sometimes I have to be around suit and tie sorts of folks and some of them get nervous when you deploy a 4 inch flipper. A little blade is sometimes the only way to have a knife handy without having to worry about someone being overly sensitive to the fact you have a knife.The kydex sheath that came with this is now on a mini-tek lok and I carry my decade edition gnome (carbon fiber scales and vg10 steel) left side cross draw when around the suit and tie or pantsuit sort of folks. It works well, and is barely noticeable.

After I finished writing this review, I decided to put this here, not because I wanted to start with the negative, but in case someone didn't want to read the entire review but wanted to know in what way the knife wasn't as advertised.)This knife was advertised as having 12C27 steel, but it came with 440C steel, and the blade is stamped with the steel type, "440-C."First of all, I should say that I really love this knife. I haven't had it for long, but it's been great so far, and I expect it to hold up well with use and proper care. Next, I should say it's a small knife. I think it's clear based on the description, but I'll add that just in case. It's a small knife, but I personally find the size to be excellent. I've always liked smaller knives, and in my normal everyday life, I almost never need something larger than 3 inches or so at most. I also like knives that have a thick spine. I've found that such knives hold up well and allow for heavier use than other knives of a similar length. The only downside to the thickness of the spine is when trying to cut strait down, like with cardboard. Because the blade's spine is so thick, it drags when cutting strait down through cardboard. It is great for slicing, and when you slice through cardboard rather than push down through it, it works very well. The knife also came very sharp strait out of the box, much more so than most every other knife I've had.The handle is also very good: it's comfortable, and gives you a surprisingly stable handle on the knife. It's probably reasonably a one and a half finger grip, but with my little hands if I really choke up on it, I can get two and a half fingers on it (I usually hold it with two fingers though). Interestingly enough, I don't usually like knives with a three finger grip; I just find it to be uncomfortable. This knife, however, is very comfortable to hold, even for relatively extended periods, and it doesn't feel awkward to hold onto. The curve where the finger is meant to rest provides a secure grip, and allows you to puncture without any real worry of your finger or hand sliding up and getting cut. The handle with the scales give a large enough area to hold onto comfortable, but it doesn't make the knife feel bulky when using or wearing it. The micarta handle scales fit well and there isn't any really noticeable seam between the tang and the scales. The red liners between the green micarta and the steel are also a nice aesthetic touch. The handle has two holes in it, one small and one larger. You might be able to get some gutted 550 paracord through the smaller hold, but I think it would be quite difficult. You could fit 3/32 cord through it though, for a size reference (I don't know if or why someone might want to put cord through the smaller hole, but I suppose someone may have a reason they might want to). I would assume that the larger hole is designed for adding a lanyard to the knife. I do currently have a little lanyard on the end of the knife. I started by using 550 paracord for the lanyard, but I found it uncomfortable to hold it. I decided to use gutted paracord for a lanyard, and it works much better. I honestly don't really like having the lanyard on the knife, but I decided to leave it there to see if it grew on me. I can also slide my pinky through the lanyard to get a more secure grip, but I don't know if I'll ultimately leave the lanyard on.It came with a kydex sheath. It fits very well, has a nice little click when putting the knife in the sheath, and is more than secure enough for me to feel comfortable wearing the knife in the sheath around my neck underneath my clothes. I'm not at all concerned that the knife may unintentionally fall out. The knife came with a black ball chain. I decided to make my own neck lanyard though. I started out with just putting some paracord with a sliding knot to be able to adjust the length, but I changed it to a different one of fixed length that would break away if too much pressure was put on it.Lastly, the part I was dissatisfied with. This knife was advertised as having 12C27 steel, but it had 440C steel. I understand that the two are very similar steels, and as far as function, are essentially the same. I was wanting the 12C27 steel in this knife, though, because I anted to be able to use both types of steel first hand to see if I noticed any differences and to see if I had a preference. I am happy with the 440C steel; it holds a decent edge, is very easy to sharpen, and takes a very fine edge, but I was bothered that it was advertised as something other than what it is. The biggest problem is, the main deciding factor in me choosing this model with the micarta handle scales over the model with the wooden handle scales was the steel I was interested in having for the blade. I did prefer the look of the model with the wooden scales more than the look of the micarta scales. If I had known of the steels being the same in the two of them, I may very well have decided to get the model with the wooden scales. I don't know if the model with the wooden scales came with a leather sheath or a kydex sheath, but I do prefer the kydex over the leather. I didn't decide to return the knife, as the steel wasn't a deal breaker for me by any means, but I was a little bit disappointed.The other thing I'd like to mention is that the knife arrived much sooner than I expected it to. I think it was estimated to take two weeks to arrive, but it arrived 4 or 5 days after I ordered it. After ordering it, I got a strange email that said something about expedited shipping (3 day shipping, I think it was), but the format of the email was a bit odd, and I wasn't positive what it was about. When it arrived so much sooner than estimated, I was very pleasantly surprised. It was a very nice thing of the seller, KNIFE PORT, to do, and I really appreciate them doing that.So, I am very pleased with the knife, and even though I haven't interacted with them directly, the seller, KNIFE PORT, seems to be a good seller on Amazon Marketplace. Hopefully a corrected description can be put on Amazon to avoid confusion in the future and minimize the potential for unnecessary dissatisfaction with future customers.

Belle lame bien épaisse, et de bonne qualité d'inox(12C27), prise en main agréable malgré la petite taille du manche. l'étui ne m'inspire pas confiance pour le port en tour de cou

Impressive little knife, it is now part of my EDC. It is so light and small that I simply carry it in my pocket and I don't notice it is there until I need it. Its construction is of very high quality, with a good steel (12C27) which is strong, corrosion resistant, holding a good sharp-as-a-razor edge for a long time and easy to sharpen (Note: easy to sharpen does not mean easy to loose its edge, it means that somebody with very little sharpening skills can sharpen this knife).The design is fantastic, with a good grip and good ergonomics that enable you to apply your whole body weight onto the blade on heavy duty cutting tasks (leather, wood, rope, plastic). The blade can take a great deal of abuse given its width to length ratio, shape and supreme steel quality. I use it for preparing food, peeling fruits and vegetables, chopping tomatoes and greens, cutting meat, also for miscellaneous tasks such as cutting climbing rope, opening envelopes and cardboard boxes, spreading peanut butter on bread, sharpening pencils, opening tins, producing wood shavings to make a fire when camping... all sorts of use and abuse. Its small size does not hinder in any way its extremely useful functionality.Questions that I had before buying:Is the price too expensive?, absolutely not, it is a fair price for the quality and functionality you get in return. This knife will become your favorite and will impress anybody if you choose to give it away as a present.Being made in China, does it mean its quality suffers?, absolutely not, the production process and quality control is German-approved, its got Boker's exceptional standards backing them and a limited life time warranty.Who is this knife for?, tool lovers, people who want to carry a reliable, good looking, well designed, compact, simple tool.Conclusion: Get one. Stone-age men used to carry a small sharpened flint which they used through the day for various purposes... this tool is the modern day equivalent, in a discreet, comfortable package.