Lion Steel ROK Framelock EDC Folding Knife, M390 Blade, Aluminum Handles, Made in Italy (Black)

I bought this model of the ROK and kept it for several months. I used it for many tasks from food prep, box cutting, scraping wood for kindling, and even banging on the blade spine to baton wood. It is one tough knife, and holds an edge for a very long time in M390 steel. The pocket clip is innovative, and works well. I think most people would like the this knife a lot. For me, though, the blade design and steel wasn't to my liking. I feel that M390 is too hard, requiring more than a simple stropping to return a dulled edge to shaving sharp. Usually I have to use a diamond stone just to touch up a M390 edge requiring significant metal removal. While in less hard steels I can either just strop it or use a fine natural Arkansas stone to repair damage. Lionsteel also probably felt that M390 was hard and less durable than their Sleipner and Niolox steels, so the ROK blade was designed thick. The blade has a very thick spine that extends almost to the point, with a thick, obtuse blade grind. So, the knife meets more resistance when cutting through material. Lionsteel's blades in Sleipner are designed with a thinner profile so that they glide through material much easier. Sure, M390 will cut rope all day long, but for me toughness is more important. For instance an important task in woodcraft/survival is cutting and scraping wood for fire making. Most times I will scrap a piece of wood 50 or more times to get enough shavings for a fire. M390, S30V, S35VN, CPM3V, Niolox, Sleipner, ect.......they all lose their razor edge and will no longer cleanly cut paper after just 20-30 wood scrapes. As far as I'm concerned, in real world tasks like that, their edge retention is pretty much on the same level, but I can restore a razor edge to steels like Sleipner, Niolox, or S35VN a heck of a lot faster and easier than M390. So, great knife, but I would have preferred Lionsteel design the knife around a less hard, tougher steel so that the blade profile was better. I love S35VN, and the newer LC200N looks very promising(just wish more manufacturers would jump on it).