Gerber Evo Jr. knife review

I've been carrying a pocket folding knife for quite awhile, and if you know me, I've lost a few. I finally got a cheap mini knife to hold in my back pocket, but the constant friction from sitting is wearing out my pants. So I've been looking for a larger knife with a clip. Just from browsing knife stores, I love the Mini Griptillian by Benchmade. But being a Benchmade knife, the couldn't justify the cost as I'm not sure if I'll lose that one too. Eventually, I found a slim knife at REI for under $20--the Gerber Evo Jr.

Appearance
This knife is a decent looking knife. Being slimmer, the knife looks quite streamlined. The blade is coated with what they call a titanium nitride, giving it a dark color. With the black holder, this looks similar to a tactical folding knife.

Construction
Now I've always steered clear of Gerber knives. Why? Maybe because I see it stocked in all kinds of stores--Target, Walmart, REI. But I never see a Gerber knife in a nice knife store. In there, you see Benchmade, CRKT, Spyderco. On the wall, you see the nice kitchen knives--Shun, Wustof, Henckels. But a Gerber? Well, I handled the display model and it feels decent enough. It's light, but that's because the handle is made of aluminum. Then to shave off even more weight, they put cut-outs in the handle pieces. Total weight is 1.8 ounces, barely heavier than my mini-Buck. I'll admit that the light weight makes it feel cheap, but it is solidly made. So it's a bit of give and take.

Blade is made of 440A stainless steel. Again, it's coated with titanium nitride, so it's supposedly more durable than regular 440 stainless steel. I'm not a metal expert, so I'll take their word for it. Blade length is 2.75". When closed it's 3.3", so it's barely longer than my Buck. However, when opened, the Evo Jr. is nearly 2" longer.

The knife has a thumb stud and a finger "tab" on the back of the blade for supposed one-handed openings. When open, the tab also doubles as a small finger guard. Like most pocket knifes, the blade is held locked open with a liner lock. This isn't an assisted-opening knife, so there's no lock when closed. A clip completes the knife.

Sharpness
Sharpness is pretty standard out of the box. I didn't really have to sharpen it right away. I opted for a fine edge instead of the straight edge so blade maintenance would be easier. I like to hone my knives every once in a while (on a kitchen knife honer, believe it or not). I sharpen all my knives at least once a year.

Thoughts
Overall, this is an acceptable knife. After using it for a while, I would say this knife to satisfy the casual pocket knife owners. I've owned several knives in my time and there were a few things I didn't like about the EVO Jr.

For one, the thumb stud is too close to the pivot point of the knife. This makes actually using the stud to open the knife very difficult with one hand. The leverage just isn't there. Then the tab on the back of the blade that's supposed to allow you to flick it open with your finger. That's a good idea, but the back of the handle has a gap where the two pieces come together and where the blade sits when closed. That gap has these harsh 90 degree handles, so when you "flick" the tab, your fingernail hits those edges. Not good if you flicked too hard. The display model didn't give me an issue, so it's might just be an issue of loosening the tension at the pivot point.

I don't like the clip position of this knife either. Clip is attached on the pivot end, meaning the knife is not in the correct orientation in my hand when I take it out of my pocket. I have to rotate the knife before I can open the blade. Small issue to some, big for me.

So these are the cons I found. Why did I get the knife then you ask? Well, it's cheap. If i lose it, big deal. I have, however, succeeded in keeping this knife around. I even bought another Gerber since then (don't like that as much). So I might just save up and get that Benchmade mini-Griptillian I wanted.