Hey, wait a minute. What's that Spyderco doing with a Benchmade logo on it?

This is actually the Benchmade Vex, a "budget" liner lock folder of yesteryear from the Big B with an admittedly very Spyderco-esque thumb opening hole in it. Although, insofar as I'm able to determine there was no collaboration between the two on this.

The marketing blurb for this knife did bang on a bit, but what it talked about were the "innovative firsts" of a finger-notched pocket clip, and a titanium nitride coating on the blade. And verily, those it has got. But they didn't mention the hole.

You may have already had that other Benchmade folder with the thumb hole in it come to your mind, the Griptillian. I think they were going for sort of a similar angle with this, but with a much cheaper bill of materials. The Griptillian, still available, sells for about $160. But back when the Vex was available, it had an MSRP of only $42.

That's quite a gulf, and for your money (or lack thereof) you lose the Axis lock, instead replacing it with a normal liner lock mechanism, and the Griptillian's S30V blade. The Vex has a ho-hum 8Cr14MoV blade, which Benchmade went to great pains to point out at the time is "comparable to many other manufacturers' top steel." That's... certainly a statement. One which I suspect quite a few will disagree. But the 8cr blade will at least take a very good edge (albeit maybe not hold it forever) and should be quite a bit more corrosion resistant than the likes of, say, D2.

The beating around the bush in the marketing literature was surely because this is one of Benchmade's "red box" knives: the made in China ones. Red card, actually -- mine was in a blister pack when I bought it and didn't even come in a box.

Benchmade has given up on the Oriental outsourcing bid and in the interim have tried very hard to memory-hole the entirety of the red box era. Not a single reference to it remains in any of their marketing or on their web site, most especially on their page which describes what all their box color classes are. Every entry from the red box series is now also thoroughly discontinued, and have unsurprisingly failed to accumulate any kind of collector's value like Benchmade's other legacy models.

Interestingly, several Benchmade catalogs still exist to be found on the internet, if you look hard enough, which admit to the existence of the red box class. You can check this 2007 catalog here, for instance, which contains not only the debut of the Vex (page 37) but also my beloved Model 32 Mini Morpho (page 25). But by the 2010 model year, the entire red box lineup had already been poleaxed.

Further documentation about it is tough to find. The model 10400 Pika was certainly the most prolific of the bunch, becoming common enough back in the day to even make a brief retail appearance at big box sporting goods stores. The entire situation is firmly in Mandela Effect territory by now, though; A lot of people don't remember -- or believe -- that it ever happened. Surely Benchmade never contracted any of their manufacturing to China!

Well, they did. Here's one of the results, just as bold as brass.

The blade on this is a serviceable drop point, and does have one unusual detail in that the spine is very rounded, with a slick smooth feel over all of it, even the part with the jimping notches in it. The edge does have a slight but plainly visible belly.

The Vex otherwise has checkered G10 scales similar to many other knives over steel liners. It's right in that full size EDC sort of class, weighing in at 132.6 grams (4.68 oz) and it's 7-9/16" long open with a roughly 3-1/4" blade, roundabout 3-1/8" of which is usable. It's just a hair under 4-3/8 long when closed, and precisely 1/2" thick not including the clip.

The clip has those two finger notches in it which are certainly there, and your fingers will settle into them whether you want them to or not, but if you ask me they're spaced apart just a little too much. The clip is reversible, but tip down carry is the only option. It's not deep carry, either -- a good 5/8" or so of the knife will stick up above the hem of your pocket when it's clipped.

As is tradition, here is the ever present, ever lurking comparison to the Kershaw/Emerson CQC-6K, my normal EDC. I haven't used my Vex much, which brings about the interesting detail in how faded the G10 scales are on my CQC.

The Inevitable Conclusion

For some reason, people really hated the Vex when it came out. You couldn't mention it anywhere online without a dozen people jumping down your throat saying "just get a Griptillian instead!!!!!" From what I could tell, nobody liked the thumb hole, nobody liked the liner lock, nobody liked the pocket clip, and nobody liked that it was made in China. I strongly suspect, however, that what actually happened was that nobody liked knowing they'd paid $150+ for their Griptillian when this close-run contender was suddenly available for less than a quarter of the price. But the Vex was a veritable flash in the pan and is now discontinued, along with the rest of its brethren, whereas the Griptillian isn't. Make of that what you will.

I don't hate the Vex, despite its silly pocket clip. Although there isn't much about it that makes me love it, either. I guess the main reason I don't carry it more often is because it doesn't really do much of anything special. It's just A Knife and doesn't pack in any gimmick, it hasn't got a trick deployment mechanism, it's not valuable, it's not collectible, and while the build quality is perfectly solid it doesn't really present any uniquely outstanding look or feel, either. It's inoffensive, not innovative. It's just a safe play with no risks; a sponge cake with no flavor. But sometimes that's okay.