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CRKT Pilar and Pilarge

CRKT Pilar, inexpensive and good? Or a knife what you can leave out? First of all, the knife could not catch me at first. Jesper Voxnaes gave me a Large (the bigger version) at the Blade Show 2019 in Atlanta. That’s why it scores very well with me – from a purely emotional point of view. I hope that my following judgement is still objective enough.

The design: Jesper Voxnæs.

Jesper is anything but a newbie in the knife scene. He has already designed for most major knife manufacturers. The Pilar definitely belongs to his “small and stubby” designs.

Does it have what it takes to be an Evergreen knife?

One of the first Youtube videos about the CRKT Pilar bears the date stamp 12.7.2017. Thus the Pilar is available in its basic version since more than 2 years.  Later, he put his hand on his design again and developed the large version. The Evergreen barometer says: Evergreen potential is clear  

Hot barometer on Instagram?

Absolutely! With far more than 5000 entries it is definitely total In(stagram). CRKTPilar auf Instagram  

Is there a story about the name or the design?

Jesper was inspired by Ernst Hemingway’s boat. Hemmingway, one of the most important writers of the 20th century, named his boat after his second wife Pauline. The two first had an affair, and according to legend Pauline’s code name was “Pilar”.  

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Design

Conclusion: Perfect! Jesper did pretty much everything right here. 5 percentage points deduction only because it could not catch me from the beginning.

Usability

Is it 42a compliant? (legal to carry in public in Germany)

No! The Pilar(ge) is a flipper or one-hand opener with a frame lock. It thus fulfils both characteristics, the one-handed opening via an opening aid and the locking mechanism.

Daily Carry check:

Both sizes are absolutely comfortable to carry. The stainless steel scales are not lightweight, but due to their lightweight construction they are not heavy. By the way, the clip can be moved on one side. That means from “tip down” to “tip up”.

easy to clean?

Absolutely! The blade is stainless. I didn’t test the more rust sensitive D2 version, but the blade has a coating. In my opinion, the stainless steel scales get a bit faster scratches than those made of G10 plastic.  

Scratches on the Scales

 

Practicable?

  • In the restaurant? the Pilar would be too small for me to cut a salad leaf with it halfway elegantly. (a steak works great by the way) The Large variant would be more suitable.
  • For lunch? The light hollow grinding always leaves a little more butter on the blade than I would have liked it to be with bread.
  • The apple was no problem for the short blade of the Pilar and Pilarge, but a piece of fruit quickly gets caught in the area between the handles.
  • Cut paper and cardboard into small pieces for the paper bin: The finger recess in the choil and handle let me guide the knife safely and even thick cardboard the small stubby creates without problems. This is certainly a strength of the stable Voxnaes design.
  CRKT Pilar Large vs Apfel

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Practicable

Conclusion: Deduction of points for the fact that there are several variants of the Pilar, but we are not allowed to carry any of them legally with us in Germany.

Price-performance ratio:

In short. Sensational. Here you can get an extremely awesome Voxnaes Framelock knife for less than 40 €.

Material variety:

If you are not satisfied with the 8Cr13MoV blade, you can upgrade to D2 with the Large. You have the choice between currently 4 different models.

Processing quality:

We have not intensively dealt with the processing of all models. But what we noticed:
  • The edge of the blade is sharpened evenly.
  • On some models the blade wasn’t centered.

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Price-performance ratio:

Conclusion: almost full score. Nice!

If I could make a wish…

What I still wish for is a 42a compliant (german street legal) version with a “high-tech steel” like the M390. Then the assembly of aftermarket titanium scales is even more fun.

Conclusion

The CRKT Pilar is a small EDC miracle. Sometimes it doesn’t take much to build a really good knife. CRKT Pilar and Pilar Large: good, compact and inexpensive.
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