Ken Onion

Ken Onion

Ken has been dividing his time between special projects for Kershaw and creating new mechanisms and designs. Even though he has nearly 300 folder patterns, he rarely builds his older designs due to a constant flow of fresh ideas. This freedom provides Ken the opportunity to continually evolve his designs.

Even with the success of his revolutionary Speed Safe mechanism, Ken refuses to sit still and enjoy the fruits of his labor of love. Consequently, expect to see a number of innovative mechanisms from Ken in the near future. It will be very interesting to see the impact that his designs will ultimately have on the end knife user and the knife industry.

Sharp corners will not be found on Ken's knives. The entire knife, inside and out, is painstakingly rounded to eliminate blunt corners. The overall shape of the handle is intended to "melt in your hand". The blade design is engineered to work well in utility tasks and to also master the task it was created for. Ken's goal is to produce a knife that is elegant yet simple and effortless to use.

Ken has selected 440C for his standard blade steel. However, he also uses CPM 440V, 420V, Stellite, Talonite, Devin Thomas Damascus, Mike Norris Damascus and various other alloys. He prefers synthetics and Titanium for handle material due to their durability.

Developer of the speedsafe mechanism and many popular designs for Kershaw and Zero Tolerance Knives.