Value is the final frontier of good design in the knife world. As we make steady progress in the march towards a $1,000 production knife (no Rocksteads and Shiros don’t really count), folks aren’t upset to drop $300, $400, or even $500 on a production knife. Throw in an integral handle and $600 seems almost reasonable. Self-published blades aren’t any better. Dozens of people make them and many of them are approaching $500 and a few are inching close to the kilobuck threshold for non-bling versions. If you are looking for a reasonably priced blade, you may need to recalibrate your definition of “reasonable.”

Orion Knives stands as one of the few self-published blades that aims at value. This knife doesn’t even use swirly metal, which, apparently, is some kind of addictive drug for a large portion of the IKC. Nary a drop of MokuTi or Damasteel to be found. No, the Solaris gets by on G10 and 14C28N. It’s not a head turning buffet of materials, but it is all really solid. Given the sub-$100 budget what can you do? Thankfully, a lot.

Value is the final frontier of good design. Let’s go take a tour.

Here is the Solaris product page. It is the designed and produced by a great Youtuber, Blade Banter. The Solaris started life as a release on Kickstarter. Here is the KS page. You can buy scales for the knife that are user-swappable. The marbled carbon fiber are particularly stunning. Here is a video review of the Solaris. There are no written reviews. Here is my review sample (purchased with my own money):

Twitter Review Summary: Bigger than you think, yet distinctive and high value.

Design: 1

This design is burdened by one thing—there is too much going on around the pivot. You want a choil? Check. You want a flipper? Check. You want a button lock? Check. You want a beefy pivot? Check. At some point you either run out of real estate or you just make the area around the pivot bigger. Orion took that second approach and as a result this is significantly bigger knife than the blade length and the dimensions would have you believe. It is big. Really big. Like just smaller than the ZT0350 big. I’d prefer either a less busy, and therefore smaller, pivot area, or just smaller dimensions in general. As it is, this is the cursed combination of a small knife that carries like a big knife. There is also an exposed rear tang when the knife is closed, a pet peeve of mine.

That aside, there is a lot to like about this design. It feels good in the hand, it opens and closes nicely. And, perhaps most importantly, it looks and feels distinctive. It doesn’t have the feel of any other knife or brand. Its not “kinda like” anything really. Maybe Kershaw could have made this design, but if they did it would have a half dozen gills somewhere, the steel would be 8Cr, and it would be called something like the Camcrank or Ripfire or some other stupid marketing speak name. CRKT could have produced this knife but they would have tacked on a lock for the lock or some other mechanism you don’t really need. With a thumb hole, the Solaris could pass as a Spyderco, as the ergonomics are quite good, but there are two problems with that: 1) the lack of a thumb hole is kind of a big deal; and 2) Spyderco doesn’t make new designs anymore (insert mean rim shot; I tease because I love). In short, the Solaris is an Orion.

The B:H (3.15/4.75) tells the tale the best here. It is .66, one of the worst of any knife I have reviewed…there is a lot of extra handle here, but as you will see below, that is not all a bad thing. The B:W (3.15/4.9) is .64, which also not a great number. As I said, this is a big knife.

Fit and Finish: 2

There are no stray marks or mistakes here, but this knife clearly lacks the level of polish you expect with a Reate or the like. But its also $80. This knife is basically on par with a midtier ZT or a WE Knives blade—very good, solid build quality with nothing flashy or lavish. For the price, that’s darn impressive.

Grip:

One benefit of a bigger knife is a bigger grip and here, with the inclusion of a full forward finger choil, the Solaris grip is absolutely top notch. All folding knives have grip issues—after all, you have to have a big gap down the middle of the handle—but with that limitation, the Solaris is one of the best grip shapes out there. The squared off handle scales are the only thing holding the knife back from absolute grip supremacy.

Carry: 1

Big knife, lots of steel, including unnecessary full-length steel liners, make the Solaris much bulkier than it needs to be. Instead, it would be better to have what the Bugout does, where the liner only exists around the pivot allowing for the Axis lock assembly and pivot to ride on steel without the added weight of full-length liners. But still, the knife isn’t too bad in the pocket thanks a pretty solid and unobtrusive clip.

Steel: 2

14C28N is the absolute best non-PM steel out there, excluding the strange stuff like LC200N. Don’t believe me? This guy named Larrin agrees with me (or, more accurately, I agree with him). With a good spectrum of abilities, 14C28N gives you near PM steel performance at a very good price. For the vast majority of people, their normal use will never reveal the difference between 14C28N and something like M390.

Blade Shape:

With a pronounced drop point, and a broad blade, the Solaris reminds me of some of the more utilitarian leaf-shaped blades from Spyderco. With the choil it harkens back to one of my all time favorite knives from Golden, Colorado—the Caly3.

Grind: 2

If the size of the Solaris was surprising in a bad way, the grind of the Solaris was a surprise in a good way. This knife is tall (hence the size issue) and as a result there is a lot of space to taper down to an absolutely razor thin edge. This knife slices like a kitchen knife. I love when knives do that because #knivesshouldbeabletocutstuff.

Deployment: 2

Button lock flippers are exceptionally difficult to balance between good detent and snappy deployment. Often they are more floppers than flippers. The Solaris, however, really snaps both open and closed. Of course it is completely drop shut, but most button locks are. I am not a fan of drop shut action because the thing that is being drop shut upon is the handle and that is where my fingers often reside when holding a knife. But IG trends are rarely based on reason.

Retention: 2

The Solaris’s clip is just perfect. It is a sculpted clip, but it is simple, unobstrusive, ramped at the end, and it looks like a pen clip providing just a bit of discretion. Companies take note—this is the design if you want to do a sculpted clip. It ranks right up there with the Spyderco wire clip as one of my favorite designs ever.

Lock/Blade Safety: 2

Button locks are like British sports cars—tempermental, if you get everything working, really phenomenal. Here, the button lock is great, providing simple, reliable, and easy engagement and disengagement. Thing of it as an Axis lock that is 50% easier to disengage.

Other Consideration

Fidget Factor: Very High

Button lock plus flipper equals all day entertainment.

Fett Effect: Very low

Black G10 and stonewashed stainless steel can be used for years with no signs of wear.

Value: Very High

If this knife cost twice as much it would be around par for the course these days. Only the steel betrays the fact that the knife is a budget design, and the steel, as mentioned above, actually performs really well. This is American Bladeworks level value.

Overall Score: 18 out of 20

Its a chonky boy, but the Solaris does a lot of things really well. The grip, grind, lock, and clip stand out as some of the very best the production market has to offer, regardless of the price. The fact that the knife is under $100 is pretty amazing. I would like to see the pivot area a little less busy and the overall size and weight reduced a bit, the the Solaris proves that Orion has what it takes to make it in the knife business. A Mini Solaris would do really really well for me. If you miss those higher end Kershaws of yesteryear with good build quality, clever design, and 14C28N the Solaris will scratch that itch all day, albeit with a bit better ergos. Value is the final frontier of good design and Orion is an interesting town in that frontier.

Competition

Civivi seems like the closest competitor and there are about two dozen knives they make that could be rivals for the Solaris, but they lack the distinctiveness of this knife. The closest true competitor I can think of, not because of similar designs, but similar targets for the market is Asher Knives. They too focus on very strong designs with prices under $100. One is incoming for review, so I will let you know how they compare. Interestingly, I also think the TRM knives are similar, though, TRM makes no design mistakes ever and sports slightly better materials, so the Solaris is a tier below them. A bit more iteration and refinement though could put these two in more direct competition.

Amazon Links

Buying items through links below help keep the blog 100% independent.

ZT0350

Benchmade Bugout