I was going to just post this in Darkbulb's thread about his Opinel no. 6, but as I was writing it became more of a review so I decided to give it it's own thread. A couple of weeks ago I ordered the above pictured Opinel no. 9 with a carbon steel blade and beechwood handle as pictured above. It was just under $15 @ Amazon. It's an interesting knife. It's well made, and well worth the $15 I paid for it. I haven't had a knife like this before and it's taking some geting used to. It's a lot lighter than I'd like, mainly due to the beechwood. Aside from the blade and fittings, there's not a lot of metal on this knife to increase the weight. The shape does feel good in the hand, but with the light weight it feels unbalanced to me, but I don't think that's a bad thing with this knife, I think it's something to get used to. I'm used to a heavier handle with a lighter blade, and this is just about the opposite. That's okay though, I think this knife was desgined for a very specific type of customer or use. This isn't a camping or woods type knife, which so many of our pocket knives are. This is a knife that a French farmer would carry in his pocket to cut open a piece of fruit from his orchard. The shape of the blade is definitely more culinary in design than utilitarian, I think. I wouldn't carry this knife on a backpacking trip, but I'd definitely take it on a picnic, outdoor festival, or a farmer's market. With its elegant design, it's very much a civilized knife for use in a civilized world. I think if were to buy another one it would be a 6 or 8. I like the size of the 9, but it would be okay in a smaller size.
Great review. Supposedly one of the benefits with the hollow handle is that it floats if dropped in water - I haven't actually tried that as I'd worry about swelling I absolutely agree that it's not, for me, a heavy duty knife but rather a lightweight knife for urban needs. Well, that at cutting open USPS packages Then again there are YouTube videos showing people chopping wood and cutting branches with one
