Introducing the Benchmade Nim Cub II one of my favorite small fixed blades. Even with its small size it still remains very capable. With its flat ground 154CM blade the Nim Cub maintains a strong structure especially towards the tip where the swedge grind and and flat grind meet creating a tip that can take more abuse than other knives without chipping or bending. Which brings me to my next point the steel. 154CM is the American version of ATS-34 a Japanese steel made by Hitachi which was very well regarded in the knife community. Buying a Premium Steel gets you all of the benefits as I experienced. The edge retention and overall sharpness out of the box was good. There is something just beautiful about a really sharp knife. With that being said I should mention that this knife comes with a "Lifesharp" warranty for a small price you can send your knife to Benchmade and they will sharpen the edge with the original bevels and tune it up which is a nice comforting benefit especially for the sharpening impaired. I was also very impressed by the blade's Black DLC coating as it still stayed intact after use. I was expecting it to come off shortly after I purchased the knife. That assumption also came from my impressions on the sheath which brings me to my first negative point on this knife. The knife came in a polymer sheath that retained the knife in two ways the first is a nylon strap with a hefty snap and the second are little protrusions on the inside of the sheath. Personally I think that the double retention method is kind of overkill because with the strap secured the knife isn't going anywhere. Not to mention the protrusions make marks on the finish not a show stopper as the DLC as I said before stayed pretty well intact after using the knife but the sheath did leave marks on the coating that are visible. A benefit of the sheath is its Belt/MOLLE capabilities. I found the knife easy to mount to Backpacks, Vests, and my favorite method which is simply the belt carry option. The sheath also has a drain hole like most good sheaths do. Except I don't recommend getting wet with this knife because I am fairly certain you would have rust issues not to mention the water that would get underneath the scales. Which is my next point the scales were one of my favorite parts of this knife. Formed from a polymer called Noryl-GTX and secured with torx screws. It's shaped into a grippy handle with a nice feel also if you look at some pictures of the 147 Nim Cub you will notice a portion at the front of the handles which is depressed. This feature as small and useless as it may seem is actually very functional giving you some cool options for gripping the knife, for example, if you pinch the knife using both depressions you get a sort of pencil grip that might be useful for some situations or you can lock your thumb into it for a secure grip like if you're peeling an apple. Anyways I thought it was neat and made the scales look nice. besides the scales the knife is jimped fairly well and has a lanyard hole like most knives. The choil is functional but I noticed that some versions of this knife have the double choil where there is a secondary guard in the grip which sits between your index and middle fingers. I guess that is to provide better grip to prevent your hand from sliding into the blade. My knife doesn't have this feature but I haven't had any problems with that. The Nim Cub is surprisingly light and feels great in hand. Besides the what I have already said you really have to hold one of these to get a good feel for it and for you to see just how attractive this knife is. Go to your local shop and just take a look at the lines. The knife is worth buying just to look at besides its functionality. As a Black Class this knife is gear towards military and law enforcement but this knife would be great as a small outdoors blade, glove box knife or a collection piece. Overall I was very happy with it's performance in the field and would recommend this knife to any of you in the market for a small fixed blade.
