Replica Civilian

“One scary knife!”

That was my reaction on opening this package. The knife in question was this one, a clone of the Civilian.

Of course the Civilian is a scary knife, designed as a weapon of last resort for law enforcement agents deprived of their firearms. It has next to no utility value, it is intended purely as a weapon.

I’ve looked at them, and among my collection is the Emerson Waved Matriarch 2, but I’ve never bought one.

However on Aliexpress I found this, a slightly blemished replica of the Civilian for $26. I hemmed and hawed for a few weeks, until I finally decided to buy it.

“One scary knife!”

The package came with the knife, in a red box, with a piece of paper that congratulated me on buying a Para-Military 2. It had been opened and checked by Customs, who had then passed it through.

The Civilian is a big knife, here is a picture of it alongside my XL Cold Steel Vaquero Voyager. It isn’t quite as big as that, but I think it is far more intimidating.

And from the other side.

Build quality was excellent, and as you can see this iteration of the copy is far closer than the previous iteration shown on the dealer’s webpage. It even includes the Boyd dent. The knife has G10 scales, with only one side having a stainless steel liner, and the blade comes very sharp. Just to see if it could I tried push cutting newsprint with some of the serrations. It could. The action was gritty to start with, so I squirted some CRC in and opened and closed the blade until it became smoother. Now it’s okay.

The original had a reputation for tip fragility, and I can see why, the deep serrations closest to the tip would weaken it there, but then if you’re ever in a situation where you’d need a knife like this you won’t care. That said, if that was your intention I would recommend buying the Matriarch 2, or Lil Matriarch if you have smaller hands. Of course the steel is not VG-10, but I’m hopeful it’s one of the decent Chinese steels, even 8Cr13MoV would be fine with a good heat treatment.

The knife is fitted for tip up or tip down carry, right hand only. The techniques I’ve seen demonstrated suggest that tip down is the better way to carry. The G10 is rounded off and comfortable in hand. The ergonomics are fine, as you’d expect given the source. It locked up fairly tight, although there was a little bit of give that I’m not used to with my EDC knives having the Tri-Ad. Although it was described as having a small defect, I haven’t found it yet.

Can I recommend the knife? As long as you treat it as a collectible, not necessarily as something you’d stake your life on, I would recommend it. If you want a dedicated defensive blade I would, as said, grab the Matriarch or Lil Matriarch. They’re the real budget versions of the Civilian.

I own the Civilian with a carbon fiber handle, it is indeed a great tool for defensive fighting, and large.

Looks like a Spyderco Harpy. I always wanted one, but couldn’t ever figure out what I’d do with it.

I’ll bet it would be great for cutting rope.

Do that, and you void the warranty.

Very scary knife.
My next “replica” is a Spyderco Military with brown G10. The Sprint run sold for $230, replica price $18.
Not expecting much but then again I won’t be using it much. The mis-labeled steel, it should be CTS XHP, lucky if it’s 8Cr13MoV.

Somebody needs to get us all back to the original post, which was excellent.

Although I was the first to get off topic, tomorrow I’m going to try and refocus on the first post, which involves some serious knife info and a great bargain.

The OP knows his knives.

OK, it’s a replica, but why aliexpress says that it’s a spyderco vg10???. If chineses make a civilian copy don’t say that it’s a spyderco vg10. I would buy a copy if they put “Ganzo, enlan, srm…” 8cr13mov, then i buy it. But, “spyderco vg10 civilian” for 26$? :weary:

Probably because it’s not the correct marking gets round some counterfeit law somewhere with it not being an exact copy or it could be that they just don’t know or care as long as they’re selling stock.
There’s a nice looking fake on AliExpress, sold as a Spyderco QQ, only model it comes close to looking like is the Spin Etched, discontinued but was $105, the copy is listed as - retail emerson spyderco military QQ small spiders,stainless steel Folding knife tools ,tactical survival outdoor camping knife…………… All that for $6, I’m prepared to bet the blade steel isn’t the VG10 of the Spyderco even though it is etched on the copy’s blade. I’ve had it in my basket three times now and each time removed it because I don’t like Wharnecliffe blades but I put it in again because I like the etched scales.

I think what I’m getting at is I only buy these copies for the look, not the performance. I have been pleasantly surprised at how usable and very well made the first two that I’ve bought are - Bonus.

I began in the knives world with copies for that, for the look. I have two böker, one extreme ratio, mtech, schrade and more… But i found in ganzo, srm, enlan… a more quality for a little more money. With the fakes i don’t know what steel are using and some of them are dangerous for my fingers (i have tested all my knives with spine wack test). Some of the fakes mine are dangerous because it closes veeeeeery easy. I wouldn’t like back to fakes but yes, some designs love me, and i hope srm or ganzo (the official copier) or enlan can make it with at least standard quality. I opened a thread with that, “What folder knife would you like that ganzo, navy, harnds… copy?” :bigsmile:

I must say that all fakes aren’t the some, some have a incredible quality in finish (almost i could say that better than ganzo and others), but finish is one thing and the steel or the locking system are others. I still prefer srm/tekut/enlan/ganzo/navy/inron/harnds (well, inron and navy regular IMO). And ganzo… some models with very important problems, the g711 with locking system problems (see videos), the g714 with a rounded pivot and you can’t tighten properly the blade, my g712 impossible to loosen both pivot screws… the g710 with poor engage of the axis lock (the g704 and g712 better engage)… Really it can be that srm and enlan are the best for me (budget).

I did manage to chip the very tip doing a cut test on a plastic water bottle. I would suggest only using it on flesh.

Sorry to hear that, any idea what the steel is?
Is the chip out of the blade small enough to sharpen out or is it missing completely?

I have one of the Clipitools with the plain and serrated blades and I’m completely underwhelmed by the Spyderedge - catches while cutting like most other serrations.

The Military of mine is a nice knife, no way could it be passed as original, no paperwork, not even a bar-code on the box.
I’ve been using it for all the cutting at home and it is smooth as silk opening and closing, lock up is solid and totally worth the $18 I paid for it.

That is the problem with fakes, very beautiful for the eye but the steel or/and heat treatment can be the knife unuseful. All are going to cut paper or meat but perhaps with other materials can show its weakness.

I think i keep buying enlans/ganzos/srm etc before fakes. But a quality clon of the civilian would be incredible!.

counterfeit batteries are not good but counterfeit knives are?i hope you dont have to buy important medicine for anyone.fake is fake

Like as the original supposed to? :wink:

Counterfeit, copy, fake or clone.
When I buy a “Spyderco” for 1/10th of the cost of a genuine one then I don’t expect Spyderco levels of quality and materials.
What I do get is a very serviceable knife for $18 shipped to my door. There is no way that the “counterfeit” could be passed off as genuine, wrong steel for the scales or wrong scales for the steel, no way is it even the marked steel (so I’d be quite happy with 8Cr13MoV or even 5Cr), no paperwork, no bar-code, poor quality box.
It does however make me wonder where the rest of the $250+ goes on the original brown G10 sprint run.
Spyderco themselves get knives made in China, even the boxes that the originals come in are printed in China so quality is not an issue, I’ll treat it as dubious until I can “trust” it.
I have been using it as a general purpose cutter in the house and it’s a very high quality pizza slicer.

if it says spyderco it will//can be sold to people as the real thing.counterfeit is dishonest no matter how you justify it…

If someone has the money to spare without researching the place they buy from, what the item they are buying really looks like and the materials that it’s made from then sooner or later they are going to be losing more than the cost of a knife.
The dishonesty is on the part of the seller who would ask for more than the cost of the fake, not the fake itself, it’s a perfectly good $18 knife.

Yuck…don’t like the serrated blade

Many times the Chinese sub-contractors ARE the original OEM suppliers to the “manufacturers”. Brand name manufacturers hold this secret closely…a trade secret.

Their production runs use specified materials with specified contracted QC…to “Spyderco” in this case, but Spyderco would have to watch them closely while the product is being made. If they are not meticulous in corporate QC oversight, they will have sub-standard products sneaking through.

When the SAME factory and the same workers run the identical item on the same machinery for their own purposes for sale as counterfeits, they are not required to use the same materials, fit, finish or OC because they are making them for their own sale to the domestic Chinese store fronts. The products are not sold directly to the West. Chinese law permits this as a legal practice.

It’s not just knives…it’s everything that’s made over there.

It represents a difference in Eastern vs Western mind set and philolsophy.

Take heat treat for example…

If a US company can add precise heat-treat for 10 cents in volume they will just do it.

If a Chinese company can save 1/10 of a penny by eliminating heat-treat altogether…they will do it and pocket the difference. However, they will take great pains to make the cosmetics as close as possible to the original.

They are tricky little bastards.

The consumer will never win playing their game.