I own 2 of that knife
http://www.botach.com/products/camillus-cu221-cuda-edc-every-day-carry-knife.html
It can be considered as a budget knife as it’s 30-40$ and I remembered buying one less than 30$.
I really love that knife, well sized for my hand, a true edc like his name.
The only problem is that to make this knife cheap, they used 420hc that even Chinese knife maker don’t use (at least the one we love, like sanrenmu, elan or ganzo).
The original knife is from a custom knife maker named Darrel Ralph but buying from custom knife maker is something from my past that I won’t do anymore.
Most of Chinese knives are copy from famous brand knives. Now I hope that someone here is aware of a Chinese knife that is a copy of the cuda edc and that is made of 440c (or at least something better than 420hc).
With a proper heat treatment the 420HC is as good as anything that you’ll see from China, at least so far.
One thing you can be reasonably confident of is that if a Chinese manufacturer is making copies of an American product it won’t be superior in materials. American and European manufacturers do have access to better steel than the Chinese do.
If you wanted something similar to the Camillus I would suggest the Ganzo G716S, which is the semi-serrated version of the G716 and under $20 on FastTech. That uses their “440C” (although it’s probably only a “near enough” Chinese steel) but they do seem to have nailed the heat treatment. Their axis lock copy is immensely strong too.
Th at looks like it a bigger knife than the specs show.
Try a SanRenMu 733 just over $10 from Exduct 8Cr14MoV steel that SanRenMu know how to treat right. In fact just about any of the SanRenMu mid sized knives or Enlan the same, mid size M series about 75mm long blade or the larger L or EL series would make a good replacement.
I’ve just got a bit of an odd one from SanRenMu, the 7046LTE-LKR after using it for a while today I’ll probably be getting it’s bigger brother the Real Steel T98 with Sandvik 12C27 blade. The blade shape has a sharp chisel ground edge in all the right places to make it a very useful tool. And they aren’t a “knock off” of anything but are designed by a Mr. Liang Gang for Real Steel and SanRenMu.