RAIDOPS

Preliminary Review of the RAIDOPS AQUILO SRN Frame Lock Folder

RAIDOPS 

Presentation box (outer pictured here and inner heavy cardboard box pictured below)

is a company that I've had my eye on for a number of years. Established  only about 13 years ago in South Korea by Nam Deuk Kim, otherwise known as Andy Kim, who is also the Director of the company.  The current Key people are:
Daniel Noh (Designer and Engineer), Lino Min (Marketing Manager) and Jack Jeon (Designer).

Design takes place in Incheon Free Economic Zone (IFEZ) and products are currently being manufactured in: Korea, Taiwan and Italy at present.


What attracted me to this company was the simply great design of their products.

RAIDOPS products are not only funky but well designed and practical. The company emphasis is on survival and tactical ethos.
That means if one is going to follow that ethos, the products need to reflect this in practical use. Full stop.

On top of that, Original knives made during the early days are now much sought after collectors items. It's easy to understand why once you lay eyes on the said knives, and they are like any sought after items commanding very high prices too!
RAIDOPS products are manufactured in: KOREA, TAIWAN and ITALY.

Some basics about Frame locking knives

Firstly if the frame lock is made from a titanium alloy (and many are done this way) then it is totally wrong from an engineering perspective to have the titanium frame directly contacting the knife tang. Once wear and tear has set in, slop will develop in the locking mechanism and the frame would need to be replaced. Look at one (there are others) popular brand, very poorly made (poorly mated surfaces and lack of precision engineering), frame locks suffering innumerable problems, with stories abounding about customers having to return them to get their brand new out of the box knife repaired!

In order to avoid this situation, a different material (but a separate piece) with proper hardness and proper mating surface and angles must be incorporated into the frame lock. This means extra work (extra parts) and of course means more production costs. But this is in my mind the only way to properly construct a frame locking knife system. Plus a frame lock really has to have exacting tolerances, not to rely on all this after sales manipulations. The titanium alloy must be correctly machined and heat treated in order to obtain a proper "spring" characteristic of the alloy. You simply can't bend a bit of titanium and expect it to act like a spring!

 RAIDOPS AQUILO SRN. Frame locking EDC folder

WOW!!!

My first impressions out of the box and a day outside with the RAIDOPS Aquilo SRN.

Number 1
Expertly engineered, with exacting tolerances.

Number 2
Pivot point

Using  washers on the blade pivot.

Number 3
Construction materials

Grade 5 Titanium alloy (T 6Al-4V ) used for the frame lock- a good alloy of Ti for making springs and it is also very strong.
See here for general information regarding Grade 5 Titanium.

The precision mating surface bolted to the Grade 5 Titanium spring frame is 420 stainless. 

Precision engineering for a precise fit of the mating surfaces from the tang and the 420 surface attached to the titanium frame.

The proper way to produce a frame locking knife is to use a separate piece of metal to engage the knife tang as in the RAIDOPS AQUILO SRN, seen here and in the above image.

Note: Perfectly flush surfaces in the lock (and below image)

This type of construction is a must for a precision lockup on a frame lock knife. The RAIDOPS Aquilo SRN locks up perfectly with a confident sounding large "click". There is ZERO slop unlike in a certain brand i alluded to above lacking this proper design feature.

A chunky but lightweight G10 composite plate for the opposing frame. Learn more about the physical and chemical characteristics of G10 here. Suffice it to say a chunk of G10 this thick is strong!
G10 is a very strong and rigid composite material. 

The Business End

The blade alloy

S30V a CPM (powder metallurgical) martensitic steel alloy with high Vanadium carbide content from Crucible LLC. This is a very good knife alloy. In this case, I have the serrated (SRN) version as I prefer partly serrated blades. Crucible LLC know what they are doing with alloy chemistry, it's in their company blood!

Deadly serrations in the CPM S30V blade make short work of cutting ropes and cordage (note optical illusion of the serrations: are they facing out or in???!)

Crucible Metals Powder metallurgy stainless alloy S30V

1.45% C  14% Cr  4%V   2% Mo yields a high percentage of tough wear resistant vanadium carbides with good corrosion resistance. HRC listed as 59-61

At just a little over 4 inches in folded length, the RAIDOPS AQUILO SRN fits easily in the hand.

Using S30V in  an EDC type knife like the RAIDOPS Aquilo SRN is a smart choice. As this type of knife is likely to get used heavily and the last thing you want to do is to having to keep sharpening it.

Main pivot bolt sits flush with the the frame, a very nice addition to the design to this knife and adds to it's "slickness" despite a chunky looking folder.

Generous Lanyard hole

Notice the blade alignment, perfectly centred

Nice tough looking, chunky but light compact folder the RAIDOPS Aquilo SRN Frame Lock Folder.

I love the versatile blade shape. I've used many folders on the job (aerial rope access) where I needed to routinely cut climbing ropes and or dirty carpets, reinforced PVC materials etc and having a small folder with serrations simply gets the job done asap. I don't want to be sawing away, I want the material I am cutting to be cut immediately.

The pocket clip is made from 420 stainless.

The opening action was a bit stiff to begin with but as they indicate in their literature this is done on purpose and the action will become fluid once the knife is opened several times. I found this to be exactly as described and for me too I don't want a folder whoose blade can easily come out and injure  me. (ie without me having to flick it open). The RAIDOPS Aquilo SRN is not such a blade and the ball retention works perfectly with little chance under normal circumstances or even trying to force the blade open by appying an accelerating force to the folded knife, it remains safely within the frame. That's what I want to see in a well made folder like the RAIDOPS Aquilo SRN.

The RAIDOPS AQUILO SRN designed in KOREA and manufactured in Taiwan. I can't fault this knife in my initial observations and basic tests.

I attempted to twist the blade to see if there was any signs of lateral slop: negative.

I attempted to rock the blade back and forwads to see if "Rock lock" is present (pointless test as this only really occurs when a knife is poorly desinged and made and the AQUILO SRN is NOT in this category.

The blade locks up (perfectly every time) with a reassuring loud click! That's how it should be with any locking knife.

The overall construction appears to be very good, flush surfaces, good torsional stability ( I tried to twist the frame- pointless really as it simply doesn't twist!)

So far, I've only cut plastics and cardboard boxes with it but I will be doing my usual full on field testing of the RAIDOPS AQUILO SRN and producing the video results and summary for all to see on BushCampingTools. Very excited about this very cool little knife.