I actually DON'T like those no question asked warranty, it only means I'm paying for the bone heads who beats their knives to death just for fun. I take care of my knives but pay the same amount to the warranty pool, so essentially I'm being penalized for treat my knives well.

That logic only holds if there are lots of knives coming back for costly warrantee work. If the no questions asked warrantee is more of an advertising thing than something that costs the company money, then neither you or the potential knife abusers are paying much of anything extra.

My guess is that once you've advanced beyond buying those 14" Rambo-survival-alligator-knifes at the mall NinjaMart, and are spending upwards of $50 on a knife from a decent manufacturer with a name that Bubba and JimmySue wouldn't recognize, you are probably no longer an abuser. I'll bet there aren't all that many RAT cutlery knife owners running around yelling "Hey y'all, watch this!"

Quite alright, everyone is entitled to their own opinion (misguided as it may be).

But you are in luck, because you can buy the exact same knife from Ontario (the RAT-7), and save ~ $10-20 depending on where you buy it from. There isn't much of a warranty, so you aren't paying for "bone heads" replacement knives.

WOW. I DID ask in the right place.

Thank you everyone for the ideas and keep them coming. I am just starting to research some of the knives suggested. I appreciate the quality of the knives presented/proposed.

Keep it coming and thank you!
-NIM

True, unless both Ontario and RAT are willing to let us know the return rate of the same knife we are all just guessing here. But I'm basing mine on how warranty works for everybody and haven't seen any numbers suggesting otherwise.



It's simply how the economics of warranty works, I don't see you providing any evidence to the contrary.

C'mon guys, agree to disagree and let's get back to the OP, S.V.P.

http://www.scrapyardknives.com/knives.htm

You might also check out Scrap Yard Knife Co (sister company of Busse and Swamp Rat; Scrap Yard is the more utilitarian of the 3 companies). Everyone I've talked to has had very high opinions of all of their knives (VERY tough knives). Several of them should fit your criteria and price range.

Edit:
Chris Reeve Knives has a couple of very nice knives also, though they are out of s30v stainless. Its a good steel, holds an edge well, and since he doesn't treat it as hard as a lot, it should sharpen pretty easily. (if I remember right, he was one of the knife makers that CPM was corresponding with when they designed s30v, so he should be able to work it well).

http://chrisreeve.com/

Another edit:
Swamp Rat has a knife right now that is 5 3/8" for sale/preorder (Ratmandu is its name). Their business model is a little weird (you have to pre-order, they only make a model or two at a time, but they make good knives as well.
details here
http://www.swampratknifeworks.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=10;t=006937