I somehow recently stumbled upon, totally by accident, one of the more interesting rarities of the pocketknife design world: an actual new fulcrum action folding knife. It’s the Equator, model CMB-01, from CMB Made Knives. Let me tell you about it.
TL;DR
The Equator is a very interesting knife. It employs a genuinely unique piece of knife action design history, built by a relatively unknown (at least, until recently, to me) Chinese knife manufacturer called CMB Made Knives. The Equator was their first model produced under their own name (more on that in a moment), and it shows both solid mechanical design prowess as well as a budget-minded approach to their initial product build.
However, you won’t find this knife on their websites (yeah, that was intentionally plural; they have 2 separate domain names and 2 different versions of their company website). You won’t find the knife in any online retailer’s inventory. Heck, you can’t even find a reference to it in Google! It’s a total mystery knife, and yet I just bought one!
I was told by a CMB company representative, whom I assumed was the owner, that back in 2020, they made far too few units of this initial knife model for regular distribution channels. And until very recently, they weren’t available at all! CMB simply kept them all stored away at their warehouse in China. They only recently began offering the few pieces they have left for auction, one per week, in their CMBMadeKnives store on eBay. I have no idea how many are left, but I’m guessing very few.
Pros
- Very cool fulcrum opening action mechanism
- Complex fulcrum action highlights CMB knifemaking skills
- Beefy 14C28N blade
- Compound grind blade design
- Solid liner lock
- Curved, contoured & textured, thick G10 scales
- Captured pivot design
- Single pivot bearing!
- Nice original factory packaging
- Outstanding price! (for now)
- Did I mention the fulcrum opening action is really cool?
Cons
- No lanyard mount (meh)
- Overly long & tall, tip-down, non-ambi, high-carry pocket clip
- Oddly color-clashing backspacer (bright, neon orange?)
- Fulcrum action is not smooth at first (much better after break-in)
- Unattractive matte, battleship gray blade finish
- A bit thick and heavy for its size
Tech Specs
Overall Features
Brand | CMB Made Knives |
Website | |
Manufacturer | CMB Made Knives |
Origin | Guangdong, China |
Model Reviewed | Equator CMB-01 |
Designer/Design | Rattle Snake (?) |
Model Launch Year | 2020 |
Style | Fulcrum action folding knife |
Lock Type | Liner Lock |
Opening Type | Manual |
Opening Mechanism(s) | 1. Fulcrum action |
Pivot Type | Captured steel pivot |
Pivot Mechanism | Bearing |
Length Closed | 103.75 mm (4.09″) |
Length Open | 172.25 mm (6.78″) |
Weight | 109 g (3.84 oz.) |
Original Packaging | Plain, white folding paperboard box enclosing a black, fleece-lined, folded nylon zippered pouch, and includes a nice, 170 mm x 178 mm (6.6” x 7”) microfiber cloth & marketing materials. |
Blade
Edge | Plain |
Shape | Drop point |
Material | Sandvik 14C28N |
Hardness HRc | 58-62 ? |
Blade Length | 76 mm (2.99″) |
Cutting Edge Length | 74 mm (2.91″) |
Height | 23.85 mm (0.94″) |
Thickness | 4 mm (0.16”) |
Main Bevel Edge Thickness | 0.56 mm (0.022″) |
Finish | Sandblasted & stonewashed matte gray |
Features | Compound grind, which only extends back for 9 mm (0.35”) from the tip of the blade |
Grind | Compound, high flat grind |
Swedge | None |
Jimping | Wide, 4-line cuts above the pivot on blade tang with matching cuts across handle |
Blade Markings | Show side: Company logo near top of main bevel |
Sharpening Choil | Yes |
On-Blade Opening Assists | None |
Handle
Materials | G10 |
Color | Light indigo |
Scale Thickness | 3.5 mm (0.14″) |
Scale Texture | Contoured with very fine diagonal lines |
Scale Features | Curved centerline cut running the length of the scales, finger choil in handle at liner lock, with show side scale and chamfered liner cut deeper to ease liner access, slightly chamfered edges of scales along most edges |
Liners | Full-length stainless steel |
Stop Pin | Floating pin mounted to clip-side liner only |
Handle Length | 103.75 mm (4.09″) |
Closed Handle Height | 26.8 mm (1.06″) |
Handle Thickness | 16.25 mm (0.64″) |
Blade Tang Liner Lock-up % | 38.75% |
Pivot Center-to-Open-Knife Fulcrum (0.0 is balanced at pivot center) | 18 mm (0.71″) |
Integral Handle | No |
Backspacing Type | Backspacer |
Backspacer Material | G10 |
Backspacer Color | Bright, neon orange |
Backspacer Length | 43.5 mm (1.71″) |
Backspacer Features | Flat, level with liners with same very fine diagonal line texturing as the scales |
Lanyard Mount | None |
Hardware
Pocket Clip | Stamped, powder coated, high-carry, high-rise, curved clip |
Clip Material | Steel |
Clip Color | Semi-gloss black |
Clip Placement | Right-handed only, tip-down only |
Clip Length | 69 mm (2.72″) |
Clip Length-to-Handle % (< 50% preferred) | 66.30% |
Clip Features | Very high carry design, very tall rise off the scale with an unusually long spoon bill |
Fasteners | T6 button-top steel body screws, 3 per side, with 2 on clip side securing the clip |
Who is CMB Made Knives?
According to their website, CMB Made Knives has a long history of being a quiet, behind-the-scenes OEM for other knife brands. They opened up shop in Guangdong, China in 2010, and developed their technical manufacturing skills and experience by building quality knives for other brands. During that time, they reportedly established a strong reputation for their appealing designs and high-level, quality-control work. In 2020, they decided to establish themselves in the knife making industry using their own brand name.
But what does “CMB” mean? Their website’s About Us blurb explains it this way: “Because knife making team everyone’s name has the letter C.M.B. So we call the brand (CMB MADE KNIVES)”. Okay, so English is not their primary language. I appreciate that (I don’t speak one word of Cantonese, so they’re doing much better than me). I admit I first thought CMB might stand for “China Made Blades”, which would express their pride in the company’s origin. I guess I guessed wrong!
The History of the Fulcrum Action Knife Design
When CMB launched as an independent brand, they did not meekly dip their toe into the professional knifemaking pool. Instead, CMB clearly went for a moonshot effort right from the start. They did not just create a basic fixed blade, and they did not create just a standard folding knife. Not at all. What I love about their story is that they chose the difficult path and opted to replicate the legendary fulcrum opening action mechanism as originally designed and patented by Charles Kain in 2006, as shown in his original schematic drawing below.
The fulcrum opening action design was quickly purchased from Kain by Columbia River Knife & Tool (CRKT), and they asked Fargo, ND-based custom knife maker/designer Russ Kommer to create a new fulcrum-based knife in 2008. That original knife Kommer created was called the CRKT 7404 Fulcrum (sometimes called the Kommer Fulcrum), released in AUS-8.
CRKT actually released several knives of various sizes and styles based on Kain’s fulcrum action in 2008, including the more stylized design CRKT 7406 Fulcrum Flame, also using AUS-8, created by CRKT knife designer Tom Stokes.
But after the initial splurge, things went quiet for fulcrum knives. There wasn’t any further development of fulcrum action knives until 2016, when CRKT released the slightly larger 7435 Fulcrum 2 knife and its smaller sibling, the 7430 Fulcrum 2 Compact, both in 8Cr13MoV.
But that was it. Unfortunately, none of those knives are readily available today, and CRKT no longer sells a fulcrum action knife. New box inventory of CRKT fulcrum knives is out-of-stock everywhere, and if you find a sale listing a used fulcrum knife, they typically carry a premium, despite the less-than-premium materials originally used by CRKT.
But, for interested knife collectors, there is good news! For those who missed getting a true fulcrum action knife from CRKT and want to own one of these rarities, CMB Made Knives has come to your rescue. Their Equator CMB-01 is being actively sold as New on eBay as I write this post! Let’s dig into the details of the Equator fulcrum action knife.
Food for thought: Could it have been CMB who manufactured the original Fulcrum knives for CRKT back in their early years? While I suppose it’s possible, I couldn’t find any information on who manufactured the various fulcrum knives for CRKT, except that CRKT knives were made in China back then, so who knows?
Introducing the CMB Made Knives Equator CMB-01
The CMB Equator CMB-01 is a celebration of pocketknife design, an homage to pocketknife legend and history, and clearly a flex by CMB to show off what they can achieve as an independent knifemaker brand. Let’s dig into the details of this very cool knife.
Details and Specs
The Equator is fun to play with and has many nice features that in many ways make it a better knife than any of the CRKT Fulcrum releases. But compared to modern knife designs, it’s also got some challenges.
Blade
The blade of the Equator is made from the very good, budget-level stainless steel, 14C28N from Sandvik Steel of Sweden. 14C28N was invented in 2008 and is known for its very good toughness and excellent corrosion resistance but offers only mediocre edge retention. However, it is a very good upgrade to the AUS-8 and 8Cr13MoV steels used by CRKT for their fulcrum blades. The Equator blade comes in a very traditional, very high flat grind, drop point design with one slight twist: its sports a compound edge grind. To be fair, the compound angle is only at the tip of the blade (just the first 1/3”), so it’s not wild and ridiculous or anything like that. But it adds some personality to an otherwise very common design. It comes in a matte, sandblasted & stonewashed finish that’s almost battleship gray. I much prefer the look of clean steel, especially when it’s a stainless, so I removed that unattractive finish using some Flits metal polish paste and a rotary tool buffing wheel to reveal the beautiful stainless steel underneath.
The edge bevel, perfectly equal on both sides, is very shallow, indicating that the edge was sharpened using a higher than the more common 17°-ish angle found on so many folding knives (I really need to get a laser goniometer!). The knife was very sharp out of the box, though. There is some very wide jimping above the pivot, a mere 4 grooves, but those grooves on the blade tang, when locked open, line up with equal-sized jimping grooves across the knife scales and steel liners, so there ends up bring plenty of room for your thumb to get a good grip.
The Equator’s blade markings are fairly minimal. The show side only has the triangular CMB company logo, located just below the flat inside the rear of the main bevel. The clip side is a bit busier, with an unexplained Rattle Snake logo (perhaps this is a designer’s logo?) below the flat in the rear of the main bevel. In addition, the name of the steel is written vertically just inside the grind plunge line.
The blade has a small, diagonal-cut sharpening choil next to the bottom of the handle. The finger choil is part of the liner-lock cut-out in the handle itself, so there’s no room to choke up on the blade when holding the knife.
Blade Dimensions
The blade is about 3” long with a cutting edge of 2 29/32”, is about 15/16” in height, and has a beefy thickness of 5/32”. There’s no swedge, no thumb studs, no flipper tabs, no opening hole, and no nail nick. That, of course, is because this is a fulcrum knife!
HRc Rating
While there is no steel hardness rating from CMB on this knife, I did see that they reported between 58-62 HRc on other 14C28N knives they made later on. I also need to get a Rockwell hardness tester (one day).
Knife Body & Scales
The Equator apparently only comes in one build style, which features fairly thick, 10°-curved, light indigo-colored G10 scales on top of stout, full-length steel liners. The scales have a very shallow contour with a curved, center-line channel cut running down the full length and is decorated with very fine, diagonal milling lines. The scale edges are not sharp, although the edge lines are not really chamfered, either. They either have a lightly softened edge or sport a clean, 45° edge cut.
Opening Mechanism
One of the first features you’ll notice is on the show side of the handle. Or perhaps, more accurately, one of the first features you won’t notice! There is no pivot on the show side scale. And as previously mentioned, there’s no obvious way for how to even open this knife, even though it is absolutely a one-handed-opening knife.
So how is it opened? The key to using a fulcrum action knife comes down entirely to this thick, empty show side scale and an awkwardly positioned and unusually large pocket clip. The show side scale moves! More accurately, it pivots down about 10° at a point about 70% of the way down the handle. And it’s that pivot action that is used to perform a one-handed opening of the Equator.
Operating the Fulcrum Action
In basic terms, for a right-handed user, you hold the closed knife, blade spine down, by your fingertips. The fulcrum action is based simply on a floating pin, attached to the blade tang, that runs inside a milled track within the show side liner.
The original fulcrum action design depends on the awkward, tip-up position of the huge pocket clip so your fingertips are touching the pocket clip from the back and your thumb is on the top edge of the show side scale where the pivot is normally located.
To open the knife, with your thumb high up on the scale, push the scale away and the blade’s fulcrum floating pin moves along the milled angled fulcrum track to the track’s center apex position.
This forward movement of the scale both pivots the blade out halfway, as well as exposing the true blade pivot, as shown below.
However, at this point, if you were to then use your other hand to try to pull the blade open the rest of the way, you’d notice that it is blocked by the fulcrum pin being captured by the fulcrum track apex. To unblock it, the show side scale must then be pulled back into its original, aligned position, which you do by squeezing the handle scales back together. That enables the fulcrum pin to finish moving down the track, thereby completing the blade’s opening action and lock it open with its standard liner lock.
That’s all there is to it!
From there, to close it, it’s simply pushing the liner lock off the tang to unlock and pulling the blade down. Easy peasy.
The first time you do it, it’ll likely be awkward and slow. (My Equator also needed a bit of a break-in period to smooth out its action, too.) But you’ll soon learn how to perform the fulcrum action quickly and smoothly. Getting consistent finger and thumb positions are key. But because the fulcrum action is actually a 2-step opening method, it’ll never be as fast and smooth as a light-switched flipper tab or a flicked thumb stud. Regardless of that, it can’t be denied that the fulcrum action is so much cooler to use!
Ergonomics
The Equator handle is thicker than a standard knife of this size, apparently a requirement for the fulcrum action to work. But CMB did add a nice, big finger choil just behind the pivot area at the bottom of the handle, as well as the already mentioned broad jimping, giving you a firm, secure grip. They also add in a generous relief cut on the show side scale, along with some smooth beveling of the locking liner’s edge so access to unlock the blade is easy and comfortable.
Of course, because the closing action requires the fulcrum pin reverse its way through the fulcrum track, the blade is not in any way “fall-shutty”. Once the liner lock is disengaged, you must manually pull the blade all the way down with your index finger. In fact, there’s no normal detent, either, until the blade is almost fully closed (maybe at the last ¼” or so remaining will it self-close).
Lastly, the previously mentioned, huge pocket clip, being both excessively long (2 23/32″, spanning 66% of the handle length) and excessive high above the scale (3/16”), while very helpful for opening the knife, makes gripping the open knife’s handle rather uncomfortable with anything beyond the lightest squeeze. But hey, it’s a fulcrum action knife, right? Some things can’t really be helped – I guess.
Handle Dimensions
The handle length of the Equator is 4 1/8”, and the whole knife, fully opened, is approximately 6 ¾”. The closed knife height is 1 1/32″, and measures 5/8″ thick (or 27/32” if you include the pocket clip with that), so the Equator is a pretty beefy beast in terms of thickness in the hand!
Hardware
The Equator sports a captured pivot, as revealed when the blade is half open. The pivot itself only connects the knife blade to the liner/scale on the clip side, not at all to the show side, and therefore only uses one pivot bearing. The pivot head is flat, free of any fastener socket, and lies more or less flush with the blade tang. The pivot on the clip side scale is a polished steel dome with a T8 socket.
When the knife is locked open, there is no movement no up-or-down, and only an infinitesimally small movement side-to-side – as long as you are holding it from the clip side scale. When holding the knife by the show side scale, which is not directly attached to the blade because of the fulcrum action, the blade exhibits more movement, which I suppose is to be expected. But the knife feels strongly built and secure to use. My blade came perfectly centered, but then loses centering as it is used, simply because it’s only connected to one of the liners. Luckily, the pivot is very easily adjusted with your T8 driver, which quickly recenters the blade. A drop of blue threadlocker helps prevent such walk-out.
The handle only shows 3 uncoated steel, button-top T6 screws on each side. There is one at the back of each side of the handle to secure the rear of the scales to the liners. The fronts of the liners/scales are a different story. On the clip side scale, there are 2 screws on either side of and below the domed pivot that attach the pocket clip (which is not recessed mounted) to the scale. Also, on the clip side liner is a big, beefy stop pin (3/16” thick) that is engaged by the blade when either fully open and fully closed. Interestingly, it’s only attached to that clip side liner (and there’s no visible screw attaching it), and there is a very small gap between the stop pin and the show side liner.
For the 2 additional body screws on the show side scale, they are attached at the front of the handle, one at the top, just below the jimping, and the other at the bottom, just ahead of the liner lock release/finger choil, connecting the scale to its liner. That steel liner hosts the milled fulcrum action track for guiding the blade’s floating fulcrum pin, attached to the tang, through the opening action. As a result, there is an asymmetric look to the left and right scales, but this is a standard part of the design aesthetic of a fulcrum knife.
Backspacer
The Equator comes with a backspacer. It’s made of the same, very-finely textured G10 and absolutely illuminates the knife with its bright, neon orange color. I suppose the designers at CMB decided the Equator needed a serious pop of color, and this certainly does the trick, even if it is totally incongruous with the rest of the knife design. But it is kind of fun! In a clash-y way, I guess.
Interestingly, the 2 rear body screws do not attach the backspacer (did I mention that it is bright neon orange?!?) to the knife, as their screw holes are clearly visible in the liners just in front of where the backspacer is located. The designers were pretty clever with the use of a hidden screw to keep the backspacer in place, which is nice work. (I trust I mentioned that the backspacer is bright, neon orange, right? Yeowza!)
The tip of the closed blade falls just inside the tiny gap left between the frame and the backspacer, so your fingertips are well protected by the backspacer (even if your eyes are not).
There is no mount of any kind for a lanyard (sorry, all 3 of you remaining lanyard dudes).
Original Packaging
The factory packaging used by CMB for the Equator CMB-01 is actually pretty nice, especially given the price I paid (that detail is coming up momentarily). The package I bought directly from CMB Made Knives came in a plain, white, folding paperboard box, but that innocuous box enclosed a black, fleece-lined, zippered nylon pouch, which also contained a very nice, rather thick (almost luxuriously so), burnt orange (not bright, neon orange!) 6.6” x 7” microfiber cloth and a small, nice 4-color print, folded marketing pamphlet. Compared to the rather spartan packaging I got with my beloved, recently reviewed Viper Moon, I was suitably impressed here.
Weight
The full-length steel liners are not milled for weight reduction, but despite that, the Equator only weighs 3.84 oz. Weirdly, it almost seems heavier than that in the hand, probably due to the beefy thick handle construction.
Knife Karen Nitpicks
Overall, this is a very cool knife. It’s a new release of the legendary fulcrum action pocketknife design, but there are definitely some things that I wish weren’t there. In fact, I think I need to talk with the manager about them.
- The pocket clip is more or less an abomination, both aesthetically and ergonomically-speaking. Yes, I know it has to be attached in the tip-down position so it can be used as grip leverage when opening the fulcrum action. That doesn’t mean I have to like it! But worse yet, it is the exact opposite of a deep-carry clip. If it is jammed as deeply into your pocket as it could be, there will be over 1” of knife handle exposed. What is the extreme opposite of a deep carry clip? It’s the CMB Equator carry clip.
- And I can (and will) go on about the pocket clip’s woes. Its stratospheric height is elevated 11/64” above the scale (then add another 1/32” for the thickness of the clip steel itself). Yes, that towering altitude off the scale definitely helps the user open the knife. But once opened, it’s not comfortable to hold with any sort of firm grip. And I have delicate Knife Karen hands!
- Lastly, that clip is so long that it spans 2/3 of the length of the handle! I must speak to the manager about this right now!
- The backspacer is bright, neon orange.
- The fulcrum action is very cool, but it’s also pretty slow to deploy. If you want a one-handed deployment knife, the Equator will work. But if you want a rocket-fast deployer, the fulcrum’s two-step dance just to open it up may disappoint. Keep your expectations in check. You’ve been warned.
- I said the backspacer is bright, neon orange!!
- The body screws are all T6! The problem is that T6 screws are more easily stripped out than T8, which is a really bad day when that happens. The world must come to its senses and end the proliferation of the T6 plague on all of Pocket Knife-dom. The Knife Karen must be heard!
- Excuse me! I said the backspacer is BRIGHT, NEON ORANGE! Oh, the humanity!
Price
Now for the most interesting part of all. We’ve discussed that the fulcrum opening action knife design is legendary in the pocketknife community. Good luck finding a CRKT Fulcrum, a Fulcrum 2, or a Fulcrum Flame anywhere. If you can, it’s almost guaranteed not to be new, and it will likely have a premium price due to the relative rarity of this design (as I write this post, there’s one listed on eBay right now for $1,000!). In any case, the blade steels used by CRKT are by today’s standards mediocre at best.
I fully believe that CMB chose the fulcrum knife as their very first release as a new, independent knife manufacturer back in 2020, not because there was a huge demand, but because it was a technical challenge to do well, which if done right, would show their mechanical prowess as a professional knifemaker. But then they decided to not make very many units of the CMB-01 Equator, and as a result, never released them for sale, not until 2024. And while limited supplies last, they are only available on the CMBMadeKnives store on eBay. CMB has been, as of this writing, auctioning 1 Equator per week.
For a knife equipped with a 3” 14C28N blade, contoured and textured G10 scales, and most importantly, the legendary fulcrum opening action, I can’t believe I won the auction with a bid that was less than $20! And yes, CMB sends it to you from China with free shipping!
I think if people only knew that they could buy a legendary fulcrum knife, brand new (from 2020), made with better materials than CRKT ever offered, knife collectors and blade enthusiasts would jump on this. Shockingly, CMB doesn’t even mention that the CMB-01 Equator is a fulcrum action knife – this is a terrible oversight for them, but a huge opportunity for me and you. It’s as if it’s a secret! And because of this, of the 7 knives that have been sold on eBay so far (as of this writing), the average of all the winning bid prices so far comes to $20.21. That’s less than just 1 AJack bill and a single GWash coin (US currency, I mean), and you still get to keep 4 shiny, copper-plated zinc AbLincs! In fact, one lucky eBay bidder got their Equator for the mere cost of $15.38! The worst part of the eBay sale is the fairly long wait for the delivery to come in. While CMB quotes about 10 weeks for delivery, I mine came in within 2 weeks.
Now that the word may get out, it’s possible that the CMB-01 auctions, for as long as CMB’s very low, albeit undefined, inventory holds out, may go up in price. Get your while you can!
Verdict
The CMB Made Knives Equator CMB-01 is a very interesting knife. It’s revived a legendary knife opening mechanism, the fulcrum action, patented by Charles Kain in 2006, then sold the CRKT Knives, who in 2008, hired knife designers Russ Kommer and Tom Stokes to design commercial knife products around that mechanism. CRKT released an upgraded version of Kommer’s knife design in 2016, but that was the end of it – until now. CMB Made Knives in 2020 decided to recreate the fulcrum action knife using the Kommer design and a more premium blade steel as their very first product. However, they never released it commercially, until the early months of 2024.
The Equator is, in my opinion, a collector’s knife, a very fine example of the Kain/Kommer design, but not really an EDC. The fulcrum deployment mechanism, while definitely one-handed, is a somewhat cumbersome, 2-step process of sliding down the show side scale to open the blade halfway, then clinching the handle in your hand to close the scales back together, which enables the fulcrum action to fully open the blade. After that, it’s just a typical liner lock knife to close (although it has absolutely no drop-shut action, despite running on [one] pivot bearing).
It’s very cool, very interesting, but it’s quite a bit slower to deploy than a flipper tab or a thumb stud flick. And to enable the fulcrum action, there are a number of aesthetic and ergonomic compromises that were required. The absurdly long and tall pocket clip is mounted only in the tip-down position, is not reversible for tip-up (like on Spyderco knives) and is not ambidextrous for lefties. This huge clip makes the fulcrum action fairly easy to deploy (after a break-in), but it also makes the opened knife rather uncomfortable to grip tightly. The design is only offered in 1 model, 1 color (light indigo), 1 blade steel type (14C28N), 1 blade shape (drop point), 1 scale type (G10), and they all have a bright, neon orange G10 backspacer! <shudder> A representative for CMB, who may have been the owner (they did not answer that question), told me that they made so few of these first-run knives in 2020 that they only offer them for auction, one per week, on eBay.
I love having this type of unusual knife in my collection, and the CMB Equator is a well-made example of the complex mechanical design that is the fulcrum action. It’s fun to drop the knife into someone’s hand, tell them it’s a one-handed opener, and watch them struggle to figure out how to open it.
To me, CMB Made Knives will be a very interesting company to watch as they further explore their own knife design concepts, use increasingly better materials and release new models where they can demonstrate why they went into the knifemaking business as a brand rather than as an OEM. Their current offerings are interesting, indeed! I look forward to picking up another CMB knife very soon! 
