Contender #5 is a copy of a TAD Gear’s Skeleton Key which usually retails for $99 and usually comes in titanium. Contender #5 is not titanium and didn’t cost anywhere near $99, which is why it was able to take part in our $2 Challenge.
There are two versions of the Skeleton Key, one with a flathead screwdriver on the side, and one with a two pronged wrench that is (as claimed by TAD Gear) optimized for use on Strider products. It would make the most sense for Contender #5 to be the version with the flathead, right? Wrong. It is the Strider wrench version, although not being tacti-cool enough to have a Strider knife I’ve got no way of testing its effectiveness. A flat head would have been a much better idea to knock off. Luckily there’s a smaller one on the other side.
There is some jimping along the side of the pry bar handle which allows for decent grip when using the bottle opener, which is nice I guess. I don’t think I’ve ever opened an extreme enough beverage that I needed large jimping on the side for hardcore grip, but I suppose a little more is better than a little less, right?
The pry bar end is probably adequate for whatever teeny tiny prying jobs you come across, although to be honest I have to imagine the curvature found on
Contender #3 would be a lot more effective. Still, many keychain pry bars are not bent, so either there is a legitimate use for a tiny, straight crowbar, or there’s a market for people who like to pretend there’s a use for a tiny, straight crowbar.
Contender #4 isn’t too bad at opening bottles- better than many but not as good as some. I’d say it is effective enough, but I wouldn’t go out of my way to use this as my prime bottle opener if I was a bartender. I’d sure miss out on a lot of tips if I did.
Then we get back to the skull itself- I’ve saved it for last because I’m a bit confused by this, just as I was with a similar problem with
Contender #2. One of the skull eyes is an O2 wrench, which I suppose is handy for at least a small portion of the population, but the other is…. Well…. It’s a semi circle with a flat edge. I’m not sure why at least one of the skull eye cutouts wouldn’t be a ¼” hex cutout. I mean, that is probably in the top three most useful functions that a small keychain type tool can have, and yet so many tools just don’t have it. I can see not having it if there’s no space on the tool, but that is not the case here.
Contender #5 cost a whopping $1.69 and could have been worth it if they had thought about what they were producing. A slight bend in the pry bar end, a hex slot and a less specific wrench tool would have all made this tool well worth the $1.69. If you have a Strider knife in need of adjustment, this might be worth the cost to see if it actually fits your knife as it is a low risk at this price point, but otherwise I’d suggest people keep looking.
Def
Donations
Community Links
