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Microtech MSI
Microtech built its reputation on out-the-front autos, and the Microtech MSI is what happened when the company turned that same obsession loose on a manual folder. MSI stands for Microtech Standard Issue, and the mission statement is right there in the name: a hard-use daily knife with a 3.88-inch sheepsfoot blade of thick-stock M390MK, deployed through a simple thumb hole, in a package that runs just under nine inches open.
Like the rest of the Microtech catalog, the MSI is machined in the USA. Unlike most of it, the hardware is standard Torx rather than proprietary fasteners, so adjusting the pivot or swapping the reversible deep-carry clip takes tools you already own.
How the Microtech RAM-LOK Works
The MSI debuted in 2023 as the first knife to carry the RAM-LOK, Microtech's crossbar-style lock. It drives a rectangular steel bar with a single coil spring instead of the pair of omega springs most crossbar designs rely on, and Microtech says the coil holds up better over time. You can drop the bar from either side of the handle and close the blade without a finger ever crossing the edge, and the X-pattern buttons on both flanks are a deliberate nod to the firing switch on the company's OTF line. The same lock now runs on the Stitch and Amphibian RAM-LOK models.
MSI vs MSI Mini
The full-size MSI is the workhorse, pairing that near four-inch sheepsfoot blade with a five-ounce build that shrugs off jobsite abuse. The MSI Mini scales the same lock and steel down to a 3.25-inch blade in a machined aluminum or titanium frame, weighing 3.4 ounces in aluminum, for anyone who wants the MSI's lockup in a smaller pocket. Same DNA, two very different carries.
M390MK Steel and MSI Handle Options
M390MK is an exclusive run of Bohler M390 tuned with Microtech's input for edge retention, corrosion resistance, and polish, and it holds its own against anything in our comparison of every major knife steel. Handles start at injection-molded polymer with Tri-Grip texturing, step up through G-10 with hardened steel liner plates and a titanium backspacer, and climb into machined frag and fluted aluminum, titanium, and carbon fiber on the Marfione Select runs, some wearing Baker Forge Damascus. For a manual knife, the MSI gives you more ways to spec it than almost anything else in the Microtech manual folding knives lineup.
