During a recent trip to Walmart, I found a pocketknife they were selling for 94 cents. For less than a dollar, you can buy an Ozark Trail lock blade pocket knife with a stainless steel serrated blade and clip. The big question is could this knife actually cut anything? When knives this cheap are made, the blade edge is made during the stamping process while good quality knives are sharpened after the stamping or forging process.

I bought the knife and the serrated edge of the knife could cut paper, the straight edge on the other hand was worthless, it would not cut anything, when I tried to cut newspaper with it the paper tore more than cut. The challenge had begun, could I sharpen the knife so it could cut paper. With a little time and a sharpening stone, I was able to have the knife cut paper.

It did not take to much time to sharpen the knife because like with most cheap knives, a very soft steel is used to stamp the blade. Soft steel makes it very easy to stamp out lots of blades with very little wear on the stamping machinery. However, it also means that the soft steel cannot hold a sharp edge and since the Ozark Trail pocketknife is such a cheap knife with such soft steel, the edge I made becomes dull after only a few slices through paper. However, once you put a good edge on the knife it only takes a few seconds to sharpen the blade so it can cut again.

Despite the knife not being able to holding an edge, it does have a couple of uses. The knife is less than a dollar and the soft steel makes it a good choice to use when learning how to sharpen a knife. No matter how bad you are at sharpening knives it is hard to make the knife duller than it already is. The knife can be treated as a throw away knife so if you spend a few minutes sharpening the knife you can then use it for things you would rather not use a good knife on.

Therefore, yes, it is possible to buy a knife for less than a dollar that can actually cut things.