When I first laid eyes on this little tool in a discussion on our forum I thought it looked interesting enough. A few months later I decided to give it a shot and added it to an order I had placed with EDCDepot
There are a few multitools out there that define an evolutionary niche. Some are successful like Leatherman’s one handed opening Wave or locking Crunch pliers, and others were not, like SOG’s SwitchPlier or Leatherman’s MiniTool. The Pro Lock is firmly entrenched in the latter category but is no less important for it. As with most things, the successes can really only be measured by the not so successes.
The FROG tool by Gatco/Timberline is another interesting tool that defines and represents a whole section of the market. Like the Frosch tools, the FROG is a single piece of steel, cut and carved in such a way as to have multiple features, and let me tell you, it would be hard to add any more features to this one!
Once in a while, there’s a tool that comes along that is so different from any other, that no other manufacturer could hope to successfully incorporate any good points into their own designs. The Spyderco SpyderWrench and ByrdWrench are just that kind of design. Unlike any other tools, the Spyder and ByrdWrenches are hard to classify.
The Coast Fishing Multitool is a different type of tool than we normally think of when the term is used. It isn’t a plier based tool- in fact, it doesn’t seem to have a “primary” tool of any sort. It is merely a convenient tool that has several functions in a compact package. What more could one want? Oh yeah, and it’s fairly inexpensive too!
What kind of people would write collect and review multitools? Quite simple really- we are designers and do-ers, outdoors types and indoor types, mechanics, doctors, problem solvers and problem makers. As such, we have, as a world spanning community, put every type, size and version of multitool, multifunction knife, pocket knife and all related products to every test we could manage in as many places and environments as there are.