IOW, while not fully automatic, are they faster to open than a well-lubed quality folder ?
Would be interested in acquiring something reasonably priced, but would prefer some educated steerage in the right direction.
These are what I normally carry.
The little red Victorinox Classic being indispensable for digging/tweezing out splinters in the shop, and the Gerber Paraframe 'just in case'.
I could never master the one hand opening, partly because I have had arthritis for a while but I used to know a guy who had a Spyderco. He could open it like lightening.
Basically as soon as it was out of his pocket, it was open.
The LW has thumbholes in both the straightedge and serrated blades. These work pretty well to flip the knife open quickly. The serrated blade has notches cut in the top so that you know it from the straightedge blade without looking.
The larger Kershaw AO’s work the best. Also made by Kershaw are the beefier Zero Tolerance knives. The Zero Tolerance Models 350 and 400 are nice, but more expensive than the normal Kershaw Models. The normal Kershaw AO knives with a 3-inch blade (or around 3-inch) work beautifully. The smaller blades don’t seem to have enough blade inertia to reliably open until lock.