Not all knives are created equal...©

 

 

Not all knives are created equal, nor is all steel the same; a knife, like any tool, is created to do a job and depending on the job, the knife, and the steel in it, will be different. 

 

When you go out into the woods you need to have a durable, reliable, trustworthy knife.  So, in a survival  situation what knife is the best?

 

In a survival situation, the best knife to have, is the one in your hand!  And as the writers at Field & Stream wrote, “Any knife is better than none in an emergency”¹. 

 

But, if you’re sitting in your chair at home, trying to decide what knife to take with you in case of an emergency, what do you pick?  Is there a right or wrong choice?

 

 

Fixed blade or folder?

 

So, do you pick a fixed blade sheath knife or a folding pocketknife?  That depends on what you plan to use it for.

 

If you are going to use your knife to baton pieces of wood apart, so you can get to the dry wood at the core and make kindling and fuzz sticks, cut browse or blaze trees, then you will want to use a fixed blade sheath knife, not a folding knife.  If you are planning on using your knife for repairing gear, skinning small game, whittling trap triggers and fishing gorges, and other small tasks, then you will want a pocketknife.

 

Fix blade sheath knives

As the late Colonel Townsend Whelen, who was a survival expert during the early years of the 20^th century, once wrote,  “The sheath
knife ... can be invaluable for a lot of different jobs: blazing, cutting browse, repairing leather goods, and making fuzz-sticks for starting a fire”².

 

Pocketknives

 

Some pocketknives have multiple blades and/or tool blades and it can be an all-around wilderness tool.  Generally, the blades are thinner than those of a fix blade knife and can be ground sharper.

 

About pocketknives, Colonel Townsend Whelen noted in On Your Own in the Wilderness that, “The best all-around type is the so-called trapper’s knife ... with one blade for rough usage and another for finer work in close quarters.  The first blade, with a rounded point, is excellent for general skinning, the second blade, with a point sharp enough to lift a splinter from your hand, if need be, can be kept for more delicate skinning ... Whatever other knife you have, you’d better have one of these that you can keep in your pocket...”³.

 

Big versus small?

 

With knives, size is a personal preference, bigger isn’t always better, and size truly doesn’t matter if the knife does the job it was designed for.  If you are going to use your fixed blade knife to hack and cut browse, blaze trees or baton wood, then you will want a knife that is five to six inches (13 to 15 cm) in length and one to two inches (5 cm) in width. 

 

Obviously, pocketknives fold and fit into your pocket so the blades are smaller, usually no longer than four inches (10 cm) at the largest.

 

What to look for...

 

The Pathfinder School⁴ suggests a knife blade with a flat spine and sharp 90^o angles on both sides.  The reason for this is in a survival situation, you can use the flat spine of your knife to scrape sparks from a ferrocerium rod or to strike against a piece of flint to throw sparks and start a fire.  Without a 90^o spine on the back of your knife, you will have to use your blade to scrape sparks from a ferro rod and this will quickly ruin the edge (for more read From a Little Spark May Burst a Flame...©, HERE).

 

For fixed blade knives, look for a knife with a full tang.  This  means that that steel of the knife runs the full length and width of the hilt⁵,
and this will ensure that your knife is strong enough to act as a tool.  For both pocketknives and sheath knives, you want a grip that feels good in your hand, a cracked scale on a pocketknife can leave you with blisters and a grip that is too big for your hand can slip.  Additionally, fixed blade knives must have a good sheath, whether it is leather, nylon or Kydex is a personal preference.

 

To rust or to not rust?

 

Unfortunately, not all steel is created the same.  Some steel is more rust resistant, and some produces better sparks than others.  Steel is an alloy of iron and some other elements, such as carbon, sulfur, manganese, tungsten, or chromium.  This mixture of elements is what gives an alloy of steel its own unique properties. 

 

Stainless steel knives resist rusting because stainless steel is an alloy with a minimum chromium content of 10.5%.  The chromium reacts
with the oxygen in the air to form a protective layer that makes stainless steel highly resistant to rust.  Just because stainless steel resists rusting doesn’t mean it won’t, it can and it will under the right conditions, just not as quickly as normal steels.  Stainless steels rust when exposed to salt water, grease, moisture, or heat for prolonged periods of time.

 

High carbon steel doesn’t have chromium in its makeup, and because of this high carbon steel knives are prone to rusting quickly and require more care to maintain, but they are easier to sharpen in the wilderness.  Also, they throw more sparks when used as a striker with flint or ferrocerium.  

 

So, what is the best steel for a survival knife, high carbon steel⁴ or stainless steel?  The Pathfinders School suggests that a survival knife should be made from high carbon steel, because it throws more sparks, if used as a striker, and because it is easier to sharpen.

 

So, what did Col. Whelen carry?

 

The late Colonel Townsend Whelen carried a fixed blade hunter’s knife, with a 3-½ long blade, and a stockman pattern two-bladed folding knife, both of which were made with high carbon steel.

 

Personally, I carry a high carbon steel fix blade boning knife with a six inch (15 cm) long blade that is one inch (2.5 cm) wide at the base and ¹/₈ inch (3 mm ) thick.  It has a full tang and is comfortable in my hand.  I have carried this knife for the last 15 years and have been very pleased with it.  I also carry a Kershaw Leek Pocket Knife (1660) stainless steel folding knife in my neck sheath.  It has a SpeedSafe Assisted Opening button, which means it can be easily opened one handed – a plus if you are injured in the wilderness and can only use one hand.  As my back-up survival knife that is kept in my survival kit, I carry a pocketknife with a 2 ¾  (7 cm) long, high carbon steel blade made by the Colonial Knife Company.  It no longer has any scales, but that is fine by me as it feels good in my hand, and it has an awl, a bottle opener/screwdriver and a can opener blade which have all proved invaluable in the field.

 

Don’t forget to come back next week and read “Not All Steel is Created the Same ©”, where we will talk about which high carbon steel is the best for your survival knife.

 

I hope that you continue to enjoy The Woodsman’s Journal Online and look for me on YouTube at BandanaMan Productions for other related videos, HERE.  Don’t forget to follow me on both The Woodsman’s Journal Online, HERE, and subscribe to BandanaMan Productions on YouTube.  If you have questions, as always, feel free to leave a comment on either site.  I announce new articles on Facebook at Eric Reynolds, on Instagram at bandanamanaproductions, and on VK at Eric Reynolds, so watch for me.

 

That is all for now, and as always, until next time, Happy Trails!

 

Notes

¹ Field & Stream, December 2008 – January 2009, page 110, HERE

 

² From On Your Own in the Wilderness, by Colonel Townsend Whelen and Bradford Angier

 

³ Ibid.

 

⁴ Information on The Pathfinder School can be found, HERE

 

⁵ Some knives have a full tang, some with a partial tang that only extends partway into the hilt, and some are forged with a “tail” that extends through the length of the hilt.

 

Sources

 

 

Ewing, Dexter; “Best Survival Knife: These 10 Blades Could Save Your Skin”, September 1, 2022, [© 2023 Caribou Media Group], https://blademag.com/fixed-blade/best-survival-knives, accessed May 26, 2023

 

Gordon, Ben; “Why Flint Probably Won’t Spark Your Knife (or Hatchet)”, © 2023 Copyright Bulwark Consulting LLC of Wisconsin dba Ben Gordon Outdoors™, https://bengordonoutdoors.com/why-flint-only-makes-sparks-from-some-steels/, accessed May 12, 2023

 

Knifeguide; “1095 Steel – Is it a Good Knife Steel?”, https://www.knifeguides.com/1095-steel-for-knives/, accessed May 16, 2023

 

KnivesShipFree; “How to turn your ESEE knife into a firesteel striker”, April 12, 2015, https://www.knivesshipfree.com/blog/how-to-turn-your-esee-knife-into-a-firesteel-striker/, accessed May 12, 2023

 

McCafferty, Keith; “Primitive Survival Skills”, Field & Stream, February 2006, page 54-56, https://books.google.com/books?id=572F69alwGYC&pg=PA56&dq=Striking+sparks+with+a+pocket+knife&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjy_824oPH-AhUyjokEHWgSAHsQ6AF6BAgOEAI#v=onepage&q=Striking%20sparks%20with%20a%20pocket%20knife&f=false, accessed May 13, 2023

 

Mee, Arthur; and Thompson, Holland, Ph. D., Editors; The Book of Knowledge, Volume XXIV, [The Grolier Society, New York, 1911], https://books.google.com/books?id=AG46AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA5540&dq=pocketknife+carbon+points&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjXi8TxnPv-AhW4EVkFHfGpAuw4FBDoAXoECAgQAg#v=onepage&q=pocketknife%20carbon%20points&f=false, accessed May 17, 2023

 

Integrated Publishing; Hull Maintenance Technician, “Figure 6-11.--spark pictures formed by common metals”,[© Copyright Integrated Publishing, Inc.], page 6-16, https://enginemechanics.tpub.com/14119/Figure-6-11-Spark-Pictures-Formed-By-Common-Metals-189.html, accessed May 17, 2023

 

Survival World 2003; “Best Survival Knife”, © 2023 Apple Pie Media LLC, https://www.survivalworld.com/gear/best-survival-knife/, accessed May 12, 2023

 

Whelen, Colonel Townsend, and Angier, Bradford; On Your Own in the Wilderness, [The Stackpole Company, Harrisburg, PA, 1958], page 116 to 120

 

Why Knives: “1075 vs 1095”, [© 2023 Why Knives], https://whyknives.com/1075-vs-1095-steel/, accessed May 20, 2023