Review - JK Handmade Knives

[bearthedog]

JK Handmade Knives-Kephart/Nessmuk


Man behind the Man
Custom knife maker John Kiedaisch (Stomper) has been making knives out of Mokena, Illinois. I first noticed his Nessmuk style knife about a year ago. Little by little I have seen pictures of his knives turning up around the forums. Now, I have a thing for Kephart style knives and when I saw the one that John made, I had to try it out.

Upon Arrival
John’s package showed up just before I left town for some preparation hikes for Mount Whitney. Inside the package were a Kephart, Nessmuk, and Hiker. The Kephart and Nessmuk are the test pieces for this review. They are handsome knives built for real use. One thing I noticed about JK Handmade Knives is their Oak Handles. John will put whatever a person wants on them but his knives always caught my eye by the Oak. The Kephart and Nessmuk are made from 01 steel. Both are flat gound. John finishes his knives with a 400 grit satin look to them. I personally prefer this type of finish. It is easy to maintain and doesn’t look too, pretty. Blade length on the Kephart is 4-inches and 1/8-inch thick. Overall length is 8 ½-inches. JK Kephart weights in at 5 ½-ounces. Nessmuk has a 4 ¼-inch blade and is also 1/8-inch thick. Overall length, 8 ½-inches. Weight on the JK Nessmuk is 5 ¾-ounces.



To understand the Kephart Knife it is important to understand the man.

Horace Kephart

Horace Kephart (1862-1931) was an author, librarian, outdoorsman and early champion of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. He spent most of his life traveling the southern mountains, researching the area and its inhabitants. In 1913 he authored "Our Southern Highlanders," which became the definitive work on the area. He also published "Camping and Woodcraft”: A Guidebook for Those Who Travel in the Wilderness, which was the "bible" of outdoor living in its day. During the 1920's he contributed his significant influence to promoting the formation of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. He died in an automobile accident, and he did not live to see the National Park come to fruition in 1940.

Some people prefer a simple spear point knife with rounded wood handles. If you look through your kitchen knives you will notice that you probably have some Kephart-ish type knives. Look around at restaurants and you will see the same style of knife, usually a steak knife from a Bar-B-Q type restaurant. I noticed this while out to dinner a few weeks ago. With my order of salmon, I got a wood handle 5-inch knife that had a spear point blade. This doesn’t begin or end here; you can find shades of Kepharts simple designs in many other places. I have been looking through my knives, even looking in, “The Basket” to see if there were any knife handles that mimic the same principals. I found the Tramontina machetes to have a Kephart-ish style handle too. While its good for general outdoors applications, it is not very good for specialty type of work like tactical use. In fact the Kephart is about as tactical as a pack of Twinkies.



George Sears-Nessmuk

George Washington Sears (1821 –1890) was a writer for Forest and Stream magazine in the 1800’s in which his stories, appearing under the name, Nessmuk. George Sears was a pioneer of ultralight camping. His book Woodcraft and Camping is still in print, it was written in 1884. Mount Nessmuk, in northern Pennsylvania, is named after him. Nessmuk preferred a trio of tools for his travels through the woods. His fixed blade features a hump on its spine toward the tip and lots of belly. The Nessmuk is one of the most replicated knives of all time.







Tests
In the spirit of the days when drying out meat for consumption at a later time, was necessary, I decided to make beef jerky. Why not? This requires cutting lots of meat as well as trimming fat. I thought this would be a good test of edge holding ability and edge toughness, not because meat is hard on a blade, but the wood cutting board under it can be. This will dull a knife and you will loose your edge fast if you don’t have a good heat treat.
The Nessmuk was used for a week in the kitchen. This means slicing fruit, vegetables, cheese, salame, and all the other typical chores one could use a kitchen knife for. I did a few things with the Nessmuk that was a little more creative. One of those was slice pizza, not for me since I gave that up. It worked well as a slicer by simply using the belly of the Nessmuk with a rolling motion. This made short work of a small frozen pizza that needed to be cut. When the slices were cut the Nessmuk made a good server for the hot pie. This gave me another idea for later. I decided to eat some fish and rice with only the Nessmuk, no fork or spoon. The wide blade design did a good job scooping up rice as if it were a spoon. For a knife with an unorthodox design, compared to most kitchen knives, it sure did all the work of a conventional kitchen knife. I think every kitchen should have a Nessmuk!







On the Trail
Big Bear, in the San Gabriel Mountains Southern California, is the place where as a kid I spent much time hiking and camping with my grandfather and cousins. My grandfather was the anti-Nessmuk. He brought everything to the mountains! He had a list of 80 items he must take with him for a weekend in the mountains. There was a hatchet, saw and a machete. He would bring two rifles BB guns and a sling shot. The tent was enough for a small army. Those were the days. While all these years later I still hike and camp in Big Bear my style has taken a different path. For this hike I carried the JK Kephart on my paracord belt.
The Kephart was used to split a 4-inch wide log that was cut by the forestry. I did this with the help of a baton. This task is hard on a knife and some people consider it abuse. When attempting to split a log that’s diameter is the same or larger than the length of your blade, you don’t have much room to strike the tip of the blade with the baton. You must pick a spot on the outside of the round log to start your splits. Slowly work your way around making flatter corners. Get it as square as you can to make it easier to split. When there isn’t enough tip sticking out to strike with the baton try using the baton in an ice pick grip to get more pin point accuracy while striking the tip. Spear point designs are good for this, there is good energy transfer directed down through the wood, not back through the blade or handle. I split through a pretty hard knot that didn’t seem to want to give. The Kephart won.

[bearthedog]

Whittling wood with both knives seemed to have different results between the pair. Whenever I make fuzz sticks with a knife that has some belly I usually get a nice curl out of the wood. The Nessmuk gives me that nice porky pig tail look to the curls. Both knives have handles treated with linseed oil; I had a confident grip without any real hot spots. I preferr the grip of the Kephart,and the curls from the Nessmuk.









I don’t do too much stabbing with a knife but wanted to see what the tips were like as far as tip penetration. The Kephart had a better overall penetration with the spear point.

Kephart on left, Nessmuk on right.




Utility
When I get a new knife I use it for everything. I wouldn’t say these two made the best choice for the tasks at hand but it helps me get acquainted with the knives. Packaging tape was cut by the Kephart while mailing out knives. The Nessmuk was used on those clam packages with the sharp plastic. It cut right through like a razor. I used both knives for cutting up old t-shirts for rags.

Photos

[bearthedog]

Photo by Kevin Estela-Survival Instructor at the Wilderness Learning Center







Hiker Wharncliffe



Hiker 4”/Utility/Hiker

Photo by Mtnfolk Mike


JK Handmade Knives

jkiedaisch@sbcglobal.net
708-479-9328

[mtnfolk mike]

great review once again bear... great pics too man... i didn't expect to see mine in there...

those are some great looking knives... i really like john's work... my hikers back-up knife has been seeing lots of use the past week or so...

[SpookyPistolero]

Handsome pics, man. I'm liking that kephart.

[sicily02]

Very nice and great pics. I like them a lot. I really love the old photos.
I was in Bass Pro shops in Council Bluffs Ia. not long a go and was looking at the old pictures they have. Those pics of you posted Bear just made me think of that.

Thanks,

Bryan

[tonym]

As usual a great review and always amazing pics!

[wasp]

a 4 in. Hiker from John and it's a sweeet knife.I went with the 4in. blade with micarta grips.John took a firesteel I had and put micarta on it also.He then did me up a nice leather sheath with loop for firesteel and all this for under a $100.00!!!! I showed it to a friend of mine and he ordered 2 just like it.Quick turn-around time,quality and John loves making the customer happy...it won't be my last knide from him...

[bearthedog]

Lets all se your Stompers!

[bearthedog]

Hiker 4-inch

[tonym]

Here are my two, ILBRUCHE took the pics as he made the pants for them.
Camp cook knife and EDC knife



[/QUOTE]

[bearthedog]

Tony you got the EDC? Nice you must post more of that bad boy! Something about the two tone micarta looks classic.

[tonym]

I will as soon as I get it, Ilbruche just finished the sheaths and shipped them out today. I will be mighty busy testing out knives this summer.

[psy-ops]

BTD, Great review especially with the historical background.

Do you think Breeden's Path Finder is an elongated Nessmuk? I feel the extra weight towards the tip makes for a deeper cut.

[bearthedog]

Originally Posted by psy-ops

BTD, Great review especially with the historical background.

Do you think Breeden's Path Finder is an elongated Nessmuk? I feel the extra weight towards the tip makes for a deeper cut.

Kind of a modern Nessy for sure, mixed with a Grohman Boat Knife but more "in line".

Good point about the deeper cut, very important feature.
Thanks for adding.

[Rockywolf]

I should have known not to open this. Hey Bear, I will call you after I get back from camping this weekend. What time of day is best? I'm 2 hours ahead of you...

[bearthedog]

I am on Roch N Roll time so I don't even sleep till 7am. Be gentle and make it 11 am for me.

I forgot to post, Rockywolf Do Not Open this Thread!

[JK Knives]

Nice job, Bear! If only I could take pictures that good.

John

[Landi]

Bear, great review, pics, and background info. Well done! Nice knives as well JK.

[DPKnives]

Great review Bear. everything looked really nice and great history lesson as well. Cant wait to see mine done. hopefully soon Doug