A look at afew of my knives, what to take on day hikes.

OmegaA said:
Perhaps my question is a bit silly, but what is the need for a large knife on a day trip? You should not be far from civilisation, I think you can avoid heavy work if you want, so it seems to me any knife will do for such a trip...
Thanks,
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well, heading to a park for a few hours, 20 min outside of town I don't need it, but my day hikes are 60 km away, or an hours drive(100 km/hr) and I go for the day. in alberta and that puts me in the middle of noware. so insdeat of an axe packing along, I would like a capable knife. Know what Im sayin?
 
In that case I think sheath quality and carry comfort would be my primary deal maker. Even though you ranked your knives on chopping ability - they were all able to chop. Even though they varied in ability to act as striker, the worst performers could be modified easily to perform better. So I'd go with the one that rides the nicest.
 
If a day hike is some times is to practiced a few skills or check out some equipment maybe a big chopper you would use on a longer trip might be worth taking out and putting it through its paces along with some multi task blades.
 
Personally, I'd go with the USMC Ka-Bar. The Ka-Bar is probably the best at batoning and the sheath pretty nice. Mine has a sharpened swedge and now it throws good sparks.
 
I usually carry a five inch blade due to its ease of carry and nearly ideal size for most tasks. I have carried the ka-bar and they are good knives, however I did put a lot of work int putting a scandi edge on it and my AF pilots knife which greatly improved their cutting performance. I don't chop with any of these knives prefering instead to either stress and cut branches and saplings, or batonning the bigger stuff. This allows greater control and less chance of injury or damage to the knife. Of the knives shown if it was me I'd take the Grohmann #4. I'd love to get one of those but can never find them in stock in carbon steel.
 
I would take the USMC.BUT - WITH THINNED EDGE AND SCANDI GRIND.I own one and in it's original version it's just not good for a bushcraft knife.Can't cut,chop or whittle with it.Well,it's great for digging,but who cares...:D
 
I bought a used kabar with the top guard cut off, i sharpened the swedge and its the only knife i have no problem using. Its preformed great so far.

on a side note could you explain what you fire kit consists of?
 
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