The BladeForums.com 2024 Traditional Knife is ready to order! See this thread for details:
https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/bladeforums-2024-traditional-knife.2003187/
Price is $300 $250 ea (shipped within CONUS). If you live outside the US, I will contact you after your order for extra shipping charges.
Order here: https://www.bladeforums.com/help/2024-traditional/ - Order as many as you like, we have plenty.
I see, I should’ve been more specific. I was subconsciously thinking of a wilderness environment I suppose, where all you’ve got are two knives, the rest of your gear, and your wits.DangerZone98, as others have said, you don't mention the environment you are talking about. If it's the usual urban or suburban environment, or something or someone is carrying a person's tools for them in a forest wilderness, then they can pretty much have anything they want. I think this is the likely case for just about everyone who prefers axes, hatchets, machetes, saws, or whatever, to the two-knife combo you are talking about.
When I'm packing into the wilderness, where I need to keep my pack weight and bulk to a minimum, I can pretty much do everything I need to do (chopping wood to delicate camp chores) with one knife: around a 10" high-quality blade with a finger choil. Knowing an unanticipated emergency or survival situation could occur at any time, having a big, versatile, do-everything knife gives me as much confidence as I can probably get, especially when calorie conservation can be the difference between life and death. Because cutting tools are so important in a forest wilderness, for redundancy and convenience I usually also carry a 4.5" blade and multi-tool, all high-quality. I can't think of too much this combination can't handle.
To each their own, though. The important thing is to think about all possibilities, not just probabilities, and be as safe as possible.
I love khuks. Just a nitpick, but the kardas we got from The Khukuri House were kinda dull. Small issue though, nothing a sharpener can’t fix.If I were thrown into the wilds and had to walk 50 miles back to civilization, I would want nothing more than a 4" stout and sharp fixed blade. With that, I could do most tasks required to hoof it out of there.
Even still, I find the area between a 9" and 3"/4" not enough of a difference to work for me. At that point, I have two knives that overlap 80% and weigh me down.
I have long been a fan of a rig that consists of wildly different knives/tools to cover more work. Something like the Khukuri set up where the scabbard pairs a large, thick blade with a small 2-3" narrow knife and a tool that can be used to maintain the edges of said knives that nest behind the big one. I modify mine a bit. I carry a khukuri with about 12" blade, pick and choose a karda (small knife) out of my collection that comes in around 3" of blade and very pointy/narrow as to handle much finer work, and then carry a small 2-3 layer Swiss Army Knife in the place of the chakma (traditional burnishing tool) as to have more specialized tools like scissors or a saw or what have you to maximize my tool set.
If you only had a big knife (9”+ blade length) and a small knife (4-5” blade length), would there be any knife-related tasks that would still give you trouble? Or does this reasonably cover all bases?
Purely hypothetical situation, folks. We all know every man needs at least two knives.
I love khuks. Just a nitpick, but the kardas we got from The Khukuri House were kinda dull. Small issue though, nothing a sharpener can’t fix.
I still don’t know how to use the “chakmak” honer that comes with the khuk, lol.
I think even Kephart had a pocket knife with him.
I think I’ve seen this before. I’ve tried chakmak honing once, but I didn’t really notice any increase in perceived sharpness.
If you only had a big knife (9”+ blade length) and a small knife (4-5” blade length), would there be any knife-related tasks that would still give you trouble? Or does this reasonably cover all bases? ...