Batoning with a knife

A saw and a large blade to baton with, are great tools to harvest large chunks of fatwood!

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marcinek said:
So I take it you did some batonning in New Orleans, since batonning is the topic at hand. Do you feel the woods and climate there brought your knife any closer to its fatigue level? Seems so far the discussion has had to do with frozen and or "northern" hardwoods.
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Hmm, this makes me wonder what batonning through a cypress knee would be like...
 
Alberta Ed said:
If you can't split it with hand pressure, don't. Get an ax. Right tool for the job...
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Axes only work if you have wood large enough to accurately swing at, otherwise you're safer using a big knife. I find batoning with my big knives not only useful but essential when harvesting wood with which to build a fire; my axe may be used for splitting wood into manageable pieces but the big knife always gets put through its paces to get the wood small enough to work with. Heck, I even baton with my Fiddleback Bushfinger, when the wood gets *that* small it's really no danger to the knife to give it a few love taps.
 
91Bravo, looks like you had the right tool to get the job done. There is nothing wrong with batoning, in my opinion. Sure batoning a 11" log with a 12" blade is silly but using a knife to split wood for creating a bow drill divot set or processing smaller logs seems viable to me.
 
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In wet/snowy conditions batoning may be required to get to dry wood. In those conditions a fire could be life or death. I'd rather have a knife that can handle the abuse.
 
bearfacedkiller said:
^



All I am saying is take that advice for what it's worth...
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I said I've used knives 5 times concerning EDC or real emergency use.

Almost all of what I do with fixed blade knives is comparative chopping tests fairly deep in the woods, and if you count that as "use", then it's thousands of chops per knife with about ten knives, Randalls ect, averaging a little under 1k each...

Most of what I see on BF is people splitting wood grainwise in what looks like their backyard, complete with square cut lumber stands, deck patios, mowed grass and huge beer coolers... At best within sight of their cars.

Any cross-grain chopping is usually done by Busse owners... 3/16" stock or 5" blades are not fun to chop with...

KingMC said:
Axes only work if you have wood large enough to accurately swing at, otherwise you're safer using a big knife. .
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The very fact someone would not know this shows you they never chop at anything unsecured, or on ground that is not cleared and dead level...

Gaston
 
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