Breaking blade while batoning

R.A.T. said:
"Batoning" is one of these techqiues that just caught on and now everyone wants to do it. Sort of like some new dance craze. Something I rarely see on these so called "survival" threads is someone using a knife as a drawknife, which has far more legitimate survival uses, in my opinion, than batoning.
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"batoning" became an olympic sport in USA ? :D

In France too ... :(
 
Jeff,
Yes, that was what I'm referring to. To me, the poster was selling your knife as fully capable to handle such tasks(as he's done a lot of batoning with his 4) and if it were to fail during use, the OP shouldn't worry about it due to ESEE's warranty. I suppose I misinterpreted the response as hostile.
 
I can't recall the last time I was ever hostile towards anyone on here. Maybe a smartass but never hostile :D
 
I only baton small logs to get dry wood for starting the fire. After that batoning is just a waste of time and you risk breaking your knife. You CAN break any knife while batoning, I hit a really really nasty knot while batoning with my Dogfather and had to reverse baton the knife out of the wood very carefully because I was scared of breaking the knife/ mauling the edge. You just have to pick small diameter logs and try to go with the grain and you'll be fine but batoning big logs is dumb.

And on the warranty issue I know that even my beaters I treat with respect and would never return a broken knife unless the failure was due to the blade being defective. You have to take care of your stuff even if it has a lifetime warranty. I respect the hell out of esee for their warranty.
 
Batoning is one of those fads I haven't been able to wrap my head around. Like most, I've tried it. Maybe it's my location but the larger wood that's on the ground here on the western side of Washington State is saturated to the core. A person can gather and snap a nights worth of small dry wood and whittle some nice kindling in the time it takes to baton and chop a tree into a few hours worth of wood.

I love cutting firewood and kindling. It's one of those mindless tasks that makes me feel at peace. I think I'll just stick using an axe.
 
If you look around the forums you will find that some of the same guys that swear that the Mora is the ultimate bushcraft knife and the only one you need in the wilds are also the same guys that talk about batoning firewood. I simply find that ironic as hell.
 
R.A.T. said:
If you look around the forums you will find that some of the same guys that swear that the Mora is the ultimate bushcraft knife and the only one you need in the wilds are also the same guys that talk about batoning firewood. I simply find that ironic as hell.
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i like to keep a variety of koolaid around too.
 
I'll be very surprised if you bust off your 6 batoning.
I'm not sure how you could bust the 5.
Bend? Sure. The Rowen HT/temper job, though, it would probably just flex a bit and come right back to zero.
Chip? Maybe. Might take some work, but you could do it.
Dull? After a while.
Rust? Definitely. Solution: oil. Canola, mineral, tuff-glide, Slip 2000, remoil, WD40. Or patina. I guess a kera-cote/duracoat job too, though the edge might still rust.
But snap/break? No. At least not easily.
 
KalEl said:
And on the warranty issue I know that even my beaters I treat with respect and would never return a broken knife unless the failure was due to the blade being defective. You have to take care of your stuff even if it has a lifetime warranty. I respect the hell out of esee for their warranty.
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Agreed. I have used knives all my life(mostly light use) and have yet to break one... not one... cheap or otherwise. I certainly don't abuse them and if I ever do manage to break one(through my own abuse), I'm more than happy to support the company by buying another to replace it. It is, however, nice having the warranty there if you need it.
 
i think it's more of an over time kind of thing. just like they said in the throwing issue... because the steel is heat treated to be a hard steel, it doesn't take repeated trauma over a long period of time. after repeated abuse, microfractures are created in the steel and eventually it could break.
the guy that broke the knife throwing it even said he threw it about 1000 times before it broke. i imagine that all the baton practicing could potentially do the same. it would definitely take a lot to break these blades though. even pure abuse of throwing them took a long time.
personally, i'm not taking chances. i'll use my blades for hiking and camping and other outdoor related stuff, but i'm not going to abuse them. for me, the warranty is a peace of mind that they back their product, not a license to be abusive and disrespectful.
 
gytheran said:
Agreed. I have used knives all my life(mostly light use) and have yet to break one... not one... cheap or otherwise. I certainly don't abuse them and if I ever do manage to break one(through my own abuse), I'm more than happy to support the company by buying another to replace it. It is, however, nice having the warranty there if you need it.
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And the warranty will always be there. Again, my personal feelings behind the idiocy of most batoning have nothing to do with our company policy of supporting the practice when it comes to our knives and warranty. I may need to get two identities going on BFs. One for Jeff the company man and one for Jeff the individual :D Then I could talk to myself and call me an idiot.
 
LWILLIAMS said:
I just want to know the odds of breaking like a 5 or 6 while batoning. I use my RTAK II while batoning and worry sometimes. Is there any way in hell that one of these blades will break or am I just worrying. If you have ever broken one while batoning I want to hear it. I am talking just knife in the wood beating on it with wood, no super hard contacts.
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Last time I checked.... wood was weaker than steel. ;)
 
I baton through almond wood with my 5 no problem. There's alot of knots in it wich makes it alot more challenging than your more common woods. I start batoning until the knife is completely submerged in the wood then I use a wedge ( made from almond wood) and baton that on top of the spine until the knife is loose enough to pull out , then I continue to baton the wedge until the piece of wood splits. This technique is awsome, because your wasting less energy and your not putting to much stress on the blade. The worst thing that happens to my blade is the powder coating is removed a little, No big deal.
 
bombaclot said:
I baton through almond wood with my 5 no problem. There's alot of knots in it wich makes it alot more challenging than your more common woods. I start batoning until the knife is completely submerged in the wood then I use a wedge ( made from almond wood) and baton that on top of the spine until the knife is loose enough to pull out , then I continue to baton the wedge until the piece of wood splits. This technique is awsome, because your wasting less energy and your not putting to much stress on the blade. The worst thing that happens to my blade is the powder coating is removed a little, No big deal.
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I waste even less energy and just throw the entire unsplit log on the fire.
 
Batoning has been around forever in one way or another.

For me, the only reason I see it's need is to gain dry kindling when in a wet environment. Like Jeff stated, wrist sized piece of wood is all that's needed. You can start a one-stick fire with a little light batoning. It's a task all who venture out of doors should know about.
IA Woodsman has a good video about it. Notice most of his batoning is using his palm to tap the blade thru.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grWSLbl19Ns
 
R.A.T. said:
For example: my personal opinion from years of work in the wilderness is the ESEE-5 is a piece of shit as a wilderness knife. It's alright for what the SERE instructors designed it for but I wouldn't have the damn boat anchor hanging on my gear. I personally think anyone who feels they have to baton a 6 inch cut of wood to make fires is really lacking in fire building and woods experience. I personally think anyone who wears cologne to try and attract a female is gay.
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I'm Telling the Coast Guard "No it's ok, Jeff told me this was cool"

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