Building Shelter without a Mora?

[Triquetra]

This question is not only about a Mora but smaller knives in general. There's always the debate of the merits of a small knife vs a large knife. It seems that one could do most things with a large knife that you could do with a small one, though maybe not as well, but not in reverse. My question is, in the wilderness with only a Mora type knife (read small knife), without a saw or other implement, what type of protective shelter can you build. I don't see how you could chop poles or branches. You could cut them, but it would take forever. Snow caves would be possible in the right environment. So what kind of shelter is possible, sans tent, tarp, plastic bag, etc. Only you, a small knife, and whatever nature provides. This is a question presented to all of you from a complete novice. So any practical advice would be appreciated.

 

[grobe]

you can build a number of shelters without any knife at all. lean-to, debris hut, most anything short of a log cabin. you can use poles without cutting them. you can also use fire to shorten long poles. a friend and i once built a three sided shelter much like an a-frame tent. it had plenty on room for both of us and what we carried (small day packs only). we used it every day for an entire spring-summer. the shelter was built using only a folding knife (mostly to scrape bark from the poles) and stood for about a year and a half before we tore it down.

 

[longbow50]

What a knife does is make the shelter easier to build. Using a Mora, instead of a large Busse just means that you will use different methods and knife skills to do the work.

 

[Triquetra]

What a knife does is make the shelter easier to build. Using a Mora, instead of a large Busse just means that you will use different methods and knife skills to do the work.

Yes, but what methods and skills would you use? To cut enough 3", 4", 2" or whatever poles to make a shelter with a Swiss Army knife or Mora would take forever. You could dig a hole and maybe cut a bunch of cedar limbs for cover, but what other kind of shelters can you build and how would you build or construct them?

you can build a number of shelters without any knife at all. lean-to, debris hut, most anything short of a log cabin. you can use poles without cutting them. you can also use fire to shorten long poles

How are you going to build the shelters? How are you going to get poles without cutting? To make enough poles to construct a shelter by burning them in half or shortening them would have to take hours or days?

 

[starlight]

What a knife does is make the shelter easier to build.

Out of curiousity, what kind of shelter are you building? What are you using the knife for?

 

[Thomas Linton]

I second the respknses above.

As to "different methods," you can quickly "cut" down 1.5" poplar, aspen, soft maple, buckthorn, etc. with a good lockblade knife. Bend the sapling over sharply and push the knife into the sapling at the point of maximum bending stress. The cut creates a stress-riser, and they snap. Such wood is quite suitable for shelter building.

 

[skammer]

What a knife does is make the shelter easier to build. Using a Mora, instead of a large Busse just means that you will use different methods and knife skills to do the work.

Agreed, it just makes life easier which is nice in a dire situation and could make the difference.

Skam

 

[Thomas Linton]

Yes, but what methods and skills would you use? To cut enough 3", 4", 2" or whatever poles to make a shelter with a Swiss Army knife or Mora would take forever. You could dig a hole and maybe cut a bunch of cedar limbs for cover, but what other kind of shelters can you build and how would you build or construct them?

An emergency shelter needs to be just big enough to occupy since you body heats it. 3-4" is unnecessary and might even present a risk of injury if the shelter collapses -- which has been known to happen. (Of course, if that's all there is, you will be slowed by the lack of a "chopper" or saw.

As noted above, debris shelters can usuallt be built with no tools at all. Just break off branches with your hands and feet.

The information needed may be how to build a shelter, not what knife to use. If you were more familar with field-expedient shelters, the discussion of tools use would be easier. I'll try to find a link to post.

And building a really thick debris shelter -- one that can keep out a good rain - takes time -- even with optimal tools and raw materials. (Find a good place. Start at once.)

Try this as a start: http://members.tripod.com/~jpbeardsley/book.html

 

[Ravaillac]

Yes, but what methods and skills would you use? To cut enough 3", 4", 2" or whatever poles to make a shelter with a Swiss Army knife or Mora would take forever.

You can cut a wrist thick tree with a mora. Kochanski describes it in his book, by bending tree, and cutting along fibers. I've used this method several times, and while not being the quickest method it works and don't take forever (less then five minutes for a 2-3" tree in most cases).

 

[crawfordew]

In "98.6 The Art of Keeping Your Ass Alive" Cody Lundin demostrates cutting branches/saplings with a Mora knife, it works (I've done it).
Gene

 

[ishiyumisan]

This question is not only about a Mora but smaller knives in general. There's always the debate of the merits of a small knife vs a large knife. It seems that one could do most things with a large knife that you could do with a small one, though maybe not as well, but not in reverse. .

small knife is good to open up game end of the story.
yes you can build a shelter will take one day ecc....


A big knife can do the jobs of a small knife but a small knife can't do the job of a big one..............A short bladed knife is not long enough to create much useful forse and does not have enough weight at the right place to be effective ecc..................

carry always two knife be smart

plan no useless move, take no step in vain.

ishiyumisan

 

[Ravaillac]

small knife is good to open up game end of the story.

How ignorant.

 

[ishiyumisan]

How ignorant.

you must be the smart man who shaves the beard with a small kinfe
do you?
MASTER MIND !!!????



plan no useless move, take no step in vain.

ishiyumisan

 

[Cliff Stamp]

To cut enough 3", 4", 2" or whatever poles to make a shelter with a Swiss Army knife or Mora would take forever.

Shelters only require two inch poles for the main frames and one inch ones for the latting. Depending on the type and the location you only need 2-4 of the larger poles and maybe a dozen or two to fill out the frame. Cutting down four inch trees is a waste of time, effort, and starts to bring you into the class of wood which is dangerous to cut.

Two inch trees can be notched felled with a mora using a baton if they are hardwoods, if the wood is weak, or you have someone to give you a hand they can bend the wood which will make it almost fall apart under the blade. It only takes a couple of minutes per pole. This is a lot longer than a small axe or large blade or saw (<10 s on that wood), but total time for the framing poles is still less than ten minutes. It would take you longer to find them and bring them back to the shelter.

Some people advocate other methods such as hammering on the butt and driving the point into the tree to weaken it, Fallkniven for example. I have tried this however and found it very slow and use other methods. You cold also make a billhook out of the Mora and use it directly as a larger blade. I have even done this with fairly small folders. All of this assumes of course you need to actually cut wood, which should be your last course of action.

For snow shelters you are better off using the knife to cut and shape a stick and use that to cut blocks using the knife if necessary to break the crust on top of the snow, at times here it gets so heavy you can readily walk on it with feet of snow underneath, this is fairly dangerous unless you know the area as step in the wrong spot and you can be over your neck in a drift.

Anyway, I would rather carry a longer blade or axe, but it doesn't take hours to cut the wood for a multiple man sized shelter with a Mora.

A big knife can do the jobs of a small knife but a small knife can't do the job of a big one..............

Yes it can, it just isn't very efficient, just like it isn't very efficient to carve a spoon with a 12" bolo.

-Cliff

 

[longbow50]

Out of curiousity, what kind of shelter are you building? What are you using the knife for?

Actually, because most of the shelters I've experimented with, were debris types, a knife really wasn't needed to do any cutting, except for the fire.

I've used a Mora sized blade, as well as a Khukuri and Becker BK-7, to cut sapplings to frame shelters and it was much easier to collect the sapplings with the larger blades, but like Cliff pointed out, the time difference between large and small blades doing the work, wasn't much.

 

[abo4ster]

Debris hut or lean-to depending on weather and clothing.

Larger or green branches batoning works well. Dry larger branches can be snapped by placing between 2 close trees or branches and using as a lever.

 

[skammer]

I rarely reach for a smaller blade ever.

My large blades are in my hands a lot! Large blades are more utilitarian no question but knowing how to get by with any sized or no blade is the goal.

Skam

 

[Thomas Linton]

you must be the smart man who shaves the beard with a small kinfe
do you?
MASTER MIND !!!????



plan no useless move, take no step in vain.

ishiyumisan

How ignorant.

Ravailac

What ever happened to simple courtesy?

A smaller knife does some tasks more slowly and other jobs faster than a chopping knife. As for me, I would not be without a 7" or larger knife OR a stout 4" knife (3/16" thick or better) PLUS a good folding saw. But that's me. I didn't write a book (98.6) endorsed by a Who's Who of the SAR and survival world.

Lundin did write that book. Attacking someone personally and name-calling because a member of this forum gives some credence to 98.6 is both vain (in both senses of the word) and useless. It does not convince. It is just "table pounding."

Ditto for name-calling the other way. :thumbdn:

 

[Triquetra]

In "98.6 The Art of Keeping Your Ass Alive" Cody Lundin demostrates cutting branches/saplings with a Mora knife, it works (I've done it).
Gene

I've seen this book mentioned on more than one occasion on this forum. Is this a practical or worthwhile book that would be to my advantage to purchase and read? I am assuming that it is.

 

[Thomas Linton]

I've seen this book mentioned on more than one occasion on this forum. Is this a practical or worthwhile book that would be to my advantage to purchase and read? I am assuming that it is.

The book presents an excellent approach to emergency survival in a very readable format. It has lots of useful, detailed information. It is endorsed by all the major authorities in the U.S. and U.K. I think you need to remind yourself of two things: 1) His experience is primarily in the SW U.S. (Someone from BC or Minn. whould write a different book in many respects.); 2) he is not a knifeknut (For example, he states that SS is always harder than carbon steel and therefore always harder to sharpen. Guess he never "met" cheap-ass SS knives OR D-2. )