As JRE Dan clearly favored the tapered tang Bush Master I seemed to reach for the full-tang model each time. I suspect it has more to do with my appreciation of the natural canvas micarta than anything else as the knife is a bit heavier and otherwise nearly identical to the tapered tang version.
So this is the one I grabbed first this morning to take out and get dirty. I threw it into my new day pack with a piece of fatwood, my firesteel, a compass, my cookset, and my camera and tripod.
The first task once I got things set up was to check the edge. It looks good so I'll leave it alone.
By choking way back on the blade like this:
you can readily chop smaller branches. The ring grip should be a bit loose and would probably be best practiced with a lanyard just in case. I didn't put a lanyard on but knew that there was nobody within 100 yards of me should the knife fly out of my hand.
I grabbed a piece of frozen deadwood and worked my way around chopping down while holding the branch at an angle. Once I'd worked it a bit one direction I then chopped back up to loosen the chips. Doing this once or twice around the branch allows you to break it cleanly and is also one of the hardest tests I can imagine for the knife's edge.
I didn't find any knots but you can see that this isn't a rotted piece of wood. It's just a nice rock-hard piece of something that is sufficiently dry to burn very, very well.
The ring grip is nice too that it helps to deflect some of the shock of chopping and I noticed no discomfort during or after the effort. The butt of the knife is shaped in such a way to provide plenty of security without a lanyard and I never felt like I was putting myself at risk doing the chopping
without the lanyard.
There was no rolling, chipping, or deformation of the edge after this task and then I quickly fuzzed up my piece of fatwood. It took me a few seconds to figure out the best angle with the knife and then it was easy to get it to bite into the wood to make nice curls.
This one isn't Ray Mears nice yet but it'll surely catch from a match and scraping one side of the fatwood would produce enough shavings to start it with a metal match.
After I had the fuzz stick done, the wood chopped, and some tinder and kindling collected, I used the Bush Master to cut a shallow hole in the dirt where I could be sure to get under the layer of mud and snow that'd suck the energy and heat right out of my new fire. This did little but make the knife nice and muddy. Don't worry, I didn't put it back into the sheath after that and I'll wash it off before forwarding everything.
So, in conclusion, as I said before I'd buy one of these today if Dan were to make them available. After using it for a while I'm going to have a hard time sending this one on but, as I've made a promise to do so, I'll have to stick it in the box.
I can see how the Bushcraft knife is a compact version of the Bush Master or how the Bush Master is the up-sized version of the Bushcraft but I think an argument could easily be made that both should find a place in your knife collection. They will in mine. :thumbup:
Brett, these are headed your way today. I'll have them cleaned up (a bit) so make sure to get them appropriately dirty again.
Thanks for reading,
B