Camp Knife Challenge Results!!!!!

I don't know, I think Brian has a bit of supermodel quality about him...I was happy with it. :eek:
 
Camp Knife Challenge II ?

6.jpg
 
Magnussen said:
Personally, I think Brian should have had our knives displayed with supermodels. What a disappointment.

Rick
Click to expand...

Damn dude......now you have to mention it!!!

I am getting old or something, because that should have been the first thing on my mind :D

Pitdog....you are just sick bro! I know you run around half naked all the time, but not me :D

All the comments for making this stuff better is way cool. In fact, there was a lot learned on my side as well. Like Dan suggested, 6 knives is a pretty good number.

Doing all the measurements, sharpness testing, and fit and finish photos didn't really seem like all that big of a deal. But even half way into the "Cooking" section I started cursing at Pitdog for getting me into this :D Just kidding. On any of the stuff, I couldn't just breeze through it. In each task, it took considerable time just to get an opinion of each knife. Then more time to figure out likes and dislikes.

Because of this, it does feel like the testing was "less grand" than what I had envisioned in my head. It was mostly because of the time consuming nature of getting a "feel" for each knife.

I ended up taking minimal pictures compared to what I actually "did" well because I already had 180ish. More would have been painful. Plus, some stuff was harder doing it by myself.

Critique away on the testing too. Maybe this is something (on a smaller scale) that folks are willing to try and continue and getting a test method down would be neat. I just think someone else should do the next round. I need a break! :D

B
 
I can't wait for the next round! If it's a small knife challenge, I'm in. I like how Brian did the testing. It was real world knife use.
 
I just read this one again. Enjoyed it as much as the first time! Hey Brian, I notice on all the backyard photo's you are wearing a baldric and another sheath knife. Its rather funny that you have 11 knives in front of you and you are carrying a knife too :D :D

I suspect there was a private 12th knife being evaluated in that mix ;)













ugghhh....a year later.....we find out the Mora clipper kicked everybodies butts :D :D :D (no I don't think so).
 
kgd said:
I suspect there was a private 12th knife being evaluated in that mix ;)

ugghhh....a year later.....we find out the Mora clipper kicked everybodies butts :D :D :D (no I don't think so).
Click to expand...

Ha! A clipper I could handle. If it turned out to be a Cold Steel, there would be no end of scandal.

All the best,

- Mike
 
This is really a great thread for a new maker to see.

It really puts things into perspective, and I mean that literally. The clear close-ups of all the flaws, or lack thereof really draws a fine line between good craftsmanship and something less than good craftsmanship.
 
Great thread. Thank you for sharing your review with us.

I might have missed it within this thread, but are the specs for that Laconico available?

Thank you.
 
69_knives said:
It really puts things into perspective, and I mean that literally. The clear close-ups of all the flaws, or lack thereof really draws a fine line between good craftsmanship and something less than good craftsmanship.
Click to expand...

I don't think that the distinction between good and less than good craftsmanship is that clear in this case. Some of the makers are focused on building solid working knives at a reasonable price. I personally don't need my knife to be flawlessly pretty...and don't want to pay that type of money. To me good craftsmanship is building a good blade that does the job that it's built to do...and does it well. By that definition all these makers are providing good craftsmanship.
 
Brian, You really outdid yourself with this post. Not only were you truthful, but the time and effort, and intelligence that you put forth with the descriptive review really shows how you took the task on seriously. You are definitely the man for the job. WOW!!!!!
 
69_knives said:
This is really a great thread for a new maker to see.

It really puts things into perspective, and I mean that literally. The clear close-ups of all the flaws, or lack thereof really draws a fine line between good craftsmanship and something less than good craftsmanship.
Click to expand...

JCavSD - I don't think 69_knives meant to be disrespectful in his post. I think he was just commenting from a maker's perspective and seeing the types of critique that can be expected between makers. Few of the aesthetic issues that Brian pointed out have any real performance implications (apart from issues of grinds). That is also why he didn't include it in the overall knife rating.

However, as Rick often states on Chat - knife makers really like to critique one another at shows and get togethers. This is done for purely informational purposes and allows one maker to see where they can make improvements to F&F if they wanted to go that route. Like any intellectual and artistic endeavor, self assessment and critique is difficult to do. Hell, look at all the spelling mistakes in this post :D I think Brian's first part in his assessment/observation provided a lot of information to makers and interested consumers even outside the sphere of participating contestants.

I have to admit that it took me a long time before I started to generate an eye and later was told to look for on F&F issues. I still can't approach assessing something the way Rick or Brian can. It really is fun to watch them look over a knife. The look at it like I would a fish during a dissection. For many makers, I would imagine having a clear demonstration of things to watch-out for can really help them with self assessment and to improve their work should they chose to go that route.

Of course the issue of whether or not improved F&F at the expense of cost is desirable or not from a user and economic model perspective is a totally different topic. There is certainly room in the knife world for all kinds of knives. But if I could have a Rick knife at $13.00 I wouldn't bat an eye at it.....Well that is unless Jimi Wade came along actually batted me in the eye for underpaying such a classy maker :D
 
Joezilla said:
Brian, You really outdid yourself with this post. Not only were you truthful, but the time and effort, and intelligence that you put forth with the descriptive review really shows how you took the task on seriously. You are definitely the man for the job. WOW!!!!!
Click to expand...

:thumbup:
Now the task at hand is to find out who really makes Rick's knives.:eek:
I mean really, does anybody think that Rick does that kind of work? I've got a fire kit that he claims to have made but there is no way in the world I believe it or that knife were made by some neanderthal drummer from Ontario. The quality is unreal.




:D

Great challenge, great review and great knives everyone.:thumbup:
 
Brian Andrews said:
All the comments for making this stuff better is way cool. In fact, there was a lot learned on my side as well. Like Dan suggested, 6 knives is a pretty good number.

Doing all the measurements, sharpness testing, and fit and finish photos didn't really seem like all that big of a deal. But even half way into the "Cooking" section I started cursing at Pitdog for getting me into this :D Just kidding. On any of the stuff, I couldn't just breeze through it. In each task, it took considerable time just to get an opinion of each knife. Then more time to figure out likes and dislikes.

Because of this, it does feel like the testing was "less grand" than what I had envisioned in my head. It was mostly because of the time consuming nature of getting a "feel" for each knife.

I ended up taking minimal pictures compared to what I actually "did" well because I already had 180ish. More would have been painful. Plus, some stuff was harder doing it by myself.

Critique away on the testing too. Maybe this is something (on a smaller scale) that folks are willing to try and continue and getting a test method down would be neat. I just think someone else should do the next round. I need a break! :D

B
Click to expand...

I still am going to stick to my original suggestion- a testing team. While I think you were very good at being objective, different styles and ideas of knife use might mean a broader experience in testing- and dude, you NEEDED like, 4 more pairs of hands for the amount of work you had!!!!!

69_knives said:
This is really a great thread for a new maker to see.

It really puts things into perspective, and I mean that literally. The clear close-ups of all the flaws, or lack thereof really draws a fine line between good craftsmanship and something less than good craftsmanship.
Click to expand...

I'm going to come down on 69's side - I consider myself fair to middling with fit and finish, but I'm far, far better than I was before I had some knifemakers grill me and talk to me about my early work.

Two things going on here-

1: experience- it takes time to get to even be able to see the details- I remember Kevin Kashen talking about how it would take his students several knives to be able to see scratch marks or fit flaws. The whole thing goes faster if you have a good critique now and then.

2: patience. There's not a single issue raised with anyone's fit and finish that couldn't be solved with a couple finer grits and either 20 minutes extra prep and prefit time or 20-30 minutes extra finish time. I'm not saying we all need to duplicate the work of the mastersmith who is cheating for Rick :D :D :D - but pulling a tang from a rough 80/120 grit finish to a smooth 400 grit isn't going to take a lot of time (that's an example, have no idea at all if it's actually relevant to any one person's knife in the thread- it's just one of those easy tweaks that sometimes bugs me when people I know do top quality work leave it out.)

Now, There's things that either take a machine shop and CAD or require a lot of experience- my handles are almost all very slightly asymmetrical. I see it, I pay attention to it, but I finish by the 'feel in the hand' and it slowly, ever so slowly, improves.

And there's things that take a ton of time- those things become big economic choices for a maker. 8 hours in a $150 knife or 20 hours in a $600 knife? There's tooling limitations, which I know all about- can have a big effect on how long it takes you to accomplish a certain degree of fit and finish.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top