CS Recon Scout Fails Miserably

[STR]

I am surprised that it broke that easy. I have actually done this same chore with my RS only on smaller logs and it never did much more than take off the black finish. The log in the pic seems to be a challenging size for a knife that small though.

My son has my old Recon Scout that I beat up for years before I gave it to him. He has been carrying and using it over in Iraq so the picture of the event that occurred here does cause me some alarm. I remember in the CS proof video them smashing cinder blocks and other such abuses with the knife. Not sure what they will think of hitting the blade with a hammer though.

However I can't help but wonder if this knife would have snapped even if the temp was in the mid 50s. Looks to me like a clean break from a bad batch of steel. I think your friend just got a bad knife. Although I have to wonder if any knife won't break from time to time if hit just right. I know you Strider and Busse fans want to think that those knives are invincible but believe they can break also, and I'm sure they have in testing and in the field. It happens with all knives from time to time and it doesn't necessarily mean that the whole of the line is bad just from one example.

I have a similar picture of a Cold Steel Warhead. (they no longer make that one) It was sold as a great survival knife. Capable of doing all the camping chores and then some. And then being made so it could be put into a long branch and made into a spear or other defensive weapon. It was also shown being thrown because it was a throwing knife too.

I bought four of these from CS when they first came out. I gave two as gifts. They came with no handles on them just holes already drilled where you could wrap it, or add your own.

The third time I threw it the tree snapped the handle right off the knife and it looked pretty much like the pic shown here. (Sorry, I didn't want to remove the knife from the new handle I put on it for the pic pasted in below.) The handle portion came off in a clean break. You couldn't have done it cleaner with a metal torch.

It hit semi flat on a hackberry tree on the third throw as I was saying. Cold steel no longer made the knife so it never got replaced and their customer service rep, whom I did speak with indicated to me that that kind of break would be considered abuse and would not be covered under their warranty.

I am interested to see CSs reaction to this and if they replace it or say sorry, that it was operator error and not their fault or the knife's fault. Please let us know if it is covered or not.

If you can carry a big knife and a hammer to the out back. Why not just a regular size knife and good camp axe? Seems to me to make more sense.

Here is a pic of the handle I placed on the broken CS Warhead. It would have been completely useless had it not been for the way it was made. I have managed to get some use out of this the way it is but it will never be the knife it once was.

 

[4 Ranges]

I'm in agreement with the minority here: wrong tool for the job.

Personally, I wouldn't expect a 7 1/2" knife to go through that type of log under those circumstances. I'd get a bigger blade or an axe. I've handled a CS Recon Stout, and I think it's a really SMALL knife for that job.

In all honesty, if you HAVE a 7 1/2" knife that can go through a log like that, then that's fantastic for you, but personally I wouldn't expect so much of such a small knife.

 

[stratocaster]

I think some are missing the point of this one.

A couple of issues ago in Blade Magazine a survival instructor showed how you could use a FOLDER with a baton to cut through/and split wood to make emergency shelters. The artical brings out that none of the folders were damaged. How much more this should be true of a quality fixed blade.

Of course if we know we will be splitting wood for a fire, we should carry a hatchet, saw or ax. However, most of us here at bladeforums carry a folder day in and day out. I personnally like the fact that if you need to get a job done with the minimum of tools a good quality knife will be that tool.


Thanks,
Scott

 

[rnr]

Ouch. I've pounded and hammered on my Trailmaster many times in subzero temps with no problems. I wonder if you got one with a flaw.

mmmmm. Me too. I recently used my 6 pound sledge hammer to baton cross grain thru a 6 inch pine log. Yeah, I know I was a bad boy. It very slightly mushroomed the top of the blade, but didn't break. It was a cool fall day. About 35 degrees.

After reading the starting post, I'm hoping nothing else happens.

 

[Ebbtide]

Considering the number of CS RS's out there, I don't think that this is a catostrophic failure rate. Sure it stinks when it is yours.

How many tipless Buck 110's are out there? Personally I know of 2 that have been re-ground.
We don't hate all Buck products, do we?

No that knife shouldn't have broken and it wasn't user error. (Thanx for clearing that up Nutn')

What I think we should learn here is that you should test your gear before you need to depend on it in extreme circumstances.
(That's what car camping is for )

I had a brand new Plumb axe break on the first hit. The handle shattered.
Crossgrained POS. The replacement is going on 20 years.

Hope you get a replacement!

 

[GarageBoy]

A short hatchet isn't THAT heavy. Me and MelancholyMutt went hiking with an axe each

 

[GarageBoy]

Now..go pickup a SWKW Camp Tramp

 

[Will P.]

A short hatchet isn't THAT heavy. Me and MelancholyMutt went hiking with an axe each

There's a difference between Army heavy and Air Force heavy.

Nothing personal, Nutn.

 

[ras]

If the purpose of the exercise is to practice survival skills and learn the limits of your gear, then an axe may be counter-productive to the stated goals. Training to make do with minimal tools (one fixed blade and a SAK) would be a good goal for a survival training exercise.

If it was me, I'd have an axe in addition to my big fixed knife, small fixed knife and EDC folder. In a real survival situation time is important and as heavy as that axe is, if it saves time building a shelter or making a fire, its extra weight will have been worth the effort. Furthermore, I won't have a group to fall back on if a tool should break, so I carry back-ups.

 

[shpshooter]

Too bad so many production knives feature sharp corners (stress risers) where the tang leaves the blade proper -- a well-known design weakness. How serious can a design be if it intentionally includes such a defect?

I'm still a bit confused on this point. Does my Benchmade Nimravus/Nim Cub or my Activator suffer from this? Can someone post a picture showing exactly what is meant by this? Thanks!

 

[Jeff Clark]

Congratulations. Now you are starting to catch up with Cliff Stamp. He has managed to break Camilus knives made of a similar (if not identical) alloy and heat treatment. Often he is accused of doing something excessive when he breaks knives under similar circumstances. I would say that not only does the steel get more brittle in the cold, but the wood gets harder. These "cutlery alloys" are not as tough as 1095 and the manufacturers heat treat them too hard for this kind of use. Those angular grinds contribute to the problem of stress concentration.

You might want to try a differentially hardened Camp Tramp from Swamp Rat Knife Works or a plain old Kabar. What I use is a WWII surplus "Quartermaster" type utility knife. That old blade is thick 1095 or similar at around 56 RC.

 

[ras]

TOPS Knives offers zone tempered and cryogenically treated 1095 blades IIRC. I didn't think Carbon V or 50100 steel (per the steel FAQ) was that much less tough than 1095.

I know 5*F is cold to me, but is it really that cold to steel? Cold enough to cause a brittle fracture in an otherwise good blade? Is there a study on this topic available online?

 

[mete]

The blade is hardened steel so of course it's going to have brittle fracture regardless of the temperature.If you want me to look at it and give a metallurgical analysis [visual]send it and I'll do it ......If you search the computer for 'brittle transition temperature ' you will find neat photos of things like ships breaking in half because of this.

 

[ras]

Brittle Fracture and Impact Testing

Three basic factors contribute to a brittle-cleavage type of fracture. They are

1. a triaxial state of stress,
2. a low temperature, and
3. a high strain rate or rapid rate of loading.

All three of these factors do not have to be present at the same time to produce brittle fracture. A triaxial state of stress, such as exists at a notch, and low temperature are responsible for most service failures of the brittle type. However, since these effects are accentuated at a high rate of loading, many types of impact tests have been used to determine the susceptibility of materials to brittle behavior. Steels which have identical properties when tested in tension or torsion at slow strain rates can show pronounced differences in their tendency for brittle fracture when tested in a notched-impact test.

Brittle Fracture and Impact Testing: Part Two

 

[fixer27]

Nutnfancy, would you consider buying another CS product at all or
would you be more circumspect? I still like CS but I wouldn't bet the farm
on them.

 

[Butcher]

(Nutnfancy wrote)
[The small log was indeed the baton for hammering the knife through the log and the knife was never hit with steel. Most of the hits were on the front of the blade protruding from the log while the user helped push the blade through. This is not an unreasonable method of splitting wood in fact it is the preferred method taught to students at USAF survival school. I should know because I went through the school.red]
(Nutnfancy wrote)
[This entirely misses the point. Fire making skills taught with a axe or hatchet aren't survival skills so much as they are camping skills. When you are day packing into the backcountry, driving in a remote area, or flying over bad guy territory (military) and find yourself stranded what kind of tools will you have with you? Are you saying you will have carried an axe with you in the eventuality that you might need a fire?! I doubt it and I often see this attitude from people who don't backpack or venture into the woods very often (car campers). Weight is always a consideration especially when carrying preparedness supplies you probably won't need on the average hike. A survival knife can be carried without breaking your back and, unlike a 2-3 lb axe, and is more versatile in purpose. In additon to the knives, we also used a 10 oz Sawvivor backpack saw to cut down a 40' dead fir tree that we split with the knives. This saw is compact and light and very effective at cutting logs in two. It, like a good survival blade, is a realistic tool that you can incorporate into your system.red]



Below is my responce..
Most of us thought he used a steel hammer, well yeah that would be tuff on any knife trying to split a frozen log splitting it on a knot. I saw the cement campfire ring and though you were survival car camping, sorry bout that. I have broken a Kabar fighting knife by just falling on it as it was on my side, i landed full force and it just snapped one inch from the hillt. You're just trying to teach the lads how to pack the right stuff not more than you will need showing them how to split a log and you get egg on your face. Well know what happens when your gear is tested in the real world. Cull out the crappy gear and replace it with new better equipment. I think most of us here would like to know what the outcome of all this will be. In all the times i've been out in the wilderness i never had the need to split wood like that, if i ever do i would want to know that my gear is up to it before I PUT MY LIFE IN DANGER. Thanks for the heads up. Let's test em to the HILT!!!!!!!!!

 

[Peoria46]

This entirely misses the point. Fire making skills taught with a axe or hatchet aren't survival skills so much as they are camping skills. When you are day packing into the backcountry, driving in a remote area, or flying over bad guy territory (military) and find yourself stranded what kind of tools will you have with you? Are you saying you will have carried an axe with you in the eventuality that you might need a fire?! I doubt it and I often see this attitude from people who don't backpack or venture into the woods very often (car campers).

I surmise that it was my post wondering where the axe was that started this line of questioning. My reasoning was that the picture shows the broken knife and log next to an operational fire. The survival skills of getting one started had been accomplished. It doesn't take much of a knife to create kindling--certainly within the purview of a survival knife. Splitting firewood from logs--and building a substantial fire--moves into the camping category. I can't comment on what's taught at Fairchild--never attended. If homesteading in the forest is a necessary, modern survival skill, then I suppose that tougher and bigger knives will be needed to offset the absent axes, hatchets, mauls, and saws. As for "this attitude from....car campers", I daresay this "be prepared" attitude is also prevalent with those who've travelled by MC1-1's and T-10's. We knew it could turn bad in a hurry. As for "carrying an axe with the eventuality that I might need a fire", yes, if I'm leading a group of campers...dead of winter...snow on the ground...in a forest...young kids...it just might occur to me that I'll need a fire--beforehand. A small fire I can manage with a small knife and squaw wood. A large campground-style fire--well, an axe or saw are, of course, ideal. Are large fires and log cabins some of the new events in the sport of survival?

 

[Accutron2000]

If I were in a true survival situation Id want to spare my only knife from as much stress as possible.

That would include using a smaller diameter branch to build my fire. I don’t think Id trust any knife to chop apart a 20 inch diameter tree trunk. Axe all the way for that job.

Id have no problems carrying a small light hatchet for winter camping - obviously I don’t carry one on my belt every day of my life, but this is winter camping and the stakes are higher. Different enviroments, you bring different tools.

I would trust a hatchet over the possible snapping of a portable saw blade too.

Then again I’m not a survivalist, more or a camper/outdoors type. Practicing survivalism you have different criteria - what you have at the time. If you dont have an axe then you dont have an axe. Cant get around that fact and you have to practice with what you think you would have on hand.

JB

 

[Nutnfancy]

Great posts and thanks for all of them. Couple of more points:

1) We were in a campground on this outing but it took a 2 1/2 mile hike to get there. All roads are closed (backside of Mt Timpanogos) and gated closed. You can either snowmobile in or hike. We did the character building hump in.

2) Big axes are good for fire prep but believe or not a good survival knife can be just as effective at splitting logs. If you don't believe this then you need to try it. You need an awfully powerful swing from an an axe to split a log and 9 times out of 10 you'll won't split the log and the blade will stick. I've used all manner of tools for fire prep in the last 20 yrs. Small axes like a Gerber (I've had one for 10 years) are horrible for this; possibly good for splitting a small log with an accurate hit but forget the big stuff. The best tool is a wood maul with a triangular head. But of course that's prohibitively heavy as is a big axe for my purposes. And as I mentioned and several others correctly pointed out, this is a survival using realistic tools that you'd have in your pack or survival kit.

3) My friend Bruce (it was his knife that broke) did contact CS about the breakage and told them exactly how it happened. The rep was hesitant about covering it under the warranty given the circumstances and asked that it be sent in for examination. I wanted to send it in for him and fight the battle since it was on my recommendation he bought the knife! CS should without question replace that blade. Bruce will remind them of their catalog quote and the nature of a survival/combat knife. I will let everyone know how this turns out as far as the replacement goes or doesn't go.

4)

Nutnfancy, would you consider buying another CS product at all or would you be more circumspect? I still like CS but I wouldn't bet the farmon them.

Actually yes. I like Cold Steel knives and own a lot of them. I love the Voyager series and have had excellent luck with them. But I probably will not buy anything in Carbon 5 again. If a 1/4" thick slab of this stuff will break in wood doing what I need a knife to do for me then I'll go somewhere else. If it's not going to be stainless then it'd better be tough; if it's neither I have no use for such a steel. Swamp Rat knives look great and I may get one or two down the line but again I want something stainless for the snow camping. I leave again for a two day-er on Monday snowshoeing in to about 9,800 ft and the Becker 9 and SOG 2000 (buddy's) will be the primary fire tools. Maybe I'll post some more pics of the trip and knife usage.

 

[OwenM]

I'd say you got a defective knife. The only thing batoning it should have hurt was the coating. This would not affect my decision if I were thinking of buying one, but it does reinforce the idea that you should test your gear before depending on it, whether it's a knife, a stove, a pack, or anything else.