These JoeX vids have certainly stirred up the haters. Oh noes! Theres knives out there that...
1. Cost real money
2. Made in USA
3. Have marketing fluff
Then they say they'll only buy Mora and CS from now on... LOL ok. Point taken.
Maybe everyone should drive a Honda Accord or a Toyota Camry.
Also, JoeX - wheres the hate for Al Mar, Randall, and Ruana?
Well, I like what Joe X does. That doesn't mean I will buy only Mora (although I like Mora's a lot). It also does not mean that I agree with everything he says. But I still like and watch what he does.
There are a few things that I want to point out:
1. Mora and CS are not even in the same category. In my opinion Mora (if we think of their classic, craft, companion, basic, pro, 2000, and bushcraft series) is top in terms of performance, in their specialty, while still being able to take some beating. CS does some very nice knives, but none of their ones that resemble something from Mora (e.g. Survival Edge, Fin Bear, etc.) is as good for ergonomy or performance as a Mora (not even close).
2. Mora has great prices and price-to-value in their basic and Companion series, mostly because their blades are short and thin. The Garberg (which is full tang and thicker) goes significantly upper in price range, close to a ScrapYard of similar size. That is because the thicker a blade is, the cost for grinding and heat treatment grows exponentially. I'm pretty sure that if Mora will ever make a knife of the same size, length and thickness, as a Battle Mistress, the price will be similar with that of a Swamp Rat. When the blades are small, thin and partial tang, you can add many of them at once in the same oven and in the same freezer at the same time, while the thinness of the blade allows significantly shorter soak and temperature equalizer times. Yeah, Mora does very good knives, but their specialty is in the range of small, thin blades, for high performance cutting and carving, where the size of partial tang thin and small blades allows for cost effectiveness. It is not honest to say that you should buy those blades instead of larger blades, because they don't address the same needs.
3. The length and weight of a blade have a significant influence on the impact power that blade can generate when swinging. The longer it is, the more leverage, and the generated power grows exponentially with the length and weight distribution forward. JoeX tested the Mora Pathfinder (which is the same C100 carbon steel as the carbon Companion and Mora Bushcraft Black and the same edge profile) and it got total damage much quicker than any other of the Mora's. The Pathfinder is just a little longer than the Bushcraft Black and that little extra-length generated significantly more impact and more vibration. JoeX suggested that the Survival Lilly,'s knives did better than Busse's; but those were significantly shorter knives than the 3 Busses he tested, while having similar thickness. So it is natural they resisted more, as they didn' t generate as much impact force when striking.
4. From what Joe X tested, the only survivors of large size were some CS machetes in 1055 carbon steel. Honestly, 1055 in CS knives is crap. No offense, I have knives in SK-5 from CS that I like a lot and that never dissappointed me, but when I purchased 3 CS's in 1055, I got the tips bent and broken at the first use, on all 3 of them, while being used the same way as my SK-5 ones were for years without any damage. 1055 is durable in shovels and thick prybar usage, but it is totally unsuitable for forming and holding a usable edge and tip. As a knive is primarily a cutting tool, I see no point in arguing that a knive which cannot cut well is better just because it is more durable in a fictional scenario.
5. JoeX's tests are missing hammering the back of the knife to speed up cutting wood, plastics or bone. This is a very often type of hard use - which is much more relevant and important for valuable usage than chopping into a concrete block or iron rod which are impervious to a knife's strikes. Also I personally don't stress the tip of my knives sideways, but I use to carv with them, so I prefer a sharper tip, rather than a thick unuseful one. I may hit rocks by mistake if chopping at ground level, but would never hit a big rock, in full, perfectly perpendicularly, with full force, repeatedly, from the same angle, 20 times consecutively.
6. Skrama is a great knife, with differentially heat treated carbon steel (somehow similar to what SR-101 was, I think), which seems to have a great combination of sharpness, size, usability, edge retention, and durability. However, its design is very specialized, with large width, and a wide angle tip that is not designed for deep penetration nor tactical usage (and I think that design had a good contribution to tip strength, at the cost of penetrability). It is a significantly better and more respectable performer than the CS 1055 machetes. However, looking at the Skrama 240 and 200 tests by JoeX, it doesn't seem obvious to me that they resisted more than the Busse's, because they have been tested slightly different (visibly different force applied striking the metal rod, and the 240 was moved to the metal rod without passing through the brick test first). As regards edge retention (in any sort of material), although I have never used a Skrama yet, I don't think its 80CrV2 steel outperforms my SK-5 blades, which are about 3 times faster wearing than my current favorite big blade (a Free Rein Wakizashi in SR-3V).
If you want to make a point sending JoeX another knife to test, that should be a Fat Game Warden.
so what have you got? An LC or a Patrol?