Ever failed ?

[mymindisamob]

I keep my knives with a working edge. I use razors to shave hair and scissors to cut paper.

 

[cultivateitnow]

I agree that it doesn't take much of a knife to work wood, cut rope, or perform other camp related task.

I'm a hunter and i learned early on the value of a sharp knife with a good blade of proper design. That's why all of my hunting knives have a hollow grind, are thin, and narrow. When I had to use low cost hunting or kitchen knives for processing deer I made sure I have a handful razor sharp before starting. Without you're just not going to be successful in anying timely mannor.

With a good thin 3.5" to 4" blade you can get completely through the process and have the deer in the freezer without the need to sharpen or switch knives. If the wife is helping she always grabs one of my knives because she too knows the value. She has pretty good kitchen knives too, but she still wants one of mine.

 

[hlee]

So just how important is this super degree of sharpness when it comes to tasks in the wilds ?
I often hear people say a sharp knife is much safer than a blunt knife, well perhaps I'm going a little off tangent here but I've cut myself far more often with steak knives and carving knives than I have with butter knives !

Ps. When the topic of battoning crops up ya always get someone say carry an axe, well maybe they should add if ya want ya blade to shave carry a razor !!!

I spend a fair amount of time out in the woods chasing game. My personal experience is that I rarely ever need a knife for anything. Food pouches have quick open perforations. Tents have lines precut to the appropriate lengths. I generally am prohibited from having a camp fire and lighting a liquid fuel stove doesn't require a knife. I'm loath to cut my paracord so I generally use what I need and let the rest hang. Generally speaking, I don't need a knife for anything unless I bag an animal.

That being said, I am one that makes sure my knife shaves before an outing, and then makes sure again before it is put away after an outing. My feeling is that I probably won't need it (The past couple of seasons have been pretty rough.), but if I do I sure want it to perform at the height of it's ability. When I have a deer on the ground (especially in the Cali archery season) I don't want to be mucking around with a dull knife.

On a tangent brought up by pitdog, a sharp knife is safer than a dull knife because it requires less pressure to do the work. Because less pressure is required, the user is in better control of the cut. I've cut myself with sharp knives and with dull knives (but never with butter knives which are not really knives at all, nor have I been cut with a table knife- but I have wanted to cut the throats of a few restaurant managers who insisted on providing dull serrated steak-knife like objects), but without exception the cuts have been worse with dull knives. I've got scars on more than one finger from letting a dullish chef's knife get away from me when slicing vegetables. It doesn't take much for a dull knife to grab onto (or wedge into) a potato slice, slide that slice across the cutting board, then find itself in my off hand. That is my experience anyway. Sharp knives glide through veggies with little effort and don't "wedge-and-slide."