- Joined
- Jun 4, 2009
- Messages
- 1,358
There have been a couple of threads dealing with the LMF II recently and I believe I've knocked the knife in both of them. It bothers me that Gerber thinks so little of its customers or its products that it won't even tell us what steel is being used.
Oh yeah, I know, they said there would be some kind of card or notice in the packaging, but there was nothing in mine and I have no idea what mystery metal my knife is made of.
Another complaint I have with the knife is that the handle material damages easily. I dinged it the first day I had it. The knife dropped and hit a rock or stick or something and put a small cut in the handle. I dinged it again today while I was batoning through some wood and missed and hit the handle instead of the blade.
Speaking of batoning through wood: in one of those other threads a fellow LMF owner complained that
To be honest I've really not used mine very much, but I was intrigued by his experiences and thought I'd try to replicate his results. So I posted a response and asked him about his usage. He replied;
He did go on to say that his was a older model from 2007 and I got mine in 2009 so there's no telling whether out knives are made out of the same steel.
So I decided to test mine this afternoon by batoning through some wood. Now, it has been raining here for the past couple days and most of the wood I could find was wet and that might have played a role in my results. I don't question the experiences of my fellow forumite, but I must say my results were quite different and I was pleasantly surprised by the Gerber's performance.
In these first few pictures I tried chopping through a piece of dry hardwood. It was actually pretty easy and I noticed no ill effects on the edge.
Then I batoned through a wet piece of deadwood. It really wasn't much of a challenge.
Since that was so easy I decided to try batoning through a 4" treated fence post. Sorry no pictures, but I didn't get through. It wasn't the knife's fault though. The piece of wood I was using to baton with was actually getting chopped in half by the knife's spine because it was softer than the fence post. I got the knife a couple inches in before stopping and wrenching the knife free. Then I batoned the knife point first into the end of the fence post. I got it in a little over an inch before rocking it free. Again There was no damage to the edge or tip.
I finally sawed off a piece of limb that I thought would be a good test.
As you can see the knife went through it with no problem. Afterwards I examined the edge and was pleased to find no chipping or rolling. See for yourself.
It looks like I've been unfair to this knife and whatever mystery steel it's made of. I'm sorry my fellow forumite and LMF owner had such poor showings from his, but my knife seems to have held up very well. It could even still push cut paper when I got back into the house. Of course this was just a quick, simple test and prolonged use might yield different results, but I certainly feel a lot more confident in this knife now than I did before this little test.YMMV.
Oh yeah, I know, they said there would be some kind of card or notice in the packaging, but there was nothing in mine and I have no idea what mystery metal my knife is made of.
Another complaint I have with the knife is that the handle material damages easily. I dinged it the first day I had it. The knife dropped and hit a rock or stick or something and put a small cut in the handle. I dinged it again today while I was batoning through some wood and missed and hit the handle instead of the blade.
Speaking of batoning through wood: in one of those other threads a fellow LMF owner complained that
To be honest I've really not used mine very much, but I was intrigued by his experiences and thought I'd try to replicate his results. So I posted a response and asked him about his usage. He replied;
He did go on to say that his was a older model from 2007 and I got mine in 2009 so there's no telling whether out knives are made out of the same steel.
So I decided to test mine this afternoon by batoning through some wood. Now, it has been raining here for the past couple days and most of the wood I could find was wet and that might have played a role in my results. I don't question the experiences of my fellow forumite, but I must say my results were quite different and I was pleasantly surprised by the Gerber's performance.
In these first few pictures I tried chopping through a piece of dry hardwood. It was actually pretty easy and I noticed no ill effects on the edge.
Then I batoned through a wet piece of deadwood. It really wasn't much of a challenge.
Since that was so easy I decided to try batoning through a 4" treated fence post. Sorry no pictures, but I didn't get through. It wasn't the knife's fault though. The piece of wood I was using to baton with was actually getting chopped in half by the knife's spine because it was softer than the fence post. I got the knife a couple inches in before stopping and wrenching the knife free. Then I batoned the knife point first into the end of the fence post. I got it in a little over an inch before rocking it free. Again There was no damage to the edge or tip.
I finally sawed off a piece of limb that I thought would be a good test.
As you can see the knife went through it with no problem. Afterwards I examined the edge and was pleased to find no chipping or rolling. See for yourself.
It looks like I've been unfair to this knife and whatever mystery steel it's made of. I'm sorry my fellow forumite and LMF owner had such poor showings from his, but my knife seems to have held up very well. It could even still push cut paper when I got back into the house. Of course this was just a quick, simple test and prolonged use might yield different results, but I certainly feel a lot more confident in this knife now than I did before this little test.YMMV.
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