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The BladeForums.com 2024 Traditional Knife is ready to order! See this thread for details: https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/bladeforums-2024-traditional-knife.2003187/
Price is$300$250 ea (shipped within CONUS). If you live outside the US, I will contact you after your order for extra shipping charges.
Order here: https://www.bladeforums.com/help/2024-traditional/ - Order as many as you like, we have plenty.
H.E.S.T Passaround Review Thread
- Thread starter Jetblack
- Start date
- Joined
- Dec 18, 2005
- Messages
- 522
LOL... the mail lady doesn't look well.
Hey Mr. Coffee, got it Wed. safe and sound just before leaving for work, this is great.
- Joined
- Feb 17, 2007
- Messages
- 2,304
Glad you got it, and I am sorry it took so long for me to get back on my feet and ship it out.
hope your feeling better MrCoffee, I must say I REALLY like the feel of this knife
- Joined
- Dec 18, 2005
- Messages
- 522
This is my fist review and first pass around so I hope my review goes well.
After much anticipation the HEST finally arrive and was sharp enough to pop hairs off the back of my hand ( Thanks MrCoffee),
As soon as I got the HEST I was impressed how well it "locks" into my hand with the pry hook coming up against my pinky finger giving a very secure grip, the thumb ramp feels natural and compliments how well it feel's in the hand. It's a great looking knife and after all the use it has seen so far was non the worse for wear. The Kydex sheath holds the knife securely and looks great. Taking the handle slabs off the hollow is large enough to carry some survival gear which is a great feature, I found a mini firesteel I had and it fit's easily with room to spare.
I really like the lanyard Jetblack, that is really top notch.
The first thing I did was to ditch my RC-3 and Izula and carry the HEST with me as my only knife. As soon as I got it, it went in my front jeans pocket as I headed off to knee therapy before heading to work. It was small enough to disapear without much of a print which is important in "polite society", and didn't seem to bother me as I went though therapy on a cross trainer,leg press and treadmill and other execises for the next hour.
Heading for work and changing into my work pants it fit all but the pryhook allowing me to retrieve it easily to cut carboard and some plastic straps. I couldn't help my self when I saw an 8 ply cardboard shipping container about 3 inches thick and stabbing it through and the tip would come out the other side with both a foward and reverse grip, the grip when doing this seemed very secure as your hand feels "locked to the knife, it would also easily cut and stab through several layers of clothing from the rag bin at the plant. No photos were taken of this part due to no camaras allowed in the plant.
The next day at the farm I switched to belt wear as it's how I usually carry and found it just a little harder to resheath the knife without looking but that was mainly due to muscle memory, I got used to it pretty quik and by the end I could readily get it resheathed without looking. The handle location on my belt was not that much different than my RC-3 so it was easy to reach back and unsheath it and I found the hook made it east to locate my hand on it.
The HEST lent itself very well to the daily farm chores cutting bale strings which isn't much of a challenge but that's normal farm life.
I also tried it cutting some rope both nylon and natural fiber, it took a little more effort to cut through the rope than my RC-3 but that was probably due to a thicker blade and edge geometry.
It would lend itself very well in and emergency, on occasion you can have livestock that is haltered go down and pull the rope tight making it nearly impossible to get them free other than cutting.
While getting to some hay bales one night in the rain I had to remove a fence insulater from a T post to roll them out to the other side, between the rain and cold fingers I couldn't get a grip on it, reaching back and pulling the Hest I found the pry hook to lend itself quite usefully in getting it off.
Now it's become a truely usefull tool, this got me to thinking what else this pryhook might help accomplish
I used it to remove a master link from a chain on the baler, not really prying but using the hook to unclip it and clip it back on.
I also used it open a can of sno seal.
I find the pry hook to be an extremely usefull feature as the knife can be used for prying and scraping without any possibility of damaging the edge, especially what I might use a knife for on the farm
On accassion a branch will grow out into the pasture fence and will have to be removed and the HEST didn't let me down here either, it easily batoned off a small tree and split it any way I wanted.
I did try the wire breaker on some old electric fence wire and it worked as I expected.I didn't get to use the bottle opener and that seemed to be the least usefull feature on the knife for what I would use it for but it didn't bother me being there.
In the short time I've got to use the HEST I've gotton to really like it,I've found it to be usefull as both a knife and a tool and feels and handles as solid as a rock and is most definatly going to be on my short list., I really liked this knife and found it to be quite usefull as an EDC.
Lord Robert Baden Powell founder of the Boy Scouts was asked once What are
you preparing for? and he replied Be prepared for anything!... In my opinion the HEST would be an excellent EDC to help me do that.
I just want to say thanks to KSF for making this passaround possible, And to RYP and RAT for such a great design.
After much anticipation the HEST finally arrive and was sharp enough to pop hairs off the back of my hand ( Thanks MrCoffee),
As soon as I got the HEST I was impressed how well it "locks" into my hand with the pry hook coming up against my pinky finger giving a very secure grip, the thumb ramp feels natural and compliments how well it feel's in the hand. It's a great looking knife and after all the use it has seen so far was non the worse for wear. The Kydex sheath holds the knife securely and looks great. Taking the handle slabs off the hollow is large enough to carry some survival gear which is a great feature, I found a mini firesteel I had and it fit's easily with room to spare.
I really like the lanyard Jetblack, that is really top notch.
The first thing I did was to ditch my RC-3 and Izula and carry the HEST with me as my only knife. As soon as I got it, it went in my front jeans pocket as I headed off to knee therapy before heading to work. It was small enough to disapear without much of a print which is important in "polite society", and didn't seem to bother me as I went though therapy on a cross trainer,leg press and treadmill and other execises for the next hour.
Heading for work and changing into my work pants it fit all but the pryhook allowing me to retrieve it easily to cut carboard and some plastic straps. I couldn't help my self when I saw an 8 ply cardboard shipping container about 3 inches thick and stabbing it through and the tip would come out the other side with both a foward and reverse grip, the grip when doing this seemed very secure as your hand feels "locked to the knife, it would also easily cut and stab through several layers of clothing from the rag bin at the plant. No photos were taken of this part due to no camaras allowed in the plant.
The next day at the farm I switched to belt wear as it's how I usually carry and found it just a little harder to resheath the knife without looking but that was mainly due to muscle memory, I got used to it pretty quik and by the end I could readily get it resheathed without looking. The handle location on my belt was not that much different than my RC-3 so it was easy to reach back and unsheath it and I found the hook made it east to locate my hand on it.
The HEST lent itself very well to the daily farm chores cutting bale strings which isn't much of a challenge but that's normal farm life.
I also tried it cutting some rope both nylon and natural fiber, it took a little more effort to cut through the rope than my RC-3 but that was probably due to a thicker blade and edge geometry.
It would lend itself very well in and emergency, on occasion you can have livestock that is haltered go down and pull the rope tight making it nearly impossible to get them free other than cutting.
While getting to some hay bales one night in the rain I had to remove a fence insulater from a T post to roll them out to the other side, between the rain and cold fingers I couldn't get a grip on it, reaching back and pulling the Hest I found the pry hook to lend itself quite usefully in getting it off.
Now it's become a truely usefull tool, this got me to thinking what else this pryhook might help accomplish
I used it to remove a master link from a chain on the baler, not really prying but using the hook to unclip it and clip it back on.
I also used it open a can of sno seal.
I find the pry hook to be an extremely usefull feature as the knife can be used for prying and scraping without any possibility of damaging the edge, especially what I might use a knife for on the farm
On accassion a branch will grow out into the pasture fence and will have to be removed and the HEST didn't let me down here either, it easily batoned off a small tree and split it any way I wanted.
I did try the wire breaker on some old electric fence wire and it worked as I expected.I didn't get to use the bottle opener and that seemed to be the least usefull feature on the knife for what I would use it for but it didn't bother me being there.
In the short time I've got to use the HEST I've gotton to really like it,I've found it to be usefull as both a knife and a tool and feels and handles as solid as a rock and is most definatly going to be on my short list., I really liked this knife and found it to be quite usefull as an EDC.
Lord Robert Baden Powell founder of the Boy Scouts was asked once What are
you preparing for? and he replied Be prepared for anything!... In my opinion the HEST would be an excellent EDC to help me do that.
I just want to say thanks to KSF for making this passaround possible, And to RYP and RAT for such a great design.
- Joined
- Jun 19, 2009
- Messages
- 435
I would like to thank KSF, RAT Cutlery, and everyone else involved in making this knife and having such a successful passaround!
At first glance i noticed that the H.E.S.T is compact and you can put it anywhere not to be noticed. I put it in my back pocket and went to my christmas party for work. I had to keep checking my back pocket to see if it was still there throughout the night, because i thought that it may have fell out. I just totally forgot it was even there! It really surprised me that the pry bar on the knife didn't poke me or rub me.
Secondly, the "pry bar". I really enjoyed the pry bar at the end of the pommel. It acted, i found, as a guide for your hand to get the perfect grip for a lot of jobs whether using it in the standard knife position, or the reverse position. It helps lock your hand on the handle easily and comfortably, which is what you are looking for if you plan on using the knife for a long period of time. I did find, however, that the pry bar, does not break glass very easily, as i thought it would. I used it against a spaghetti sauce jar. (The jar i picked because of the thickness of it) I "smacked" the jar about 4 or 5 times with some pretty good blows, but to no avail. I then decided to grab one of my wife's kitchen glasses (oops). With one smack against the thinner glass it broke right away. So i would say to break the thick glass in a car, the way the knife is designed, it would not do it easily.
Thirdly, I wanted to use the knife in some real life survival situations, to see how useful it would be. If you could only choose one knife to go out into the bush with, would this knife be the one? I found that i really truly believe that you could use this knife for everything you wanted to! The thickness of the blade provides you with a sturdy knife to use for batoning. The pry bar persay, you can use for digging holes, or trenches for like a dakota fire pit. You can also use it to dig out wood to make a spoon. The knife is small enough to maneuver well, to make deadfall traps, start fires, make nice sharp spears for hunting, and even skinning or deboning game.
Lastly, the wire break. I didn't use this on a piece of wire or anything because i figured that everyone would try this. But, i did try it an an aluminum can and pry holes into it. I figured this would be useful if you needed a make shift filter for water or something. As for the bottle opener, it does just what its intended to do, open bottles!
I have pictures of some of the things i talked about in my review. I made a figure 4 deadfall trap, pried some holes in an aluminum can
I enjoyed the knife very much and must say that if i wanted a knife that could do just about anything, this one would be it.
pictures to follow soon!
what i started with. with a little batoning on my christmas tree, lol
using wire break to make holes in can for a strainer
holes it made quite easily i may add
the final project. while doing this i noticed how easily the knife was to control, it wasnt overwhelming in any way.
At first glance i noticed that the H.E.S.T is compact and you can put it anywhere not to be noticed. I put it in my back pocket and went to my christmas party for work. I had to keep checking my back pocket to see if it was still there throughout the night, because i thought that it may have fell out. I just totally forgot it was even there! It really surprised me that the pry bar on the knife didn't poke me or rub me.
Secondly, the "pry bar". I really enjoyed the pry bar at the end of the pommel. It acted, i found, as a guide for your hand to get the perfect grip for a lot of jobs whether using it in the standard knife position, or the reverse position. It helps lock your hand on the handle easily and comfortably, which is what you are looking for if you plan on using the knife for a long period of time. I did find, however, that the pry bar, does not break glass very easily, as i thought it would. I used it against a spaghetti sauce jar. (The jar i picked because of the thickness of it) I "smacked" the jar about 4 or 5 times with some pretty good blows, but to no avail. I then decided to grab one of my wife's kitchen glasses (oops). With one smack against the thinner glass it broke right away. So i would say to break the thick glass in a car, the way the knife is designed, it would not do it easily.
Thirdly, I wanted to use the knife in some real life survival situations, to see how useful it would be. If you could only choose one knife to go out into the bush with, would this knife be the one? I found that i really truly believe that you could use this knife for everything you wanted to! The thickness of the blade provides you with a sturdy knife to use for batoning. The pry bar persay, you can use for digging holes, or trenches for like a dakota fire pit. You can also use it to dig out wood to make a spoon. The knife is small enough to maneuver well, to make deadfall traps, start fires, make nice sharp spears for hunting, and even skinning or deboning game.
Lastly, the wire break. I didn't use this on a piece of wire or anything because i figured that everyone would try this. But, i did try it an an aluminum can and pry holes into it. I figured this would be useful if you needed a make shift filter for water or something. As for the bottle opener, it does just what its intended to do, open bottles!
I have pictures of some of the things i talked about in my review. I made a figure 4 deadfall trap, pried some holes in an aluminum can
I enjoyed the knife very much and must say that if i wanted a knife that could do just about anything, this one would be it.
pictures to follow soon!
what i started with. with a little batoning on my christmas tree, lol
using wire break to make holes in can for a strainer
holes it made quite easily i may add
the final project. while doing this i noticed how easily the knife was to control, it wasnt overwhelming in any way.
Last edited:
- Joined
- Dec 17, 2005
- Messages
- 7,809
Thanks guys!
Passaround is still alive and kicking. Were just being a bit lax about the time frame seeing as nobody is waiting to get their knife back. Well, except the guy who wins it but he doesn't know he's waiting for it.
Passaround is still alive and kicking. Were just being a bit lax about the time frame seeing as nobody is waiting to get their knife back. Well, except the guy who wins it but he doesn't know he's waiting for it.