Help Me Choose a Mora

DOH!
Sorry Abe :embarassed:
These to came from the website that Canranger posted
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Still not sure why sharpening a knife isn't cost effective though...
 
Ebbtide said:
Still not sure why sharpening a knife isn't cost effective though...
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In general not, but for a Mora which costs a few dollars the cost of sharpening one which was heavily used is likely more than the cost of just replacing. James Mattis used to comment on their disposable nature in that regard.

-Cliff
 
Cliff Stamp said:
In general not, but for a Mora which costs a few dollars the cost of sharpening one which was heavily used is likely more than the cost of just replacing.
-Cliff
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I sharpen my own knives, so sharpening one isn't going to cost me anything. Maybe you are refering to time spent? Still dosen't apply for me. I like to sharpen; it relaxes me. And besides, I normaly sharpen when watching TV or surfing the net. So, for me anyway, time isn't an issue either.

So, the question is, just exactly what do you mean by "cost of sharpening"?

Leo
 
Time spent, this is why few carpenters now sharpen saws, the time they spend sharpening them could actually be spent doing work and they would earn far more than would be saved by replacing the saw. Few would sharpen a $5 knife for the same reason. They are just viewed as tools and the time spent maintaining them is just viewed as work time as much as the time spent using them. You also have to consider the time it took to learn how to do it in the first place, initial cost of abrasives, etc. . If all you own are blades that are that cheap and disposable there probably isn't a huge incentive to learn how to sharpen them. Of course if you like doing it, then it is something people often pay to be able to do, few people would pay someone to be able to sharpen their knives though. I don't mind doing it, but I would not say I enjoy it and I definately would not pay to be able to do it. I sharpen Mora's, I even sharpen $0.5 Olfa blades, I don't do it to save money though, I just don't like the idea of waste. I don't however resharpen the impulse hardened saws as it takes way too much time, I just recycle them into other cutting tools.

-Cliff
 
Re: Mora knives. My most used Mora is a carbon steel Clipper super-cheap model that gets use in the kitchen and as a really good envelope slitter when dispensing with junk mail.
I don't however resharpen the impulse hardened saws as it takes way too much time, I just recycle them into other cutting tools.
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What sort of tools do you make from the sawblades? I've heard of people making card scrapers from old (probably panel) saw blades. I've got a pretty well worn out blade on my Tashiro Folding Pocket Saw that is about ready for retirement.
 
My Mora 760 came today. When I first took the knife out of the box, I immediately noticed that the sheath is absolutely TERRIBLE. Terrible is really a huge understatement. It feels like it is going to fall apart when I touch it, it is made out of the cheapest plastic I have ever seen. I am going to have to look for a new sheath, this one just isn't going to cut it.

As for the knife itself, I really like the feel. The handle doesn't feel cheap, like I thought it would after feeling the sheath. Initially the blade was very dull, barely able to slice paper and not even able to scrape hair, but after just two minutes on the sharpmaker, the blade is shaving sharp and ready to go. I will have to take it out into the woods this weekend to test its edge retention, but the blade feels very solid and sharpened very easily.

Overall, I am very satisfied with the knife, it is everything I expected and more so far, but the sheath certainly will need to be replaced.
 
There is a kydex sheath being made that will work well with the 760. I cut the belt attachment on mine when it broke. Placed a ranger band on the sheath so that it helped to hold the knife in and it lives in a bag in the PU. Eventually I'll replace the sheath with a kydex.
 
THE MORA 2000 is one of the most awesome, budget, economy, top quality, most underrated, all round utility outdoor knives on the planet!!!!

NOW THAT IS A KNIFE!!
 
RokJok said:
What sort of tools do you make from the sawblades?
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They get relegated to more extreme sawing as the sharpness fails, first to plywood, then to scrap which has flashing and concrete (cut up for firewood), staples and nails, then for cutting up sods and similar and finally for cutting up sharpening stones. By this time they have no actually teeth left, you can then grind a bevel on them and use them for any number of cutting tasks, I ran one as a light billhook for awhile, it is probably still be used as such I would imagine. I gave it to a friend for some garden work awhile back.

-Cliff
 
So they didn't become other tools, just less effecient saws?
I'm confused.

Dave, Give the sheath a chance, they grow on you.
I just throw my SWAK in my back pocket when I head out into the wilds of my garden. Haven't worn in on my belt yet :shrug:
 
A billhook isn't generally used like a saw, it is basically a combination of a machete and axe, generally used for vegetation too thick for a machete but too light for an axe. The saw blade ones though are basically really light machetes as the saw blades are *really* thin. I was tempted to actually grind an edge on the back of one of the saws so it would be a machete/saw, I just didn't like the idea of carrying it.

-Cliff
 
Oh, I know what a bill hook is.
I was under the impression that you made cutting tools other than the bill hook and worn saws that you mentioned.
Must be me :shrug:
 
As a swede i find the moras a good workhorse in the forrest, mostly cos its so cheap i just throw it away when its dull and take a new one. No need to resharpen em cos they are like 2 buchs.
But they are boring and i carry knives that i think is fun handling and chopping with like the us style bowie, and the nepalese khukuri. Knives should be fun, and the mora aint
 
Watching Mear's Bushcraft videos I wonder if the natives sharpen their machetes because the edges look heavily oxidized, when they are freshly sharpened you can see the bright metal stand out strongly. Now you could argue that they only sharpen them infrequently, but at least once, with dozens of blades in each episode it seems like at least once you should see a freshly honed one and he never mentions maintaining the blades except for a brief mention once of stropping on a mushroom.

-Cliff
 
Cliff,

Bare carbon steel oxidizes very quickly in humid conditions. I sharpen all of my machetes before I take a group out and by the second day there isn't a bright edge in the bunch. Some plant juices will oxidize carbon steel very quickly and the plant juices themselves often oxidize and turn dark on the blade. Shiny blades in the jungle are the exception. Mac
 
Yes, as I noted, with infrequent sharpening you would not expect to see blades commonly fresh edged, however he has a lot of footage, spanning many days with each episode and never once is a blade seen which has been recently sharpened. Simply take the ratio of time that the edge is noticable after sharpening to the use time and that is the probability that you will see it on a random viewing. Now multiply this by the time you spend viewing to get the expected number of times you would see it, it takes really infrequent sharpening to get this to below one when your viewing time is long. A lot of the time even the natives have machetes which still have the fresh stickers on the sides of the blade, it doesn't take very long for them to peel off so they are obviously replacements. I sharpen knives for salt water fisherman on a semi-regular basis, and it takes quite awhile for the edge to get to the point where you could not tell it was not sharpened by just comparing the patina on the flats to the edge.

-Cliff
 
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