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.
(Or on a boat or near a body of water... but I get that point.)
Crag the Brewer
chopping knives can benefit from lanyards, especially if they will be used at length. As long as they are used properly, and wrapped tightly around the back of the hand, rather than loosely dangled about the wrist (which is very dangerous).Well yes, for sure. That is a very different type of lanyard but I agree that the tight wrap wrist can be very useful on chopping knives when you want to do finer work.
Okay. What I mean by pinky lanyard is a lanyard that ties near the butt and is an inch or two long loop that you slip your pinky through, pinky threading in the direction toward the edge. It makes a two or three finger hold very very secure, secure enough to chop with, even with very small edges. Okay. What I mean by pinky lanyard is a lanyard that ties near the butt and is an inch or two long loop that you slip your pinky through, pinky threading in the direction toward the edge. It makes a two or three finger hold very very secure, secure enough to chop with, even with very small edges. So then not surprisingly I like it because it extends the usefulness of the blade. You could also say it allows you to pack more punch in a smaller size.
And preferably lashed in front, over the hand rather than from behind.... but again. I haven't seen a need for it, maybe others do? I'm flexible on that.
J jayjaygee nothing turns a 2.5" blade into a machete. Hyperbole is fun but in this case doesn't really say anything useful. Care to explain in concrete terms what a pinky lanyard is by your definition, how you use it, and why you like it?
another problem with lanyards/fobs/etc is cleanliness.... Yuck that gets into the knots.
Yeah I don't use it a lot but if you have a 7-14" blade and you want to do fine work, holding it by the spine is how. And the lanyard makes that position safer, assuming you wrap it right. I think that means through the thumb and back over the hand. I don't really know, I just do it instinctively at this point.
I haven't had that problem, but I wouldn't use a pinky lanyard on a skinning knife. They're mostly to make a 3 finger knife into a securely-gripped 3 finger knife. Or do a little chopping with a non-chopper. I have a Buck 722 folder. I don't usually use a pinky lanyard, because the point of that tool for me is it can get soaked in gunk from the shop. But when I tried it with a pinky lanyard for a day of bramble clearing... wow it was like I had a machete in my front pocket.
Are you sliding your arm up though the lashing, so that you are pinch griping near the tip of the blade and your arm is over the long spine?
How hot is the hot threashold before damage can occur? Do you use a temp gauge of some sort to monitor?
Yes, it's just holding the spine to your forearm, but with the lanyard wrapped tightly you don't have to put any energy into preventing it from falling onto your leg/foot/etc. But yes, you have the idea. It's great for a longer blade, like a proper chopper, when you want to do smaller things, maybe cook or slice butter. Yes if I had to dress an animal that is the grip I'd use, although it would be hard to slice up the gut from the groin to the sternum using a typical underhand stroke. I think I might have to straddle a deer facing the hindquarters and cut toward myself using the grip we are describing.
I know you're not asking me but I think I can answer. Just keep a can of wd-40 or a water spray bottle and keep a steady stream of fluid to wash the heat away. At least that is what I do when I'm cutting metal. I just don't like the small dremel tools for this specific task I think.
Very handy for carbon steels, but air-hardening stainless steels will differ.
Thanks! But I don't know what you mean. Could you explain that to a stupid person (me)?
That's precisely what I'm aiming to do. I ordered a 16mm diamond file, it was cheap and always good to have so if it doesn't work that's ok. But I'd like to know exactly how you accomplished this?
I’m talking about a 2x72 belt sander like the one below. You can get an attachment with set of small ”wheels“ that come in various diameters to grind choils, fullers, finger grooves, etc. The sweeping plunge line was accomplished by running the belt off the side of the platen so it will create a natural sweeping radius in the plunge line. The farther you run the belt off the side of the platen, the more sweep you’ll get (to a point). The choil was created by using my 1/2“ wheel (I think) on the belt sander and cutting in to the depth I wanted then turning the edge into the straight belt as it was coming off the wheel. I’d think it would be fairly easy to accomplish the choil shape with a round file and flat file or just a half round file. I’d just file in the round/radius portion of the choil, then mark a tangent line at whatever angle looks good and file to it. Files are definitely less risky than power tools because you don’t have to worry about getting anything too hot a ruining the temper.
Oh okay, well that's a bit more than I'm going to spend to put a bevel in my $11 knife.
Looks like a great toy though!
Hey thanks again for this tip. The file finally arrived last week, the temperature finally went up enough to go out to the garage today. I now have two knives that are much more useful to me than they were. Image attached (assuming I'm doing it right)