Knife Design ~ The Killing Knife

S

shane justice

Joined
May 12, 2003
Messages
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Honestly, I never been to good at political correctness.

I don't know what a "tactical knife" is...

...and forgive me if I am just dumb about it...

...but I don't know what a "fighting knife" is either...



the only book I ever read about using a knife to actually injure another person is "Get Tough"...it is pretty brutal and straight forward...and does not dance around with words like "neutralize the threat"

Recently...I have been to "school" on the topic of the "killing" knife...

THese days I consider it a VERY specialized tool....and while all knives may work well to varying degree to injure...I would like to find out what makers are asked to build...in the way of a killing knife.

I would especially like to hear from...Greg Covington...since he has spent time with Mr. Bagwell...and as I understand there are numerous makers here who sent knives to Iraq and Afghansistan....

I hope this thread won't get erased...or the lawyers won't shut us down for talking about this sort of thing....

Shane
 
Knives used now adays by the military are much more likley to be used to open an MRE than to open a person. i spent a year in Sadr city baghdad and not once was a knife used to kill a person. on the other hand knives were used constantly to open crates break down pallets, pry open windows and doors and that kind of thing. a killing knife as you surmised would no doudt be a specalized tool. although any knife is capable of inflicting enough damage to kill.
 
After talking with numerous folks I've got to agree with docdredd. Military needs aren't generally going to coincide with this topic. In military application, the knife is a last ditch sort of thing for combat. There are many other things it needs to be good at first.
I do remember one case in afghanistan where a knife was used. There was an article on it in general discussion awhile back about a guy saving his team in an ambush when they ran out of ammo. The knife appeared to be a clone of a buck 110......

For this topic, I think it depends heavily on training/method and you will get alot of different answers. To be honest I think the most common use you'll find these days for "killing knives" is among hog hunters :)
 
Take a peek over at http://www.fightauthority.com Those folks will echo what you've heard here. The Chineese (I'm a kung-fu student) used what amounted to steak knives. The Koreans used the bali song, but the blade is only part of the story. The handles are useful for all sorts of control and joint lock type moves.

So my aswer for what do you take to a knife fight. Something that handles quick (no two foot long bowies). Something extremely sharp. Something that won't break off and leave you without a blade.

The way to tell the winner of a knife fight... he's the guy who gets out of the hospital first.
 
The only knife I've seen in recent times that may offer an advatage in actual lethal use is the MOD Beshara. Then again its just a wasp waisted dagger with no tip. However the dual chisel grind combined with serations would leave a nasty stab wound and upon twisting would really open someone up. Even bieng an inovative dagger with practical design (and from what reviews have said penetrates very deep without mucking up the tip), I think it will end up in the hands of mall ninjas. There really arent alot of paid killers willing to talk about there business and most soldiers might take offense to bieng thought of as killers (some would at least). The fact is knives, while able to kill, are second rate for protecting yourself while keeping distance. The thought that a GI may have a knife fight is not unreasonable. To think hes gona be in two says more about the soldiers bahvior on leave than anything else I would guess. Most cops/military/bodygaurds think of knives more as tools than weapons and rightfully so. As far as a "killing knife" bieng advanced in design I disagree. Like I said basicly nothing has been invented for pure offense in the field of knives since the wasp waist dagger and bowie (IMO, dont forget karambits are old). When I was training Batto-Do we recieved many challenges from Karateka and people in all forms of fighting training. Many claimed they could close ranks with and defeat a sword student. Not a single one even got close. Best knife for offense is a sword. With a Boken in hand not a single trained knife or hand fighter ever got within striking distance of us before getting whacked even when they were sheathed. Not that I'm suggesting swords for edc, I'm just saying they are the clear choice for killing someone without getting sliced up yourself. The fact is that the only thing specialized about "killing knives" (a horrible term imo) is that they be able to penetrate deep enough to hit lung heart or nerve cluster. A dagger or bowie with the right blade length is all that is needed for that and both are hard to cary. Dark Ops and there ilk do us all a diservice for acting like there are legions of S.E.A.L.s and Special Forces guys stabbing 20 iraqis in silence as he sneaks into a base. Clearly these people play to many video games. While I'm shure there are people who could silently dispatch a person without making a sound I bet they could do it with a spoon just as easily as a "killing knife".
 
It's knowing how to use whatever it is you have at hand. A set of car

keys a stiff comb or some of IG's hot sauce can be used in a lethal manner.

When makers or collectors talk about fighters or tacticals, they are usually

speaking in classical terms. Then again, if you asked makers here to show

a fighter, you would get all sorts of examples, depending on the maker. The

same would go for most other knives as well.

You have to penatrate the human body very little to cause death if it is in

the rite place. Those little neck knives sell really well. In truth they could

be called a fighter or a tactical. Just me, Fred
 
The perfect killing knife would be the longest possible rapier that you can handle. But, its alot easier to carry a gun; and if you are in the military, you are probably better off making a call for artillery and airsupport. A knife is a utility item; it might be used in a fight, like a rock or anything else out of pure desparation; but, getting that close in a fight may make for a very costly win.

n2s
 
the killing knife,, a scalple kills everyday as well as saves..

hp2spare
what family are you studying? I studyed (pronounced)> shug far
for over two years.. only two belts in a life time in it, white and then Black.


sorry for the OT guys.
 
hp2spare said:
Take a peek over at http://www.fightauthority.com Those folks will echo what you've heard here. The Chineese (I'm a kung-fu student) used what amounted to steak knives. The Koreans used the bali song, but the blade is only part of the story. The handles are useful for all sorts of control and joint lock type moves.

So my aswer for what do you take to a knife fight. Something that handles quick (no two foot long bowies). Something extremely sharp. Something that won't break off and leave you without a blade.

The way to tell the winner of a knife fight... he's the guy who gets out of the hospital first.
Click to expand...
Maybe not a 2 foot long bowie, but, regardless of what you may think about him, Bill Bagwell sure makes a good argument for a decent sized bowie being the best combat knife. Just for fun, take a larger bowie, even one with an unsharpened clip, and try a hard "backcut' on something like a a cardboard box or bag of cement or fertilizer and you will see what i mean. Now i am an opinionated sort, but to my mind, the bowie makes a lot more sense than some of the tiger-striped, paracord handled Star Wars/Dune looking "chisel with a slight cutting edge" combat knives that are being sold to our troops today.
 
modifiedbandito.jpg
[/IMG]
fightingbowie1.jpg
[/IMG][/IMG] The first knife was made for a Krav Maga instructor. The bowie is 17" long 3/8" thick 5160. 3" wide at the integral guard. Made for a local martial artist.
 
OK Guys,

All you points are well taken...

I also started this topic in the HI Cantina...

Point of fact,After having a tough year...paying bills and scrapping nickels... Wendy and I bit the bullet...went a little nuts and took a second honeymoon in December and went with Larry Harley to hunt Hawgs...

I used one of Larry's double edged Hawg Knives...

A lot of my biases about big knives...and double edges are now dead...

We saw a hunter use a Cold Steel Trail Master on two hogs...

and...while all his hawgs were just as dead as the three we took...there seemed to be a marked performance difference in the way the knives did their jobs...

I have read Bagwell's comments on big knives...at the time I did not truly have a solid opinion...as I had no experience one way or the other...

Having seen the devastating nature of a big double edged knife...I see there is a huge difference between big camp knives that are used as weapons...and knives designed specifially as killing tools...

What are the common design elements you are asked to make for this type of knife?

Shane
 
those hog knives are made for one purpose and one purpose only......deep stabs. Read the chapter in the Bagwell book about that. As I recall, even Harley's double edge hog stickers are not your "classic" dagger but more of a modified bowie profile. He has made a lot of those knives in a single edge format too i think. My only prob with the full double edged big knives is that you might have a little trouble doing other tasks with them. One could also argue that the Trailmaster might be a bit on the chunky size for the length and width of the blade, especially out toward the point. Check out some of Don Hanson's bowies on his web site. You might get some inspiration for a blade shape. One point that Bagwellmakesin is bookis that, unlike the samurai, the "fencers' object was to hit the opponent and avoid being hit themselves. Now that goes by the wayside rather quickly, but it is definately a different philosophyand the fighting styles and equipment reflect that.
 
There was a very interesting thread here a while back with agrussell -the bowie knife originally [documented !!] was a large heavy duty hunting knife ,not a fighting knife and didn't have a saber tip !! And most where made in Europe primarily Sheffield !!...As far a "combat" knives , I was always amused when the Sykes-Fairbarne commando knife was sometimes called a "light duty" combat knife !!. In actual use the tip broke off easily !
 
I talked knives on another forum with a few really serious hog hunters and they all had different critieria and carried different knives.
The one guy who did the most hunting (managed a game farm in texas and hunted hogs all the time to give the deer less competition) gave me some pretty specific details on what he thought he wanted. He was starting to give some thought to working with a custom maker and trying to develop something specifically for hogs. That was a few years ago, he may have something now I haven't seen him online in awhile.
Anyhow....he was looking for a double edged leaf shaped blade rather than a bowie style. His reasoning is that the point makes a huge hole going in, and the narrower portion following along leaves lots of room to bleed. IIRC 8" was the minimum blade length because any shorter may have trouble reaching the heart on bigger pigs. And he didn't want a huge gaurd on it, but there needed to be something to help grip retention and keep your hand from sliding forward.

I can see where a blade of that type could work really well for hunting with dogs and sticking pigs. I don't know how well it would lend itself to other methods though. It probably wouldn't be much for slashing, although it might chop ok with all the weight out in the tip...

I guess in the end there's really no good answer to this question. There are specific knives for specific situations. And for me.....I'm perfectly happy with leaving my knife in my pocket and using a rifle ;)
 
One of the fun hunting facts out there is that more Americans have been killed "in the woods" by whitetail deer than any other wild animal. I read a story in one of the kinfe mags a goodly number of years ago about a hunter who shot a large buck and was walking up to claim his trophy when the apparently dead critter did a Lazarus and jumped up and charged him. The hunter happened to be carrying a Randall Smithsonian bowie, which arguably, is an oversized bowie, and proceeded to swing it and chopped through parts of an antler en route to splitting the buck's skull and returning him to the land of the recently deceased. A ruined trophy beats a sucking chest wound every time in my book....lol
 
mete said:
There was a very interesting thread here a while back with agrussell -the bowie knife originally [documented !!] was a large heavy duty hunting knife ,not a fighting knife and didn't have a saber tip !! And most where made in Europe primarily Sheffield !!...As far a "combat" knives , I was always amused when the Sykes-Fairbarne commando knife was sometimes called a "light duty" combat knife !!. In actual use the tip broke off easily !
Click to expand...
the "Sheffield" bowie came later to fill the demand for the knives. But you can see the inspirations for the bowie design in the long knives of the 18th centrury, the rifelman's knife, Mediterranean dirks and even back to the Seax.
Somebody just put it all together in the early 1800's and came up with what is arguably just as Bagwell states.....the perfect big knife. If the Vidalia sandbar fight legend is to be believed, Ole Jim fought a guy who had a smallsword and beat him.....not to mention whatever firearms were present
:D the Sheffield makers may have "standardized" the basic forms we mostly know today....the clip point and the "Rio Grande' spear point. The Sykes-Fairbairn is pretty much useless. The Randall Model 2 is a much better choice for a pure dagger because the blade is wide and thin enough to have shallower bevel angles that you can get a really sharp edge on and it has a usable handle. But I would much rather carry a Model 1 or 14.
 
Mark Pointen said:
modifiedbandito.jpg
[/IMG]
fightingbowie1.jpg
[/IMG][/IMG] The first knife was made for a Krav Maga instructor. The bowie is 17" long 3/8" thick 5160. 3" wide at the integral guard. Made for a local martial artist.
Click to expand...
I like the integral bowie. I am going to have to try one like that with full width guard split away from the billet a la Wayne Goddard when i get my press up and running:thumbup:
 
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