Old Hickory

B

Battleship

Joined
Aug 3, 2013
Messages
126
I bought the 5 piece set last week, and i love these knives, they came pretty dull but they sharpen up nice. I wish i had bought these knives years ago, for the price these knives can't be beat.
 
They are a good kitchen knife as I have used them for years I just do not believe they are a good outdoors knife as we do have great outdoors knives. Knife making has went a long ways since the 1850's ad using a Old Hickory as your outdoor knife is just plain dumb in my book.

As a kitchen knife they work well as I have many.
 
Mix it up said:
They are a good kitchen knife as I have used them for years I just do not believe they are a good outdoors knife as we do have great outdoors knives. Knife making has went a long ways since the 1850's ad using a Old Hickory as your outdoor knife is just plain dumb in my book.

As a kitchen knife they work well as I have many.
Click to expand...

One of the advantages of using an Old Hickory is you can modify it. The 7 inch butcher knife, for example, can be made into a Kephart blade.

As for "knife making has come a long way since 1850 ..."
Has it really? The materials may have changed some; stainless steel, and better heat treatment, maybe. But the essence of a fixed blade has not changed. Oh, sure, marketing has convinced a lot of people that if you cannot baton a knife, it is "useless" in the woods, and that you "need" a blade 3/16 inch wide or more at the spine.
In 60 years, I have yet to find myself in a situation where I needed to baton my knife.

There are a lot of popular fixed blades being made today using traditional steels of 1055 and 1095, with handle slabs riveted on, just like they were in the 1850's or earlier. (Ditto knives without a full tang being made the same way they were in the 1800's and before.)
 
It seems like if somebody does something once on here are on a Youtube video then everybody else has to.

If it is such a good idea to make your 7 inch butcher knife into a Kephart design then why did Ontario not do it years ago? If they have I have not noticed.

I see this in even hobby. A few years back in the motorcycle world everybody every body was really into David Mann stuff. Not when he was alive but when OCC told everybody to be really into him. Then it happened in the hot rod scene. All of a sudden everybody was into rat rods and Von Dutch. Not because they knew any thing about the guy but because he became popular.

Now everybody is into bush crafting and Kephart is a big name. If his knives were so great why did Buck not make them years ago instead of the 119. How come Ontario did not make one, Why did KA-BAR not make one. Why does Randall Made not make any. Did Mike Stewart make any? I do don't know but I do not recall seeing any. He may have as I don't know his whole line but I think most of his stuff is hunting stuff. How about Bob Dozer. His claim to fame was a drop point hunter in D2. I seen him at the Tulsa gin show last year and he did have a Kephart design knife in D2 but only because it has became a craze and he is cashing in on the fad.

I live in Arkansas where there are lots of knife makers. It has changed a lot since the 1850's. Knives are now made out of powdered steels and ground in a machine, not forged or hand ground and bevels and angel grinds are produced to make knives way stronger than they were in the 1850's.

I hear ya on not batoning as I have done it lots but in reality I should have been carrying a hatchet.

I forgot what this thread is about, anyway, God bless American and amber waves of grains, buy US bonds, peace out!.
 
Pretty sure one of Ontarios most popular blades currently is a Kephart, the Sk5 blackbird...
 
Mix, not all knives are made with powdered metals. I would venture to guess that the vast majority are still made with a 1055 to 1095 carbon steel blade, or one of the 440 and 425HC stainless steels.

I agree there are far fewer hand forged blades used for production knives. Off the top of my mind, I can't think of any. Certainly not Case, Buck, Ka-Bar, OKC, GEC, Canal Street, or other "big names" in traditional knives. I don't follow modern knives, so I don't know about them. Of course, starting in the mid 1800's (if not sooner) hammer forging machines and other automated processes were in place in the cutlery industry. I doubt any production knife has had a hand forged blade. That would be more of a one - off blacksmith made blade.

As far as I know, and I admit that is not a lot, but it is my understanding that the final grind on production knives is still done by hand.
 
Perhaps using an Old Hickory as an outdoors knife isn't a necessity and perhaps it doesn't make sense for those of us that have fancy made-for-it outdoors knives, but the fact of the matter is that they work. They work darn well. And they're cheap enough that you CAN modify them to be what you want them to be, whatever that is, without hesitation- and they're cheap enough that you can abuse them without being afraid of breaking one, but high enough quality that they'll last. Things have "evolved" in the outdoor and knife realm, but when you really take away all of the hype and theory, one realizes that our forefathers were onto something. They didn't need a sharp prybar. They needed a knife that would cut, and what we call kitchen knives worked for them for generations.
 
A $170 super knife made from hi tech alloy, that can whittle hairs and chop down trees is cool. I prefer my collection of more affordable knives including some carbon steel Old Hickory knives. I'd rather pay ten dollars and have it arrive dull than fifteen dollars and have it arrive sharp, I enjoy sharpening and carbon steel is easy. I've never modified one but if you want to then go for it!
 
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