Respect always gets shown.

E

ElCuchillo

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We talk about traditional knives on here all the time, which are the best, which are the hardest workers, etc., but which get the most respect? Which ones cause the public to go "eyes up"?
Today at work I was talking with some old timers, and some young guys, just chewin the fat, you know? Talking about this and that, and we got on the topic of the new Indiana Jones movie, and how he didn't have a knife!! Why does he cary a whip but no machete? What type of knife would he carry, etc. It led to us discussing our own preferences in knives. The younger guys were all for tacticals and tactical fixed blades. Benchmades and Spydercos for the folding tacts, Gerber for the fixed blades. The older guys pulled out their knives. Mostly Cases, with the exception of a Boker. They had Two trappers, a Barlow, a Pen knife, and a few stockmen. The young bucks brought up the locking blades and fixed blades, how safe they are, and how functional a half straight and half serrated blade is. The Old timers countered with how their knives were better made, simpler, cut better, and had multiple knives, therefore were more functional. The young guys said their's were lighter and could clip to your pocket or ride on your belt. The old guys said the tacticals were plastic, and a pocket knife belonged IN your pocket, not ON your pocket. I was laughing, because it felt like I was sitting at my computer reading posts on here. It was pretty cool. Then I pulled out my SAK Super Tinker, and they all stopped talking and looked at it. Almost to a man, they all went "If that's a REAL Swiss Army knife, then it can't be beat. Those get REAL sharp. Those are REAL tough. Those are REAL handy. Those are REAL famous. REAL funtcional. REALLY good knives." Etc., etc. I couldn't believe it. Here are all these die hard old timers and rebellious, chip-on-their-shoulder carrying younger guys, and they BOTH paid respect to the humble SAK!! Almost like they were saying a SAK is in a category all it's own. I thought it was pretty cool.
Just thought I'd share that with you guys. Thought it was interesting.
 
Great post, ElCuchillo! I guess that I am more 'old timer' than 'youngster', but I agree that the SAK holds a place of it's own.
 
I ignore all those threads that carry on the "if you could only have one knife" debate, simply because the answer is too easy: SAK. With all their varieties, there's not much a SAK can't do. It may not able to handle the jobs a large fixed blade can do, but I figure a SAK can handle most, if not all, of the chores a pocket knife would be called on to perform.

I figure that on the 8th day, God made a Swiss Army Knife, and said, "it is good."

thx - cpr
 
The sak is in a catagory all it's own.

Mark Twain wrote about his Russells barlow. Gearge Sears, under his pen name Nessmuck, wrote about his 2 blade jack. Will Rodgers was pround of his premium stockmen.

But, The sak has been documented in more ways of saving lives, and fixing problems, than any other knife type around. From the hights of Mt. Everest on down, a sak has saved a bad situation many times. It's not just a knife, it's a tool. How many old pocket knives have we seen with at least one snapped off blade because somebody needed a screw driver in a pinch, or needed to pry something more than a thumbnail would do but had only a pocket knife?

When I tried the experiment started by ElCuchillo last winter, I was carrying a small stockman. I couldn't do it, I had to switch back to my Wenger SI that was the modern equivellant of my old boy scout knife. The ability to have a small tool that gives one the ability to make quick repairs is invaluble.

Versitility.

From the smallest sak, versitility is what sets it appart, aside from exellent craftsmenship. When I set about to convert some non knife carrying members of my family to the "other" side, I gave out sak classics as Christmas stocking stuffers. It worked because they were cute, well made, and most of all were versitile. It was not just a knife. Some of the women loved having a nail file available right there on thier keyring. A couple loved having a little sissors there. Cousin Scott, who lives in a suit, loved that it was so small that it fit on his keyring and he always had a sharp cutting tool when he left the house without a bulge in his dress pants pocket. When our niece Allyssa got married, the whole wedding reception was set up with those little classics. Boxes opened, candalabra's put together with the set screws, crepe paper cut and hung, tape cut, string holding bundles of table cloths cut, lots of stuff. I could not have done it with my peanut. No screw driver.

The old timers carried some stuff we don't. Those pocket screw drivers, nail clippers that did duty as small phillips and slotted screw drivers, fine wire cutters, and other stuff, all get put out of buisness by a small sak. sometimes just a couple of tools gives you options. I know I've used a sak sometimes to get out of a bad situation. A loose conection in ignition plate on a 1966 BMW R60 motorcycle that wouldn't start one night, a loose battery cable on a Vespa motorscooter way out in the middle of nowhere, a repair on the electic trolling motor in the middle of a large lake.

However, if a sak is the meat and potatoes of my pocket knife work, then the peanuts, stockmen, and barlows must be the gravy.

And everybody knows meatloaf and mashed potatoes are great with lots of gravy!:D
 
Great post El.

The fact that SAK's reach across such a broad spectrum of people is what makes them such great gifts (I've given them for birthday's, Christmas, and to my groomsmen). Also, the quality control is so high that you don't have to fret much about someone getting a defective one.

I could go on and on, but I don't want to make my traditionals jealous.
 
it's true saks have saved my bacon more than once....my brother gets a good deal of his income from selling woodcarvings that he makes almost exclusively with a vic spartan. I feel constantly torn between my sak and my more traditional pocket knives....Would an allox sak be cosidered somewhat trad? the best sak I've found to meet my personal edc needs is a vic supertinker...
 
RescueRiley said:
Would an allox sak be cosidered somewhat trad?
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I would think so, its still a very basic slippy. Being a bolsterless design, one may even be so bold as to say it's a shadow pattern scout. :D

The Wenger SI and the victorinox pioneer/soldier are basicly a scout knife in layout.
 
I would agree they are very similar..for use out doors it's hard to beat a vic alox farmer...This may sound sacreligious but they feel alot more solid and snap alot tighter than the majority of my other slippies as well...incidentally out of the box a vic edge profile seems much more conducive to wood carving than any of the blades on my boker stockman...
 
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I'm 40 and like tactical, traditional and SAKs and have tons of each.

But who says Indie doesn't have a knife? :)

pocket_knife.jpg


Of course this is from the first movie.

Oh, and I got this image from a post by rickppoole
 
eswartz said:
But who says Indie doesn't have a knife? :)

Of course this is from the first movie.

Oh, and I got this image from a post by rickppoole
Click to expand...

He does have one in the first one, but in the last one he asks for a knife and states that he doesn't have one on him.

peter
 
It's interesting, because on the one hand, you have folks who look at a SAK as a toy, not a REAL knife. This, I'm guessing, is a result of all the knock offs out there that aren't worth a damn. Yet on the other, it is incomparable.
As for Indie, yes, i know he had one in the first movie, which is why I was SHOCKED when he asked for one in the new one!! I'm guessing it was to show off his son's knife, or to make his son shine in that moment. Who knows.
 
jackknife said:
The sak is in a catagory all it's own.

When I set about to convert some non knife carrying members of my family to the "other" side, I gave out sak classics as Christmas stocking stuffers. It worked because they were cute, well made, and most of all were versitile.
Click to expand...

(edits mine) I do exactly that; every couple of years, I buy a dozen or so, then hand them out for birthdays, graduations, Christmas, Easter (if the occasion permits), boys 'coming of age' - occasionally a dad will ask me for my advice on a first pocket knife; I just give them a SAK Classic for their kid, and they usually end up buying one for themselves :D. Of all the knife inventions of the last century, I think the SAK is hands down the best.

thx - cpr
 
I have found that everywhere, the term "swiss army knife" is pretty much a universal word, and pretty much always synonimous with quality and reliability.

a conversation i had with a non-knife outdoors guy today at the river:
"yeah i am just carrying my SAK today"
"oh really? i have a couple of those...good knives"
 
The last time I was in the US I purchased a key for each of my 4 daughters.
It has a whistle, mini-mag light and a SAK classic.

I asked them if they use the Classic.
They all said "yes all the time".
My little one (12 years) then procceded to expound on how she uses her knife to open plastic things, splinter out of a friends hand, sissors for school work.)
She was so cute!
 
ElCuchillo said:
It's interesting, because on the one hand, you have folks who look at a SAK as a toy, not a REAL knife. This, I'm guessing, is a result of all the knock offs out there that aren't worth a damn.
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This has happened to me many times.

One example of many, I was working on this one job where I had to set some threaded standoffs into a milled plate of aluminum. I was using an old hand press over in the drill press section. It had a depth set that was locked in with a phillips screw. Since my tool chest was on the other side of the shop in the mill section and I did not feel like walking back over there, I used a tinker that was in my pocket. An older machinist was working in the drill press section at the time, and he glanced at my tinker as I tightened the set screw and remarked,"Huh, a Swiss Army Knife! I got one of those, but it don't hold an edge worth a damm. I guess a screw driver is all that piece of junk is usefull for." I told him mine cuts and holds an edge quite well, maybe he's not sharpening it well. He reaches in his tool box and gets it and tells me if I can get the piece of junk sharp to have at it. He hands it too me, and it has sort of redish maroon handles, a sort of similar white cross decal on it that was peeling off, and some blades that sort of are profiled like sak tools. It did not even have a country of origin on it, and it didn't even look like Chinese. Maybe Pakistani. But in his dim mind since it had redish handles and had some tools it must be a sak.

There are alot of dumb people in the world, and the sak knock offs have given real sak's a bad name with people who don't even bother to look at a tang stamp. Then you have the people who think since it doesn't have black handles, open in a blink of an eye, lock open with enough strengh you can hang a Sherman tank from it, it's a toy.
 
when I was younger (early 20's) carried a tac folder...it tactically cut boxes open and tactically carved wood....I now own only one tak folder which I kept because it was given to me by a friend.,.any way...while in the woods I've done almost everything I could think of with various saks from using the saw to build a lean-to...making a bowdrill set..to cleaning and skinning a number of squirrels, bunnies, and fish,,,and it still goes to work with me on monday......Can' beat that
 
I have only two tactical folders; one is a Spyderco Native and the other is a Kershaw Vapor. They stay in the consoles of our cars just to make sure there is a knife handy.

I enjoy traditional slipjoints, but it is mostly a SAK or multitool that I carry, other than the Case peanut for dress clothes. I find that I admire and play with my traditional slippies, and trade them when I get bored, but I put my SAKs and multitools to hard work more. I just like having more tools than just a cutting edge available.
 
Foilist said:
I have only two tactical folders; one is a Spyderco Native and the other is a Kershaw Vapor. They stay in the consoles of our cars just to make sure there is a knife handy.
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Actually I keep a couple of SAK in each of our family cars. I sharpen them before I put them in. I put one in the glove box and two in the Emergency backpack that we keep in each vehicle. Steven
 
Foilist said:
I have only two tactical folders; one is a Spyderco Native and the other is a Kershaw Vapor. They stay in the consoles of our cars just to make sure there is a knife handy.

I enjoy traditional slipjoints, but it is mostly a SAK or multitool that I carry, other than the Case peanut for dress clothes. I find that I admire and play with my traditional slippies, and trade them when I get bored, but I put my SAKs and multitools to hard work more. I just like having more tools than just a cutting edge available.
Click to expand...

Subsitute a pair of BM Mini-grips for the Spyderco and Kershaw and your post fits me to a tee.
 
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