ROSarms Passaround Knives

[ChapmanPreferred]

The passaround ZLATOUST knives from RosArms arrived today. The larger knife is their Federal Super model and the shorter one is the Messer I am the last participant in this pass. There were ten participants that were signed up for this pass and there have been some excellent reviews to date.

Here are the knives when first removed from the shipping box.

The closure device on the sheath of the Federal Super (larger) was loose when they arrived.

I tightened it up and then realized that it did not have leather cover over the slotted screw that would be pressed up against the leather washer handle.

 

[dullone]

From the photo it looks like something had been glued over the screw head at one time. Is that your impression?

 

[ChapmanPreferred]

I would guess there was originally a leather disk there which did not make its way to me. Good question.

Moving on...

The materials used in the handles are not unusual, but the combination of all of them on each handle was worth a closer look. The larger of the two knives has a metal bolster that leads to Micarta washer, which leads into stacked leather washers which was the majority of the handle material. The pattern is then reversed heading to the butt of the handle.

The smaller of the two knives has Micarta bolster which leads into wood washers and then into a lovely piece of wood. Again, the pattern is reversed while heading to the butt of the handle.

Another unique point about the use of Micarta in the handle is the orientation of the grain. In most knives I have or have beheld, the end grain is intended to be viewed on the knife from the side. In this knife the end grain is viewed from the front of the handle.

 

[ChapmanPreferred]

Next up are some comparison of other knives that I have in similar blade lengths.

Federal Super knife

Messer knife

The edges of the knives were not sharp out of the box for me. There was a distinct burr on both knives which was not consistent. It would waver from logo side to the other side and back. Initial attempts to cut paper were successful but not smooth at all.

I chose to strop rather than sharpen to see if that would be enough to bring the edges back to what I would consider sharp. The smaller knife edge came back with just some stropping. I tried to do the same to the larger knife, but was not able to succeed from the tip through the first two inches of the blade (or two inches from the tip to the tip if that is more clear).

I will use the knives for 2 days and then sharpen them up and finish off my time with them. I will then touch them up again before shipping them out.

 

[ChapmanPreferred]

The following is a quote from World Knives website regarding the Messer (smaller) of the two knives. The one on their site is a guilded version, so the quote has been edited to match the one I am reviewing.

"This is an unusual hand made knife from Ros Arms of Russia...

The blades of all Ros Arms knives feature the famous Zlatoust forged and hardened stainless steel which is similar to ATS-34 or 440c stainless steel. Their special heat treatment tempers the blade to 58 on the Rockwell hardness scale.

The blade on this fine knife has a beautiful hollow grind, fine mirror polish. The handle is Birch wood. The guard and pommel are Micarta.

The blade is stamped with the Russian Ros Arms seal and a fine quality leather sheath is included."

 

[ChapmanPreferred]

I’ve been using these knives for a week.

I used the Messer in some traditional wood carving and whittling efforts. In a standard hammer grip, the handle was very comfortable but bordering on a little slim for my tastes.

In the chest lever grip, the thinner spine of the handle had less surface area to spread the pressure across so it was a little painful on harder cuts.

It was not so painful that I was not able to continue and created a point on the stick.

Next I used the hammer grip and placed the spine of the knife against the lower part of my knee just below the knee cap in the soft spot. This worked very well for removing bark from the stick.

Next I cut a notch

I finished off the peg by flush cutting it off of the rest of the stick with a stop block under the cut so I do not go into my leg and removing the remaining bark.

 

[ChapmanPreferred]

The Federal Super has a much thicker edge than the Messer does. I did not remember to get out my calipers before boxing up the knives for shipping back to Hillbillenigma, but it was more on the geometry of a chopper than it was a slicer. I chopped a branch in half with three to four chops on average.

I tried to use the same hammer grip with the spine of the blade against the soft part of my knee but due to the serrations/saw on the spine, I had to alter my technique to suit this particular model knife.

It worked fine to take the bark off of this green wood stick and was even doing pretty well as a feather stick maker in this grip. I was surprised with as thick as this edge geometry was on this knife.

Summary:

Both of the knives had comfortable handles for the hammer grip, but both were a bit thinner on the spine of the handle which made the chest lever grip uncomfortable. The steel held its sharpness pretty well after I stropped the edges, so I did not even sharpen anything until just before packing them up. I could not bring myself to sharpen the Federal Super because the edge was just so thick and I was trying to get the knives to the post office before it closed today so it only received a second stropping. I took time to sharpen the Messer on Spyderco’s Diamond rods for their Sharpmaker and then stropped the edge.

I enjoyed my time with these knives and thank Hillbillenigma for the chance to use and review this pair of knives. My thanks for everyone who chose to follow my review!