Spyderco CPM M4 Mule as a skinning knife

gunmike1

gunmike1

Joined
Dec 9, 2005
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I bought a CPM M4 Mule from Tom Krein with TK's custom green micarta scales and great kydex sheath. The ergonomics are excellent on this knife, and the handles are every bit as comfortable with the same fit and finish as my custom Krein knives. The Kydex is secure and perfectly fitted to the knife with great ease of access. The steel itself was tested at 62.5 RC by Phil Wilson, and it takes extremely sharp 10 degree per side edges and holds those edges very well (more on that later). The Full Flat Ground leaf shaped blade is excellent for utility or field work, and the 1/8" M4 is plenty tough for any utility task I can think of with it's .018"-.020" thick edge behind the edge bevel. For those that care ( I don't) the grind lines were nice and clean with even edge bevels.

I have been using this as a hunting knife recently with very good success. A month ago my brother in law got a decent sized pig (over 100 lbs) and the knife dressed it out with ease, though the .05 micron edge actually started to cut better after dulling out some. That is most likely due to the fact that it had an edge optimized for push cutting on it, and skinning and dressing out game is almost purely slicing. Either way after plenty of bone contact the knife was still cutting very cleanly when done with the pig. I resharpened it to 2000 grit on my Shapton Glasstones. It could easily whittle hair, but still had some teeth to it for slicing.

I got to test it again Sunday on a 400 lb Boar I took down with 1 well placed shot from my Glock 10mm. A 175 Grain Winchester Silvertip hit right behind the ear and severed and shattered the spine, killing him instantly which was nice so the animal didn't have to suffer and of course prevented him from charging me (that would have been a very scary proposition). This guy was so big 4 of us had trouble dragging him and could barely get him in the truck bed. He was big enough to have to sit diagonally in a 6' truck bed to fit. We skinned, cut off the feet and head (lots of bone contact) and again the knife was still able to cut cleanly at the end of this 2 hour marathon session, though I'm the type that would resharpen it at that point, even though it still cut clean. I just like very sharp knives I guess. The knife's edge took no chips in all of that bone contact, though the steel did stain a tad and take a tiny bit of rust spotting from not immediately drying the knife after the skinning and washing of the knife, but overall the corrosion resistance is more than adequate.

I must say that right now CPM M4 is my favorite steel, and Spyderco offered a true bargain for the CPM M4 Mule. They did a spot on heat treat to 62.5 RC which makes for a steel that takes an extremely sharp edge with no burring, excellent edge retention (better than CPM D2 by a fair margin, but not ZDP189 good) and pretty good toughness. With all of the bone contact at a 10 degree per side geometry (with my natural convexing from freehanding the very edge the angle is probably 12-13 per side) I am pretty sure my ZDP 189, S30V, and CPM D2 knives would have chipped at that geometry, but the M4 Mule just has excellent edge properties. The Tom Krein handles and sheath make for a true custom quality and performing knife for a very affordable price. Top notch heat treating on M4 with just plain great Green Canvas Micarta scales that feel like they were made just for your hands with an excellent Kydex sheath make for one wonderful hunting/utility knife. Thank you Spyderco and Tom Krein for giving me such a great knife. I can't recommend the M4 Mule enough, was worth every penny I put into it, and I can't wait to get my ZDP 189 Mule back from Tom Krein to compare to my M4 Mule.

Mike
 
Very nice write up Mike, that M4 is a amazing steel. Camera coming in handy?
 
Nice write-up.

I like M4 also, though the rust issue is a concern. I use a Mule and a Gaucho in the steel. The steel takes a nice edge with relative ease and retains that edge for a good time.

My user Mule in M4 has seen more kitchen use than anything else and there has been some spotting.
 
As always, a top notch review. Always worth reading.
(I might have skipped this thread, except I saw who wrote it.)

Thanks!
 
Thanks for the compliments, here are some cell phone pics. Excuse the mess on the blade, it is the only pics I actually have of it handy on my phone (I'm on break at work now), and they were from the first skinning session on the smaller hog. I thought I'd throw in a couple pictures of the hog I got, though the pictures doesn't do justice to his size. I am 5'9", 182 lbs., and that guy was WAY bigger than me. Well over 6' long and super thick (and very lean as I found out after skinning him).I'm lucky that 10mm did the trick with the first shot, as this guy charging me from close range would have sucked. I'll try to get a better pic up of the blade and great handle work by Tom Krein later, but for now phone pics must do.

Mike








 
thanks for the results on using the mule
i had tested same knife on cardboard & figured it would good a long distance on deer. will be able to use this knife & gec mdl 23 next week on deer & maybe hogs. we have plenty of both on brothers ranch.the hogs are smarter than the deer so it may be later in yr. before we get hogs. was wondering if that mule blade would be long enough for a big pig, you answered that ? from size of tracks looks like we have some 400or 500 lb. hogs on the property.mike have to give you credit for great bullet placement.newcomers to hogs have no idea how tuff they are, pop barbed wire like kite string .i'll probably blow up our pigs with a 270. my brother likes the 7mm stw.
 
Great writeup and pics, thanks! Good shooting too! Nice to see the 10mm will do the job.

I'm glad to see how well it performed, I've got 2 mules into Tom right now for handles and sheaths, an M4 and an S90V. I can't wait to try them out when they come back!
 
Thanks Dennis and Sodak. Dennis, you bring up a great point about how brutally tough hogs are, unless you are VERY confident of your ability to place your shot well don't try to take one, let alone a huge one, with a handgun. If a 7mm Magnum wasn't backing me up I would have used my .308 M1A SOCOM 2, and I still could have got charged and lit up if I would have been off by just a few inches. I used to shoot competition and can make very credible groups at 60 yards with my Glock 20 (the 10mm I used), and I was using a known hog stopper load in the Winchester Silvertips. A 200 or 220 grain super hard cast flat point would have been better, but the Silvertip worked because I put it where it needed to go.

As for the knife, it absolutely works great on very large, tough game like this huge hog. The hide was so thick most wouldn't believe it, and the thick, dirty hair just loves to dull blades. Not to mention what cutting off the feet and head can do to dull a blade with all of that bone contact. M4 does a great job maintaining it's edge while being tough enough to not chip out while directly hitting bone. This performance is why I have a Gayle Bradley M4 folder on pre order even though I've never seen it. Spyderco, Gayle Bradley, and CPM M4 is enough for me to know the Bradley folder will be an excellent cutting tool.

Mike
 
mike if you were shooting a handgun at 60 yds' you are good. my brother was a partner in hill co. wholesale for yrs. got my ammo in case lots wholesale so i did 1000s of rounds in 80s & 90s. 40 yds. was about it for me. that was from a rest.had an old colt det. special for yrs. never shot it .went to brothers ranch range one day as a fluke tried it out off sand bags[ was going to sell it] that 2 in. barrel would pop beer cans at 40 yds. decided to keep it. back to pigs, had a sow hanging & started to clean her & she came back to life, it's hard to believe how far in their necks you have to go to cut the big arteries.thing i hated most was all the ticks we had to scrape off 1st.it's been better lately , we think fireants gobbled up the ticks. i forgot where i was in the forum, mods will probably blow this out . no knife info. here.
 
I've never used M4 steel but I have made a knife or two out of hard M2 power hacksaw blades. I'm not surprised in the preformance of M4 because of how great M2 performs. That Spyderco knife is a great design as well. I'm pretty ticked I missed out on it. I'll bet you could cut that pig and it's twin up as well with that knife. :) great review love seeing some real world results. PS I love smoking pigs just as much as I like eating them :)
 
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Hey that's a good point. What did Babe dress out at? Now db's gone and made me hungry....

The pig that I did a couple of years ago was 240 lbs before we popped him, plus it was domestic, so much cleaner hide. This one looks like he'd dress out at that much or more!
 
The actual shot was only 12-15 yards (the joys of using my buddy's hunting dogs), but it did hit in the exact spot I wanted. The last time I shot my 10mm was at 60 yards, at which point I was hitting 10 shots in 6" or so, unsupported and not espescially slow fire. I just mentioned the 60 yard shooting to show I wasn't completely nuts going after a 400 lb pig with a mere 10mm, I actually have a bit of ability to place my shot where it belongs.

The pig was around 225 lbs of meat weight according to the butcher. The skin was rediculously heavy, a good 70 lbs or so. The gut pile and organs were similar, heavy enough to break apart the kitchen garbage can they were put in when I tried to pick it up. I had to hug that can to get what was still in the busted plastic garbage can tossed out. The head was 35 lb or more, and who knows what those thick legs below the knees were, but those and other bones lost in processing makes for one big assed pig. I'm just glad that sucker dropped dead and didn't charge me. I certainly would have rethought the pistol hunting if no dogs were there to get as close as I did to the pig, but it is still a big risk without placing your shot right as many a dog and man have been severely injured by hogs even with hits from magnum rifles in them (the local gun shop owner had this happen). My brother in law and his buddies thought I was crazy chasing pigs with that 10mm, but I felt confident the dogs would allow me to get close enough to make that clean shot with my thumping 10mm. As the smile on my face in those pics show I was lucky enough to be right and I certainly surprised the rest of the hunting party with that immediate stop on the pig with my pistol. My brother in law has never had that clean of a take of a pig with his 7mm Magnum, so he was completely shocked I dropped such a large pig with a 10mm. It's amazing what shot placement will do.

Mike
 
Next test for M4, pig sticker? 14 yards? You need to get within 14 inches! lol, those guys are crazy. The ones who shoot the hogs from helicopters have the right idea.
 
I really want a knife in M4. I believe it to be a great steel for knives when extreme sharpness and edge retention are needed.
 
CPM M4 is definately a great steel if you value extreme sharpness with excellent edge retention. It is tough compared to most steels anywhere near it in edge retention, of course you sacrafice some stain resistance to get there. I feel it is well worth the extra care to prevent rusting considering how it does pretty much everything you could ask out of a blade, it is just a very well balanced steel IMO.

No pig sticking for me, that 12-15 yard shot was closer than I ever want to get to a massive hog again. In retrospect a lot could have went bad and got my ass lit up by that mean sucker, but adrenaline made me not really think about the consequences of a bad shot. Luckily my hands were steady in spite of the adrenaline, competition shooting under pressure gave me the practice to be able to shoot steady under pressure. I'm sure the PETA crowd would have cheered if I chunked the shot and got gored, but I'll count my blessings that I made the shot.

Mike
 
thombrogan said:
Awesome review, Mike!

How's feral bacon taste?
Click to expand...

I'll find out tonight after I pick up the meat from the butcher. I still have to wait for the hams and the chops, which are getting smoked, but the rest of the meat is ready to fill up my recently purchased chest freezer.

Mike
 
ChapmanPreferred said:
Nice review Mike. I really need to send Tom one of my S90V mules for a handle job.
Click to expand...

You won't be disappointed. Hid handles are great with every bit of the detail and fit and finish on the Mules as on my customs from him. Speaking of Krein work, I will try to get some time to get your EDS sharpened ASAP. I can't wait to see how sharp I can get ultra thin H1. Sorry I've been so slow in doing it, but I've been busy.

Oh, as for the bacon, I'm still waiting on that and the hams ans hocks, as they are being smoked now. The sausage is great though (I got 50 lbs of that), but I haven't tried any of the countless pork chops and pork steaks that we got out of this hog.

Mike

Mike
 
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