Stacked Leather Handles and Narrower Tangs?

marcinek said:
I am not comfortable with lower limitations either.

That is why I have found "the best" way to kill spiders around the house is with a 12 gauge.

Guaranteed kill!
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Thanks for the tip, I have some DDT left over from the good ole days but I was worried about what I would do when it ran out. I was thinking about a baseball bat but I can see the shotty having more range. :thumbup: Chris
 
My apologies...sometimes my smartass evil twin takes over.

However, I think some (not me, mind you, some) may not associate "indestructible" with "best." Some (not me, some) may associate "indestructible" with "overkill."

Like if I were to say "The material of my living room sofa is indestructible. Its made of cinder blocks." then I would be guilty of overkilling my point by making too many wiseass analogies.

That would not be "the best" way of making my point.
 
I have a plan of action....I just purchased an RD-4 from Ranger knives, a really hard core 4.5 knife. I will work with that for a while. Than I will purchase a Marbles Sport for $66. JUST for the sake of comparison. I would just use both knives to do some woodcraft stuff and the like. I am not a knife abuser in the strick sense, though I have pushed some knives hard. At least maybe I could gain some personal understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of each style.
 
Fiddleback said:
You read into my post what you wanted to hear. I didn't say they weren't weaker than full tang knives. I said they weren't weak. There is a fundamental difference there.
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And that difference would be ?

I suspect it would fall under my previous example of a stick tang being, say, 50% as strong as a full tang, but if you only push it 30%, then you'd conclude they're "equally strong" which just isn't the case.

The original post asked about stacked leather handles and stick tangs holding up to "serioius use," including batonning.

Clearly, a stick tang would be weaker than a full tang. It's a simple matter of physics. To argue that is silly.

Batoning a stick tang could and has bent the knife at the blade/handle juncture. There is a video online of a Cold Steel Recon Scout snapping at the blade/handle juncture just a couple hits into the batoning. (Noss was nowhere to be found on that one....:D)

The words that caught my attention in the OP were "serious use."

It appears that there is disagreement over what "serious use" in an outdoor/survival situation really means....

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David E said:
And that difference would be ?
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Quite different:confused: Let me elaborate.

Stick tang knives are not weak. They have served well for thousands of years. Now we have the full tang (my personal favorite) that can "theoretically" out do/last a stick tang. That does NOT make a stick tang weak. See, pretty simple.

Another point. Anyone that has any skill with a blade, can use a stick tang effectively, and safely so not to break it.

Codger brings up a very good point.

Codger_64 said:
I have hunting/fieldcraft knives from every decade beginning in the 1890's until now, and all of them are still quite serviceable. My circa 1915 Marbles Woodcraft and my Remingtons and Western States still have another hundred years left in them if they wind up in the hands of people who know how to use knives properly and properly maintain them. Codger
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runningboar said:
Some very interesting points have been brought to bear here and at the risk of alienating myself even more from certain factions on this board, a bombproof unbreakable knife does not make it the best knife. If you use a knife mainly for cutting and slicing and very occasionally subject it to light pounding and prying almost any design will suffice. If your main intent is to beat the hell out of it all the time then you might need to get a specialized tool for your particular application.
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I, personally, can't see any way to disagree with that. A dull knife won't cut well no matter how well it prys, and if you need cutting, it's not the "best" tool.

"Compromises"? You bet.

When you consider how many members we have at BF and all the knives they use (and abuse), I don't think we are hearing about a relatively large number of knives breaking unintentionally.
 
tarmix101 said:
Stick tang knives are not weak. ...the full tang can "theoretically" out do/last a stick tang. That does NOT make a stick tang weak. See, pretty simple.
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Geez.......... less material is less strong, IE; WEAKER, than more material. See? pretty simple.........

There is another picture online, not involving Noss, that shows a Kabar bent to about 90 degrees, right at the handle/blade juncture.

Anyone that has any skill with a blade, can use a stick tang effectively, and safely so not to break it..
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I don't know what prompted the owner of the above cited Kabar to pry with it, but yet again, it all goes back to the term, "serious use" and what it means to different people. In that case, his knife choice let him down.

Some people think it is utter abuse to baton or pry with a knife. Whilst I expect my knife to handle that, should the need arise.

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Then the Busse line suits your expectations. You were either taught, or learned on your own to have different uses and expectations for and of a knife than I. I simply choose different tools for the tasks you expect a knife to accomplish. Or I find a way to accomplish the task without endangering or ruining my knife. To each his own.

Codger
 
David E said:
Geez.......... less material is less strong, IE; WEAKER, than more material. See? pretty simple.........
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Less material also weighs less.

Corollary: If the weights and design are otherwise equal, the knife with the slab tang will necessarily have less metal in the blade.
 
Codger_64 said:
Then the Busse line suits your expectations. You were either taught, or learned on your own to have different uses and expectations for and of a knife than I. I simply choose different tools for the tasks you expect a knife to accomplish. Or I find a way to accomplish the task without endangering or ruining my knife. To each his own.

Codger
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Actually, it was reading these forums that first caused me to think "outside of the box" regarding knife uses and function, especially when considering a survival "serious use" element.

In that case, you may not have the luxury of using the "proper" tool, so to me, that places added emphasis on knife selection.

BTW, Based on an earlier thread we shared, I tried to get a couple of those Old Timer knives you recommended and like so much, but I kept getting outbid.

I'll keep trying, tho. :)

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There is more steel in those blades than you might imagine. Don't be put off by patina or a bit of surface rust. Risk a toss of a few bucks at a lesser appearing knife with a poorer picture and reasonable shipping. Even with a poor or bad sheath, new original sheaths are easy to find and a lot of nylon sheaths fit them. Taylor Brands LLC is having these reproduced in China. I haven't tried them. But I have reviewed other pattern. IMHO they were crap. The sheaths were reconstituted leather, not leather. At any given time if there are ten of the pattern on, five or six will be the copies. Look closely and it isn't hard to tell the difference. If in doubt ask the seller. I think that this pattern even with rising resale prices, represents a bargain on today's knife market. Dayum. I sound like a salesman! Ferget it! Shy away from them! They are mine!!:D

Codger
 
Having more metal at the tang dosent automaticaly gaurantee strength, heat treat is the key. a large tang incorectly or poorly done my very well give way long before a smaller tang correctly heat treated will. Bigger isn't alway's better. ymmv. I'am sure some one will agree to be disagreeable :grumpy:
 
I think those Fallkniven Northern Lights series are beautiful. I love the one that I think is called the Frey. Has an ox hide stacked leather handle, 5.5 inch laminated vg-10 blade. Beautiful.



riddleofsteel said:
I have a Fallkniven Idun that is laminated VG10 with a stacked ox hide handle. I use it for a field knife during the bow season. Light skinning and quartering duties. Over the past few seasons the handle has taken on a nice color and it is very comfortable and non-slip. All the Northern Lights come with ox hide handles and in a variety of blade designs. Check them out.
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Side note- I saw a couple of people mention Ranger knives. I've heard really good things about them too. They appear to be built like a tank.
 
Codger,

Found another one and it says that it is STAINLESS.

I thought you said yours was 1095 ?

Are there two versions, or was the seller mistaken?
 
David E said:
Codger,

Found another one and it says that it is STAINLESS.

I thought you said yours was 1095 ?

Are there two versions, or was the seller mistaken?
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Email me the link and let me see it. SOme SFOs were stainless, and so are the Chinee knives.
 
David E said:
Geez.......... less material is less strong, IE; WEAKER, than more material. See? pretty simple........
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Assuming that were true, how thick should the full width tang be? I have a khukuri with a 9/16" thick full-width tang. Would a khukjri with a 1" thick full-width tang be "better"?

Sorry if I keep asking about "better," but we are talking about, at least in part, cutting/chopping tools. That is, I pressume one cuts/chops more with a knife than one prys. Stronger but not better at the main task seems fairly useless. But that's just me.

Some people think it is utter abuse to baton or pry with a knife. Whilst I expect my knife to handle that, should the need arise.
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The knives I take off-road are expected to do the same, and have been doing so for some decades. They have more often been less than full-width-tanged knives because the full-width tang knife was quite rare until relatively recently.
 
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