I love to whittle and carve while I am on con calls or listening to audio training. When I do this I always find that I default to one of several knives: new 5.1, 4.7, Fallkniven F1 and LT Wright GNS pretty much in that order. So I decided that I would make (yet) another try stick or two using all of these knives to see which knives cut the best, felt most comfortable in hand during hard use, to see if I liked smaller knives or bigger knives (something that I go back and forth about all the time) and to make any other observations
I took a 2.5' section of pine hand rail whittle it down to a circular shape, cut it in sections and make a try stick and a handle.
Over about 2 or 3 hours I whittled the square shape of the handrail to a circular shape mostly with my F1 and a little bit with my 3.5 just to see how it performed verses the F1. I cut several sections out with my GNS then carved a handle with my F1, GNS and 3.5. From there I took another section and made a short try stick with my 4.7, 5.1 and F1 (which I used the least on this try stick).
How did the knives do?
GSO 3.5 3v - I was really surprised that this was my least favorite knife to work with on this project. It cut and carved the worse of all the above mentioned knives. But in it's defense it's not really a heavy use knife and I was using it on hard treated wood. I should just use it for green wood and not try to use it like a heavier 5" knife. I'll see if I can get Guy to re-profile the blade. This should make it a better carver.
Fallkniven F1 vg10 - Over the past 3 years I keep coming back to this knife mostly because it's the best slicer and carving knife I own. VG10 holds an edge well and sharpens easily. The thermorun handle is small but pretty comfortable in the hand and doesn't produce hot spots. It did a great job on the hard wood and stayed sharp. It didn't have any micro folds after 3+ hours of cutting and carving. However the 90 degree spine TORE up my thumb and it became my second least favorite knife to use when I started making the hooks and 90 degree cuts in the try stick.
LT Wright GNS 01 - This is another non GSO knife that I regularly reach for. It's big and heavy enough to be able to hang with my 4.7 for heavy duty cutting. It also stayed very sharp and is the second best slicer I own; but like the F1 the 90 degree spine tore up my thumb. It did a better job making try stick cuts but fell short because it became uncomfortable when I used 2 hands. At one point my left thumb went numb due to the sharp spine.
GSO 4.7 CFV & new 5.1 3v- These knives did the lion's share of the hard cutting on the try stick and as always they did a fantastic job. They stayed sharp and didn't have any micro folds. Even though I prefer the rounded spines on the older GSO, these knives didn't damage or cause my left thumb to go numb.
My conclusions:
First and foremost Guy's new handles and the new scale treatment are second to none. The GNS handles comes close but the micarta is no where near as tacky. The F1's thermorun handles are also pretty comfortable and work well. But I wish they were longer and had more girth (yes I understand they were designed for use with gloves).
Cutting and carving - The F1 and GNS are definitely the 2 best carvers and slicers. These two knives did a great job rounding out the handrail. The 4.7 and 5.1 are the best cutters. They both carve & shave pretty well but were second fiddle to the F1 and GNS.
Small vs medium sized blades - I spoken to a number of guys who say they are moving away from their med and larger knives and gravitating to 3" to 4" knives. I thought I was going that direction too though I found that during this exercise I preferred using the 4.7 and 5.1 more than the 3.5 and F1. I also liked the bigger handles, weight and feel of the 2 larger GSOs. And finally I thought the 4.7 was my favorite knife but my 5.1 is still my favorite. This is about the 100th time I've flip flopped between the two but after about 8 try sticks made out of this hard treated lumber I find that I just prefer my new 5.1 to all my other knives.
Last thoughts - The only 2 knives that could have done all this work, rounding out the square shape of the handrails, cutting the hand rails into sections (see pic below) and making a try stick and handle were the 5.1 and the 4.7.
PLEASE forgive any spelling and grammatical errors!!!
