Swamp Rat Rat Trap Passaround Review:
Weight: 4.42 oz.; 125 gr.
Overall length: 8 15/16
Blade length: 3 7/8
Handle length: 5 1/32
Blade thickness: .123
Scale thickness: .129
Overall thickness less clip: .402
This is a well made, comfortable knife. The grip is well thought out; comfortable in any position, with no obvious hot spots. I could find not noticable play in the blade when open and I agree with what has been said in previous review, opening and closing is very smooth. The knife is very thin for its size; as always there are comprimises. The knife is very easy to carry clipped in ones pocket or without the clip at the bottom of ones pocket. For extended use, it may be to thin for some, but this would make for a heavier and bulkier knife. The G10s texture is, in my mind, well balanced; rough enough for good grip, yet not so rough as to cause hot spots. I can not say how well the edge will hold up with extended use, but I have used this knife for all of my normal chores this last week and the edge has held up fine. I like Cliffs convex edge, I believe it makes for a better slicer.
One item that has been discussed several times is the thickness of the liner lock. It measures .040 thick, which compared to many current knives is on the thin side. It is also steel as opposed to titanium, which I prefer for a liner lock. It appears that Swamp Rat took some time to lay out the geometry of the lock, because it has not slipped in any of my use, and I have gotten many liner lock to slip. It does bend slighlty with pressure on the spine of the blade, but it would be very difficult to fail in this mode as the liner will make contact with the G10, which in turn needs to give before the lock would actually fail. The liners could be thicker, but this would also make the knife heavier/thicker. For this style knife, which I would classify as medium duty, I think it is just fine. This is not a sharpened prybar, it is a knife designed for cutting and slicing, but not to the point of being exclusively so.
I do believe there are some minor modifications which could be made to improve this knife. It is always easier to redesign something after it has been made, so this is not a negative toward Swamp Rat, just constructive critizism from my point of view. The hole for the lanyard is .145, I would enlarge this to at least 3/16, preferable ¼. Larger should not hurt the structure of the handle, but would allow more leeway in regards to what one wants to use as a lanyard. The other improvement is the thumb grooves on the spine of the blade. The look fine, but when the blade is open and the thumb rests over them, they are below the surface of the G10 scales. Unless one really bears down on them, they do little, if anything to improve the thumbs purchase. Other than these two minor items, I would leave this knife as is. In my opinion, this knife would be an excellent folding knife for camping, hunting, fishing or just about any sort of use a 4 bladed knife would be needed, short of prybar status. Fine job, Swamp Rat; it is rare that I can look at a knife and not find more to improve upon.
Richard
Weight: 4.42 oz.; 125 gr.
Overall length: 8 15/16
Blade length: 3 7/8
Handle length: 5 1/32
Blade thickness: .123
Scale thickness: .129
Overall thickness less clip: .402
This is a well made, comfortable knife. The grip is well thought out; comfortable in any position, with no obvious hot spots. I could find not noticable play in the blade when open and I agree with what has been said in previous review, opening and closing is very smooth. The knife is very thin for its size; as always there are comprimises. The knife is very easy to carry clipped in ones pocket or without the clip at the bottom of ones pocket. For extended use, it may be to thin for some, but this would make for a heavier and bulkier knife. The G10s texture is, in my mind, well balanced; rough enough for good grip, yet not so rough as to cause hot spots. I can not say how well the edge will hold up with extended use, but I have used this knife for all of my normal chores this last week and the edge has held up fine. I like Cliffs convex edge, I believe it makes for a better slicer.
One item that has been discussed several times is the thickness of the liner lock. It measures .040 thick, which compared to many current knives is on the thin side. It is also steel as opposed to titanium, which I prefer for a liner lock. It appears that Swamp Rat took some time to lay out the geometry of the lock, because it has not slipped in any of my use, and I have gotten many liner lock to slip. It does bend slighlty with pressure on the spine of the blade, but it would be very difficult to fail in this mode as the liner will make contact with the G10, which in turn needs to give before the lock would actually fail. The liners could be thicker, but this would also make the knife heavier/thicker. For this style knife, which I would classify as medium duty, I think it is just fine. This is not a sharpened prybar, it is a knife designed for cutting and slicing, but not to the point of being exclusively so.
I do believe there are some minor modifications which could be made to improve this knife. It is always easier to redesign something after it has been made, so this is not a negative toward Swamp Rat, just constructive critizism from my point of view. The hole for the lanyard is .145, I would enlarge this to at least 3/16, preferable ¼. Larger should not hurt the structure of the handle, but would allow more leeway in regards to what one wants to use as a lanyard. The other improvement is the thumb grooves on the spine of the blade. The look fine, but when the blade is open and the thumb rests over them, they are below the surface of the G10 scales. Unless one really bears down on them, they do little, if anything to improve the thumbs purchase. Other than these two minor items, I would leave this knife as is. In my opinion, this knife would be an excellent folding knife for camping, hunting, fishing or just about any sort of use a 4 bladed knife would be needed, short of prybar status. Fine job, Swamp Rat; it is rare that I can look at a knife and not find more to improve upon.
Richard
