Tactical to Traditional??

[Kleingra]

I came to a similar conclusion a while back. Still have my modern knives but the only time I ever really carry them is if I'll be wearing heavy work gloves or out in cold/wet weather.

 

[arizonaranchman]

Have you used the saw at all on that Farmer? I don't think I would use the saw on the SAK. If I'm going out camping or on a long hike, I usually just take a Laplander along and stick it in my backpack.

It works surprisingly well. The teeth are very aggressive and cut fast. Obviously it's not something you'd intentionally process firewood with as your #1 choice, but if on a hike or fishing and you are struck with the idea of an impromptu fire it's quite capable really. Or if out in the yard you feel the need to trim a small branch, cut a rose for the wife, etc.

 

[arizonaranchman]

No stable of traditional pocket knives is complete without a 4" Stockman

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Ha! Oh rest assured my OTHER all-time favorite is a Case large Stockman

 

[Aias]

To the OP: I totally understand you brother... I, more or less, went down that road just recently. I've kept a few moderns (mostly relatively low cost users and two I plan to gift), and have otherwise gone the traditional route with regard to folders. I carry my GEC #42 Missouri Trapper everyday, everywhere possible (and have a SAK fieldmaster in my pack)... and that's all I really need... and want. There is just one modern left on my radar, and after that... nothing else.

 

[T. Erdelyi]

Yes, everyone should have a Stockman...

 

[dasknife]

Ha! Oh rest assured my OTHER all-time favorite is a Case large Stockman

Where did you buy that orange SAK? I like my "tactical" knives more but i use my cadet, solider, and peanuts plenty more during the day as opposed to my bigger knives. So, hmmm. Methinks I need to evaluate the my frame of mind.

 

[dasknife]

 

[blademan 13]

Yes, everyone should have a Stockman...

Or 6...

 

[xICEMANx]

Well I sold a couple modern folders today, and as luck would have it a TC Barlow popped up on the exchange and I snagged it. Feel like I just caught a unicorn. Lol

 

[asdf12345]

I think a slipjoint/other traditional is perfectly suited to most cutting tasks. However, "tactical" folders offer things that it seems no one is doing, or you have to pay much more money for, in a traditional pattern knife. These things include functional pocket carry options, blade length, and one hand use. Make me a slipjoint in CPM 3V with a four-inch blade, pocket clip, and thumb release, and I'd buy it. But then it wouldn't be a "traditional" anymore

 

[midnight flyer]

The "traditional only" group sure has a great cheering squad!

Personally, to me, knives are tools. I like traditional patterns and have carried them for almost 55 years. About five years ago, I bought a RAT 1 as a less weighty and bulky partner to my traditional patterns for work. That got me started on carrying two knives as the RAT can't do what the traditional can do, and vice versa. I carry two knives almost every day, and use them both every day I am at work.

I don't have one remote clue why it has to be one or the other, a traditional or modern knife. I will promise that my large Kershaws will take a lot more hard work than my CASE knives. So, I use the big work knives for all the nasty stuff, and the traditional patterns for slicing tasks. A great combination.

Thinking to myself that this has been a frequent and very well hashed subject, I remembered this thread:

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/980449-Traditional-and-Modern-pairings

Many that have use for both sizes and styles of knives carry them with no concern of which political knife stripe they belong to. I don't think I am alone on that thought as the thread linked about now has almost 1200 posts spread over 59 pages, loaded with great pictures from guys that carry two knives on a regular basis, guys that find more than one style of knife useful to them.

Carry what you want, when you want, whatever you find useful for your knife chores. The wind blows in a lot of directions here, and it wasn't that long ago that folks were abandoning their normal knives in favor of carrying just a peanut pattern! It was the rage! My fingers are too arthritic for tiny blades, so although I have a few peanuts that were gifted and inherited, it was a no-go from the start. But nothing wrong with peanut power, either. I believe that there is plenty of room for all the knives we want, and certainly don't believe that because a knife has colored (black, orange, red, tan, green, etc.) handles and a stainless blade it is a "tactical" knife for some mall ninja. Sometimes a knife is just a knife...

Robert

 

[cards94]

The "traditional only" group sure has a great cheering squad!

Personally, to me, knives are tools. I like traditional patterns and have carried them for almost 55 years. About five years ago, I bought a RAT 1 as a less weighty and bulky partner to my traditional patterns for work. That got me started on carrying two knives as the RAT can't do what the traditional can do, and vice versa. I carry two knives almost every day, and use them both every day I am at work.

I don't have one remote clue why it has to be one or the other, a traditional or modern knife. I will promise that my large Kershaws will take a lot more hard work than my CASE knives. So, I use the big work knives for all the nasty stuff, and the traditional patterns for slicing tasks. A great combination.

Thinking to myself that this has been a frequent and very well hashed subject, I remembered this thread:

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/980449-Traditional-and-Modern-pairings

Many that have use for both sizes and styles of knives carry them with no concern of which political knife stripe they belong to. I don't think I am alone on that thought as the thread linked about now has almost 1200 posts spread over 59 pages, loaded with great pictures from guys that carry two knives on a regular basis, guys that find more than one style of knife useful to them.

Carry what you want, when you want, whatever you find useful for your knife chores. The wind blows in a lot of directions here, and it wasn't that long ago that folks were abandoning their normal knives in favor of carrying just a peanut pattern! It was the rage! My fingers are too arthritic for tiny blades, so although I have a few peanuts that were gifted and inherited, it was a no-go from the start. But nothing wrong with peanut power, either. I believe that there is plenty of room for all the knives we want, and certainly don't believe that because a knife has colored (black, orange, red, tan, green, etc.) handles and a stainless blade it is a "tactical" knife for some mall ninja. Sometimes a knife is just a knife...

Robert

Great post sir and this says it all for me. It's almost like these types of threads turn into trying to convince the other side that this type of knife is the only one you need or should carry or that I'm much too suave to carry a modern folder.

 

[pmew]

I agree, midnight flyer hit the nail on the head.

However, there are different reasons why people do what they do. Legally, where I live, I cannot carry any kind of locking blade unless I have an extremely good reason for doing so and can prove it. I can't carry any kind of blade longer than three inches in length be they non-locking or otherwise, or any kind of fixed blades either in a public place.

Exceptions are things like; necessary for work, sport or religious/national dress.

So I can carry my sgian dubh when I wear my kilt.

 

[Liberando]

I've always been a fan of traditional knives. But for a few years, when I was still on active duty, I'd carry a "tactical" knife as well in the field.

Sure, the tactical was handy. It would cut things, open MREs, scrape, etc. But I never had the affinity for it as I would the Bucklite, or big Old Timer or Buck stockman, or Case Barlow that I had tucked away in my mobility bag. Seems that the tactical would be replaced pretty quick by one of my traditionals.

 

[squazy]

I think once the word tactical is mentioned we all know what it means...to me it screams insecurity,unfortunately for the small umber of users who genuinely require one handed opening they get put in the ''tactical'' box and I feel sorry for them!

 

[knarfeng]

I actually think there are three styles.
►Tactical - which tend to be built like a brick telephone booth with thick heavy blades. Often advertised as "folding fixed blades". Often marketed with a focus on self-defence.
►One-handers - less robustly built than "tacticals", but with pocket clip and open with one hand. Not normally marketed as "self-defence" tools, but sometimes discussed as such by the uninformed.
►Traditionals

I carry two of the three styles.
I carry one-handers because they are handy to use.
I carry traditionals because they give me several useful blade shapes in a single package.

When I'm working and have one hand grabbing what needs to be cut and only one hand free to open and hold the knife, a one-hander is darned handy to have.

When I have both hands free, a traditional gives me a choice of blades, each with a shape optimized for certain types of cuts.

 

[arizonaranchman]

Where did you buy that orange SAK? I like my "tactical" knives more but i use my cadet, solider, and peanuts plenty more during the day as opposed to my bigger knives. So, hmmm. Methinks I need to evaluate the my frame of mind.

This Farmer was a gift, so don't know where it came from. I believe Alnamvet bought a couple of these so he may be able to tell you where he got his.

I love the orange Alox

 

[slide13]

I actually think there are three styles.
►Tactical - which tend to be built like a brick telephone booth with thick heavy blades. Often advertised as "folding fixed blades". Often marketed with a focus on self-defence.
►One-handers - less robustly built than "tacticals", but with pocket clip and open with one hand. Not normally marketed as "self-defence" tools, but sometimes discussed as such by the uninformed.
►Traditionals

This is a useful distinction. I have little interest in tacticals these days. One handers could have a place in my life even though I haven't carried one in years. I used to edc a small Sebenza and it was a very useful knife. If I ever decide I need something more than my traditionals that is what I would get again without a doubt.

 

[James Y]

I think once the word tactical is mentioned we all know what it means...to me it screams insecurity,unfortunately for the small umber of users who genuinely require one handed opening they get put in the ''tactical'' box and I feel sorry for them!

I don't know...there are lots of people who carry and use one-handers and are not necessarily insecure. Many simply prefer one-hand operation; for some, it's easier on their hands/joints than pulling open some traditionals, which in some cases can be nail-breakers.

I love both traditionals and modern one-handers, and to be truthful, really don't care what anybody else might think. We are lucky and should be thankful to be living in a time and place where many of us can have all these options to choose from.

Jim

 

[midnight flyer]

I agree, midnight flyer hit the nail on the head.

However, there are different reasons why people do what they do. Legally, where I live, I cannot carry any kind of locking blade unless I have an extremely good reason for doing so and can prove it. I can't carry any kind of blade longer than three inches in length be they non-locking or otherwise, or any kind of fixed blades either in a public place.

We have the three inch/locking laws in place here in South Texas, but I have never seen them enforced unless part of a larger problem such as being used in a bar fight or stabbing. As an interesting piece of local history, our knife law prohibiting locking knives and knives with blades over three inches is directly attributable to the Buck 110.

That's right, the venerated, respected, "now considered traditional" 110. It had a nasty point on it that was seen as making it a stabbing tool. It locked, which the traditionalists of the day screamed that NO traditional knife needed a lock unless it was for no good purpose. (Learn how to use your knife, boy... you shouldn't need training wheels...)

The lock was the killer as they local constabulary felt that it made it into a concealable weapon. And it was. The local motorcycle club immediately adopted it as their own for must have gear. A ton of folks carried them, and it was found to be a quite necessary tool of the Saturday Night Knife and Gun Club. I didn't get one back in the 60s because in its day, that knife was considered an aggressor's weapon around here. Lots of murders, stabbings and misunderstandings with that knife, and it was so often used that they developed a graphic (which reinforced it as a thug's knife) to show when they announced a local stabbing murder.

That only lasted a few years, but that knife was considered the blade of a trouble maker. The popular thinking among my blue collar workers was that if you wanted a blade that size on a knife, you should buy a fixed. If you didn't want to learn how use a folder properly which meant you shouldn't need a lock, maybe you shouldn't carry a knife at all. Traditional knife carriers were really militant then, and saw no need for this large, heavy, overbuilt locking knife with the long point that was SO big that it came with a belt sheath. Or was that actually a holster? The city ordinance passed easily that banned that type of knife, and the 110 was used as the poster boy to get it done.

Rigorous enforcement of the law got a lot of folks in trouble, and if you were in an altercation of any type and the police were called, you were arrested if you had a 110 on your person, even if no used in the commission of a crime. Arrested. Possession of an illegal weapon!

After about 5 years or so, all that calmed down, and the 110 started showing up everywhere. So much so, (and for a while, with so many police officers carrying them) the just quit enforcing the law. I have never seen anyone get in trouble around here for their choice of knife carry as long as they use common sense when carrying it.

Exceptions are things like; necessary for work, sport or religious/national dress.

So I can carry my sgian dubh when I wear my kilt.

Heck, ya! I wasn't familiar with that particular knife, but it seems our law makers all have the same kind of sensibilities when making law. It makes perfect sense that you shouldn't be able to carry a knife with a 3" blade, but can carry a double edged fighting dirk/dagger when wearing a kilt. Makes perfect sense to me!

Robert