Ban
Moderator
- Joined
- Oct 14, 1998
- Messages
- 4,942
Just received my talonite M.E.U.K-1 this week! The fit and finish on the knife is excellent. The blade appears to be bead blasted and is coated with something similar to Greco knives. The handle is very different compared to the handle of my maddog labrat, which is in the same size range. The maddog handle is more ergonomic and is slightly more comfortable because of the thicker handle slabs. The handle on the M.E.U.K is also very comfortable in its own right and feels a little more secure because of the flared butt area and the texture of micarta. The flared butt area on the handle cannot be seen on the pictures because it requires a top view as if looking down the spine. If you take a birds eye view of the handle you will notice that there are three noticeable humps. One in the guard area to better prevent the hand from sliding forward. One towards the end of first 1/3 of the handle approximately where your middle finger rests. The last hump is on the butt of the handle. The profile of the handle resembles the contour of a vase if you look at it from a top view.
The first thing I did with the knife is whittle on some hard round sticks purchased from the local hardware store. The knife felt very comfortable and bit into the wood very easily. I whittled until I got bored and noticed that there was no difference in the edge. By the way, the knife came shaving sharp and easily shaved hair off of my arm. However, I did notice that the edge was not quite as hair popping sharp as O1, 1095, and other high carbon steels. Next I took the knife out to the yard and started cutting notches into a 2X4 that was laying in the yard. After cutting about 12 or so decent sized notches I inspected the edge and noticed that it is still unaffected. I then proceeded to chop into the 2X4 by gripping onto the last third of the handle with only my thumb and first two fingers. This made chopping a little more effective. The knife was not a great chopper due to its size but still did a respectable job. I mainly wanted to test the ergonomics of the handle. The flared butt area made the knife feel fairly secure even while gripping only with my thumb and first two fingers. After about 30 chops I inspected the edge and did not see any chips or edge rolling. After the little workout the hard coat on the blade was pretty scratched up. I took out some steel wool and was able to take out most of the scratches. Since the edge was still good as new I decided to test it some more by cutting into the steel wool. The edge was noticeable duller afterwards. 10 strokes on each side of the Sharpmaker and it was shaving sharp again. In conclusion, the M.E.U.K makes a great utility knife and talonite can really hold an edge. To top it off, talonite is also very easy to touch up and resharpen. The only gripe I have is with the coating on the blade that tends to get marred up during heavy use. Since talonite is very corrosion resistant I really don't think that the coating would be necessary.
The first thing I did with the knife is whittle on some hard round sticks purchased from the local hardware store. The knife felt very comfortable and bit into the wood very easily. I whittled until I got bored and noticed that there was no difference in the edge. By the way, the knife came shaving sharp and easily shaved hair off of my arm. However, I did notice that the edge was not quite as hair popping sharp as O1, 1095, and other high carbon steels. Next I took the knife out to the yard and started cutting notches into a 2X4 that was laying in the yard. After cutting about 12 or so decent sized notches I inspected the edge and noticed that it is still unaffected. I then proceeded to chop into the 2X4 by gripping onto the last third of the handle with only my thumb and first two fingers. This made chopping a little more effective. The knife was not a great chopper due to its size but still did a respectable job. I mainly wanted to test the ergonomics of the handle. The flared butt area made the knife feel fairly secure even while gripping only with my thumb and first two fingers. After about 30 chops I inspected the edge and did not see any chips or edge rolling. After the little workout the hard coat on the blade was pretty scratched up. I took out some steel wool and was able to take out most of the scratches. Since the edge was still good as new I decided to test it some more by cutting into the steel wool. The edge was noticeable duller afterwards. 10 strokes on each side of the Sharpmaker and it was shaving sharp again. In conclusion, the M.E.U.K makes a great utility knife and talonite can really hold an edge. To top it off, talonite is also very easy to touch up and resharpen. The only gripe I have is with the coating on the blade that tends to get marred up during heavy use. Since talonite is very corrosion resistant I really don't think that the coating would be necessary.
