The 20 Best Knives You Ever Owned

Huntsman Knife Co. LLC.

Huntsman Knife Co. LLC.

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Title says it, list the 20 best knives you've ever owned. There is no criteria except #1 has to be your absolute favorite/best knife of all time. Pictures are recommended.

Your 20 can be comprised of any knife, from a huge chopper to a slipjoint.

To rephrase the question, if you had to keep a collection of 20 knives from everything you've ever owned, what would that list be?

Here is my personal list, sorry for the shameless plug but I stopped making knives in 2019 so I've got nothing to sell you. :cool:

1.Swamp Rat Rat Daddy LE
2. Busse Nuclear Meltdown Fusion Battle Mistress (NMFBM)
3. Swamp Rat Ratmandu Satin
4. Busse Basic 11
5. Spyderco Paramilitary 2
6. Swamp Rat M9
7. Huntsman Knife Co Fell Beast 3V
8. Scrap Yard Dogfather
9. Scrap Yard Scrapizashi
10. Benchmade 810 Contego M4
11. Benchmade Bedlam
12. Swamp Rat Chopweiler
13. Scrap Yard Alpha Regulator
14. Huntsman Knife Co Hacksaw
15. Scrap Yard 1311
16. Busse Fusion Battle Mistress
17. Lionsteel M4 in m390
18. Big Chris Bolo in 3V
19. Scrap Yard Wardog
20. Spyderco Manix 2

Pictures of some legends:

Ratmandu and M9 + Rodent Waki Circa 2011
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Busse NMFBM
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CPM 3V Fell Beast. These things were heavy hitters

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Scrap Yard Dogfather

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Huntsman Knife Co 3V Hacksaw. (Have a run of these in 10V I never completed)
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In no particular order

1. Spyderco para 2 (s110v)
2. Benchmade 15020 bone collector
3. Microtech Ultratech
4. Microtech utx 85
5. Protech Malibu
6. Protech godson
7. Buck Sprint
8. Zt 0990
9. Medford Smooth Criminal
10. Spyderco Native
11.Benchmade 940-1
12. Becker bk16
13. Buck marksman
14. Trm atom
15. Hogue Deka
16. Freeman 451 folder
17. Leatherman Wave plus
18. Trm neutron 2
19. Victorinox trekker
20. Kabar heavy bowie
 
1) Siegles’s ( Outlaw bushcraft )
2) Gossman’s ( Tusker 5 )
3) Swiss Army’s ( farmer )
4) Leatherman’s ( wave )
5) Swamp Rats’s ( RMD / Battle Rat )
6) Les George’s ( Talos )
7) Busse’s ( Basics / steel hearts )
8) Scrap Yard’s ( Dogfather / yard keeper / DS8 )
9) Carother’s ( HDFK / MC / DEK 1 / UF )
10) Benchmade ( Adamas / Striker )
11) Martin ( T3 / BT )
12) Temple ( Omen )
13) Krein ( Recurve hunter )
14) TRC ( Millie C )
15) SET ( too many to mention )
16) JJ Smith ( pure excellence and performance).
17) James Helm ( Benghazi Warfighter)
18) Chris Reeve ( 21 )
19) Spartan ( SHF )
20) Laconico ( CJ )

These are in no particular order. I can say that every maker mentioned has set some kind of standard for me though. Grateful that I’ve had the chance to own and use all of the mentioned knives.

If I could only keep one of the mentioned knives , it’s a draw between Siegle, Gossman and Martin.

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I’ll dig up pics soon
 
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Krein Rogue
Krein roaring river
Krein recurve
Krein black knife
Krein white mountain hunter
Gossman short bolo
Gossman ULP
Gossman kubo 2
Emerson cqc8
Emerson cqc11
Emersom A100
Emerson mini A100
Billy Cho type 56 XL
Strider dgg smf
Sibert scout
Siber Luk
Vehement tunnel rat
Strider d9 mod 10
Krein alpha
Zt/Rexford IMG_20200724_010906_1.jpg
 
I would have a hard time listing all of them but I do have a single folder and fixed if I could have one of each (I actually had to do this in 2020), fixed is a Fallkniven F1 and folder is a Spyderco Native.

Some that I have truly loved over the years
Swamp Rat RMD
Spyderco PM2
Gossman Polaris
ESEE 3

I have come to a point where I value cutting efficiency and edge stability over most other attributes so in a couple of years this list might change based on the custom makers I’m trying.
 
luethge said:
1) Siegles’s ( Outlaw bushcraft )
2) Gossman’s ( Tusker 5 )
3) Swiss Army’s ( farmer )
4) Leatherman’s ( wave )
5) Swamp Rats’s ( RMD / Battle Rat )
6) Les George’s ( Talos )
7) Busse’s ( Basics / steel hearts )
8) Scrap Yard’s ( Dogfather / yard keeper / DS8 )
9) Carother’s ( HDFK / MC / DEK 1 / UF )
10) Benchmade ( Adamas / Striker )
11) Martin ( T3 / BT )
12) Temple ( Omen )
13) Krein ( Recurve hunter )
14) TRC ( Millie C )
15) SET ( too many to mention )
16) Jeremiah Smith ( pure excellence and performance).
17) James Helm ( Benghazi Warfighter)
18) Chris Reeve ( 21 )
19) Spartan ( SHF )
20) Laconico ( CJ )

These are in no particular order. I can say that every maker mentioned has set some kind of standard for me though. Grateful that I’ve had the chance to own and use all of the mentioned knives.

If I could only keep one of the mentioned knives , it’s a draw between Siegle, Gossman and Martin.

View attachment 2166578



I’ll dig up pics soon
Click to expand...
What I'm more interested in, is what number are you about to cross off that list...?
Haha. 😬
 
Tried to order them but it's more grey than BW:

CPK: UF, FK1, Behemoth
CPE: Any of Paul's Fullers and Cuviers (say this counts for 2?)
Busse: Jackhammer 10, DSF, Axe Hammer, SOB
Swamp Rat: MMD (v1), Eraticator
SYKCO: SOD, DS8
REK Kuros
Hinderer: Fulltrack, XM24 Wharncliffe, XM18 Fatty Wharncliffe
Spyderco: Military, Manix 2
 
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This.... is actually harder than those "if you could only keep one" threads. Every knife is "the best", until I've carried it for a while and worn the new off.

I guess this is one of the few times when working from memory is going to be the best way to do this, since the ones that stay there are likely to have had something special about them.

CRKT/Lightfoot M1. A high-water mark for Columbia River, and I was fascinated by Greg Lightfoot's work. Had a Timberline by him too, now that I think of it. Big, but not as special to me as the M1.

Benchmade Mini-Griptilian. One of the early ones with Pardue's touchmark, in D2, of all things. Does anybody remember when Grips could be had at a store for $80?

Cold Steel 4Max Scout. I've grown up more in some ways than in others, and I still like dumb knives. A town boy like me has no actual use for any version of the 4Max, and that's what makes it fun.

TOPS Lil' Roughneck. I've posted pictures of this, too. 6.125", tip to tip, and 0.375" thick at the spine. Pocket fixed blade? No, pocket splitting maul.

No pictures. The image hosting site is being... Microsoft-like.
 
shane45-1911 said:
OK, I've been meaning to ask for some time now......

How do you get your knives to stay vertical in some of your pics (such as the one, above)????!?!

Nice knives/pics.
Click to expand...

That's a bamboo magnetic board for kitchen knives - wife prefers over the normal knife block as it's easier to thoroughly clean .... the result is that all my CPKs are slightly magnetic now :)
 
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