Hibben Alaskan Survival Knife

02/18/2013 by Miika

-Price Paid: $60.00
-Used for Outdoor/Survival
-Owned for 3 months

Comments:

This knife is designed by Gil Hibben and made by United Cutlery. Hibben is known for his custom knifes/swords.
This is very heavy knife compared to it's size. Lenght of the knife is 317mm (12 1/2") and it weighs about 500g (17.6 oz).
Blade is made of 420 steel with a curvy model, it's full tang and roughly 5mm (1/5"). There's one finger groove on the blade right after the finger guard so you can get more balanced hold for finer whittling.
Handle is made of micarta and has really deep finger grooves which has rather pointy heads. The finger guard is quite fancy, tho I wonder how it survives possible drops or slight misabuse.
I have always liked this kind of blade (have it on my old Tailwind Pro -folding knife). This kind of blade curve gives you more precise and balanced way to work with wood. I have find it to strain my wrist a whole lot less than knives with straight edge line.
For that little money you get a REALLY good knife. Just remember it is heavy even compared to larger knives.

SOG PowerAssist

02/18/2013 by Miika

-Price Paid: $120.00
-Used for Every Day Carry
-Owned for Greater than 1 year

Comments:

I'm a multitool person and I own 11 of them, so here's my 2 cents of SOGs multitool.
Firstly, it's quite heavy 272g (9.6oz) and large at closed size of 117cm (4.6") which makes it even larger than Leatherman Surge.
PowerAssist has 15 tools (by SOG) and what makes it absolutely versatile is the ability to change the tools to make it more suited for your needs. For me a metal file is pretty much useless so I replaced it with a wirestripper.
PowerAssist stands out in other area as well and it's the pliers, that has 1:2 gear ratio (=1 lb force applied to handle translates to 2 lbs force at the plier end).
PowerAssist also has two assisted blades, straight and serrated, which requires some space = lesser amount of tools. The assisted blades have two locking mechanism: one to keep the blades from opening and the other to keep the blade from closing.
The tools are back locked or as SOG says: piano locked. Every tool has its own lock, but they work like back lock.
For this price I find this multitool one of the best I've used.

SOG Demo 2.0

02/18/2013 by Miika

-Price Paid: $235.00
-Used for Outdoor/Survival
-Owned for Greater than 1 year

Comments:

Sexiest knife I have seen. When I first saw this knife on SOG's www-site I had to have it.
Blade has straight edge and 2/3 serrated on the spine. Blade is made with AUS-8 steel with RC 57-58. Blade is roughly 5mm thik and goes through the knife.
Handle is made of Kraton, with deep finger guards ending to a steel finger guard. This is the second best handle I've felt and used (only to lose to ColdSteel SRK). You get a firm grip no matter what your hands are covered.
Knife is well balanced, the mid point is between the first finger groove and finger guard. It's heavy enough to be able to do some hacking but not too heavy for finer whittling.
I seriously recommend this knife for EDC/outdoor use for its versatility. This knife comes with a leather sheath that has a pocket for a small honing stone. I prefer using that pocket for a firestarter kit.

Boker Fred Perrin Shark

02/18/2013 by Makoto

-Price Paid: $100.00
-Used for Other
-Owned for Less than 1 Month

Comments:

Best neck knife ever!
440c chisel ground edge is razor sharp.
Concealable and fast deploy accessory.

Kizlyar Phoenix-2

02/17/2013 by Miika

-Price Paid: $175.00
-Used for Outdoor/Survival
-Owned for Greater than 1 year

Comments:

After a wrong purchase (Kizlyar DV-2) I bought this one to replace ColdSteel SRK.
Blade of the knife is full tang, quite thick as in all Kizlyar knife and the blade is hand made (each blade has serial number). The blade has a sharp point because this is more of a combat knife than outdoor knife. What I specially like about this knive is the slightly curved edge which I find very easy to sharpen and use for pretty much everything from slicing tomatoes to make tinders.
Blade is made with same russian steel as DV-2 (65X13) and it is very strong (you could swerve a train back on it's tracks). And beacuse of the sharp point it's really easy to make small holes on sticks etc.
The handle... it's something I've never felt before and it is not easy to describe it. I'd say it's like wrapping a 3-4mm layer of car tyre around the handle. Soft to touch but not that soft you could press a cavity it. Even the handle is relatively smooth you get a good grip wether your hands are wet or oily.
Phoneix-2 comes with a plastic (not kydex) sheath with few holes to wrap paracord around it.
I think this is pretty decent all-around-knife which replaced my SRK.

Ontario TAK 1

02/17/2013 by HanSolo

-Price Paid: $70.00
-Used for Outdoor/Survival
-Owned for Greater than 1 year

Comments:

When I bought this knife I didnt realised thats its so thick and so heavy.. Yep. Blade itself is 4,75mm thick and knife weight is more than quarter of kg (0,28kg). Its too heavy, too bulky, too thick for a knife at that size but I love to use it :) I really like that knife and now, I almost forgot its flaws. Its a TANK of a tool. Absolutely indestructable piece of steel. Finish of the blade and handle needs some work but dont let it bother you. Its a great working-animal.

Benchmade 522 Presidio Ultra

02/17/2013 by HanSolo

-Price Paid: $60.00
-Used for Every Day Carry
-Owned for 6 months

Comments:

After discontinue production of Red Class knivesne 522 is one of the cheapest knife in BM catalog. Very well built, light-weight, great cutting abilities, good in a EDC role, good folder -overall.
Presidio Ultra is comperable with griptilian HG but its got bigger handle. Im very happy owner of this knife.

Leatherman Squirt PS4

02/16/2013 by Matt

-Price Paid: $30.00
-Used for Light Duty/General
-Owned for 1 year

Comments:

I bought one of these to take to South America with me on travel. I wanted something small that I could keep in my pocket. Additionally I wanted something that wouldn't alarm somebody is countries where knife use is not as common(or even illegal). Since I'm not familiar with the knife laws in many of the places I visited, I wanted something with a very short blade, and I wanted something with no locking feature.

The Leatherman Squirt(I chose the PS4 because I like the pliers) has been just the ticket. It has been very durable, easily concealable and any time I pull it out nobody bats an eye.

The tools it has are a knife blade, a nail file(that doubles as one size of flathead screwdriver), a bottle opener(which doubles as a smaller flathead screwdriver), a pair of scissors, an even smaller flathead screwdriver(that doubles as a wedge), a small set of pliers, and wire cutters. By far the unspoken hero are the wire cutters. They are easy to miss when first looking over the tool, but I use them all the time. Most frequently I use them to cut the ends off guitar strings after I restring my guitar.

Another thing that is difficult to notice when viewing pictures of the multitool is the texture on the grip. In the pictures it looks very smooth, but it is actually a little bit porous, which aids stability when I am using my squirt with sweaty hands(this happens frequently in South America near the equator).

If I had one complaint about the squirt ps4, it is that the keyring on the tool isn't particularly robust looking. I don't attach mine to my keys, so I have not been able to test this hypothesis, but compared to the rest of the multitool this feature looks a little underbuilt. I suppose that it doesn't have to withstand a great amount of loading, but it wouldn't have killed Leatherman to use slightly thicker steel on the loop, that's all.

Overall I recommend this multitool to anybody who needs to small multitool that prefers the look of a Leatherman over a swiss army knife, or to anyone who would find a small set of pliers useful when carried on their person at all times. I think Leatherman did a nice job with this one.

Leatherman Wingman

02/16/2013 by Miika

-Price Paid: N/A
-Used for Light Duty/General
-Owned for Less than 1 Month

Comments:

Wingman is one of the new Leatherman products. It's quite basic tool (scissors, partially serrated blade, 2 flat screwdrivers (one on the file), 1 phillips screwdriver, can opener and shrink-wrap opener and spring assisted pliers.
For a good basic multitool the downside is that the tools aren't lockable. Any original PST users knows how it feels when you are tightening a screw and the screwdriver slips and...

SOG Slimjim

02/16/2013 by Miika

-Price Paid: $60.00
-Used for Every Day Carry
-Owned for 3 months

Comments:

This is at the moment the slimmest assisted opening knife. SlimJim comes in two sizes, normal and XL and tanto and clip point blades.
The opening system works very well and locks firmly. This knife has a back lock mechanism with additional locking switch which locks the back lock release. This kind of security is mindblowingly simple and it should be mandatory in all back lock knifes.
Even the knife is very thin you get a firm grip on the handle without getting your palms bleeding. No sharp edges (xcept for the blade). Because the knife is very light (68gm) you won't even know it's there whether it is in your pocket or backpack.

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Victorinox Swiss Tool

02/14/2013 by Tom

-Price Paid: $55.00
-Used for Light Duty/General
-Owned for Greater than 1 year

Comments:

Outstanding versital tool that I've used for years now. Quality construction with now problems as of yet. Just keep it sharpened. Would highly recommend this multi-tool to anyone for light duty workload around the house of campfire.

Leatherman Wave

02/14/2013 by Miika

-Price Paid: $60.00
-Used for Every Day Carry
-Owned for Greater than 1 year

Comments:

Even Wave is quite old it's my newest in Leatherman family. When I purchased Wave I also got two bit kits with it so it's a complete package.

Now days Wave is pretty much like Charge xx series. It has two bit drivers and scissors. The original wave didn't have bit drivers but static screwdrivers. This new version is more versatile because of different bits you can use.

One thing that I miss on Wave which is present in ALX is the seat belt/gutting hook on the serrated blade. I've been thinking about modifying the blade but so far I haven't had the guts.

If you want a versatile tool with a great price, Wave is the answer if Charge series feels over priced.