People have been asking for some survival stuff so I will do it in parts.

Knives

These are tools and need to be treated as such.

I am a fan of knives that can be treated with hate and enjoy it.

For me they come down to a few variables. The first to me is the steel. If the steel is not a certain type I will not buy it. I don’t care if it is on super sale. If the steel is substandard I will spend my money elsewhere. So what is good steel.

• S30v and its variations
• CPM3V
• D2
• SR 101
• SR 77
• Infi (by Busse)

The only time I will go with 1095 is when it comes from RAT (Randalls Knives, ESEE). Otherwise it has to be one of the above steels.

The next part is what I am I going to be using the knife for. If you can nail down what the outcome is then you can figure out what you need to buy.

For me this is the list that I have:

• Skinning is a Havalon Piranta (this is the one knife that goes against everything I say about a knife but it is cheap and if I lose it ehhh and it keeps from having to sharpen knives that used to do the skinning job as well as other work.)
• 3” small knife is a RAT 3 (the old D2, d2 is only good for blades under 4” or the blades chip) for small stuff also my EDC (Every Day Carry knife in the woods). With this knife I can do everything it just is not optimized for much other than small basic utility
• My 5” is a Scrapper 5 from Scrapyard Knives made of infi steel. This steel will have you weeping at the feet of Jesus. It is AMAZING. This is the first knife that I was able to put through some oak batoning, dress an animal (different than they do in Vegas or Hollywood, more like we do in Wyoming and Texas) then slice a tomato. Awesome Awesome knife! This knife would be my primary carry knife but it is my favorite so I take it out on special occasions.
• I have a 7.5” blade knife that is made for destroying anything in its path. Scrapyard knives Son of Dog Father.
• I have a leatherman surge
• I have a Gerber saw that has an extendable blade.

I have had a ton of knives from benchmade, chris reeves to Gerber. The above knives are what I use because they take an extreme beating and are reasonably priced.

The other brand I would use if I felt rich is a Ferhman.

Blades have a bunch of different grinds and shapes and edges. They all serve a purpose but I tend to buy ones that I can work on and use in a number of different circumstances, except for the havalon skinning knife. I use a knife with a flat grind. The flat grind does not catch on anything when you are batoning working kind of like a maul when splitting wood, and it holds up well. It usually has a solid thick spine so you can beat the crap out of it. The exception is a RAT 3, those have a slightly thinner spine than I would have thought. I also didn’t think they would hold up as well as they do.

For EDC I will carry either:

• Rat 3, and the gerber saw
• Or leatherman

For backpacking I will carry

• Scrapper 5
• Gerber saw
• And leatherman

In the truck

• Ghurka or Machete
• Son of dog father
• My EDC
• shovel

Lastly go to http://www.knifeworks.com for most of the knives that you want for a pretty good deal. They don’t do the scarp yard stuff.