This week, we’re bringing you six new pieces of gear to lay your eyes on—a little something for everyone (maybe last minute stocking stuffers?). Check out the Benchmade 317-1 Weekender, a multi-blade slip-joint knife for EDC that will give your grandpa’s Stockman a run for its money. Or maybe you need a little light in your life; the Cloud Defensive Micro MCH can help you out. Whatever your need or whomever has a stocking in need of stuffing, you’ll likely find something that strikes your fancy here.
Are you better served with a bare-bones basic blade built with quality and durability, or one saturated with a variety of bells and whistles that can perform numerous tasks? On the surface, the answer may seem apparent. More is better, they say. But does this relate to knives? Or conversely, though equally as important, simple designs last longer, and perhaps a standard fixed-blade knife would be the victor. Here we’ll dissect the two distinctly different knife types and try to determine if one outshines the other or if both have their own respective value based on individual needs.
From the time the first caveman realized a chipped bit of obsidian could be used to remove skin and meat from animals they harvested, humans have sought to improve on the basic design of that sharp edge. For some collectors, the shape of the blade, often called the blade’s profile, is primarily a matter of aesthetics. They might purchase a specific knife simply because they don’t have a hawkbill or trailing-point knife in their collection yet. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that approach in the least. Here, regular contributor Jim Cobb walks us through some of the most common blade profiles and the types of jobs in which they truly excel.
It is said that the best knife is the one you have with you when you need it. After all, if it is sitting in a case at home, it won’t be of much help when you’re two days into a five-day hiking trip. Yet, at the same time, when it comes to shopping for a knife, often we’re far more concerned with the blade steel and handle material than we are about how we’re actually going to carry it with us. While some models might incorporate more than one of them into the design, there are four materials that are typically used for knife sheaths. If you’re gifting someone a knife this Christmas, make sure they’ll also have the proper sheath to go along with it.
