New Koyote

[Rotte]

More testing.

I'm trying to use this knife as a daily knife. Carry it in my bag during the day, and use it for the usual tasks: opening boxes, cutting string, etc....

This evening: the dinner challenge. After all isn't food prep one of the most common tasks for a camp knife?

The target:

I like to "spatchcock" my chicken for even roasting. This involves cutting the backbone out and removing the wishbone, then opening the leg joints. The Alaskan laughed at this task--the edge geometry worked very well here. Cut through skin and bone alike with ease. Being able to choke up on the tip allowed for fine work when removing the wishbone (part tip, part index finger). And easily cut along keel bone and around leg joints.

After roasting, used the Alaskan to halve chicken and break it down into pieces. But at that point the camera had been knocked aside...

The more I use this knife the more I appreciate it. It's big enough to easily halve a chicken in one cut like a chef's knife. But my hand also naturally climbs all over this knife to use the tip or the heel of the blade for optimal control or power, so it uses like a small knife.

I need to do a little more work with the tip to demonstrate the drilling ability. Christof beveled the tip to make it slightly pointier and I suspect it will drill nicely.

More later. :thumbup:

 

[Rotte]

I have the LBK (little big knife) spearpoint and now the alaskan is gonna be named the BLK?

Hey, works for me.

I do have an issue to raise. Pics in a moment or two.

 

[koyote]

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmkay

 

[Rotte]

So here's my concern...and I'm a little hesitant to bring it up because I don't have any better ideas...but there is a risk with the sheath design. Specifically the retention strap.

Here's a shot of the top half of the sheath to orient the reader:

When the snap is released, it does not fall out of the way easily:

It may be possible for the heel of the knife to catch and slice the retention strap :

Keep in mind that this blade is razor sharp and will cut at the slightest touch!

I really like the sheath over all; I just have to be careful when taking the knife out not to cut the strap. I wouldn't want to wreck one of K-girl's sheaths and have her get pissed at me. And I don't know that it could be significantly improved, unless a spring was added to pull the strap away...like a pistol holster. I'll think about it some.

Here's a shot of the back of the sheath for those not familiar with Koyote Girl's excellent Expedition sheaths:

Very versatile. I haven't decided how I want it positioned yet.

 

[koyote]

welllll. I haven't found an answer, or we'd use it.

The rest of the sheath, yeah. KG does a fine, fine job. Andthe strap is easily replaced, at least! but I haven't figured out anything barring possibly some sort of spring thing to fix that on a dropped edge knife.

 

[Rotte]

Well, it's such an excellent sheath that I hesitate to even bring it up. But I'm always looking for ways to make small improvements.

Did I detect some cynicism about my chicken test?

I'm testing ALL phases of this knife's ability here! No cut will be passed by! Besides, it was some goooood chicken.

 

[koyote]

Oh hell no- the chicken test is perfect. I mean, if you manage to get small game, you gotta do something with it! And I think meat processing is a general test that field knives should pass.

 

[Rockywolf]

How about putting the bottom of the snap on the body of the sheath itself? Angle the strap, and create a bit more reveal so strap can still retain knife.

 

[Rotte]

I had a similar thought Rockywolf. Seems to me that the stud might be fastened to the sheath and the strap come down over the heel of the knife. On the other hand, it's a cool looking sheath as is.

 

[Rotte]

So it's been snowing for the past 22 hours, with another 22 hours of snow predicted. But who knows, the weather can change in an instant here.

The wet snow pulled a couple branches down off the cottonwood out front, and it seemed pretty obvious to me that the fallen limbs needed to be chopped up right away.

The weather conditions prompted me to use gloves with the knife. Christof, you had wondered about using a glove with this handle, but I saw no problem what so ever.

Did a little carving and a lot of chopping. Christof had expressed a little skepticism of this light blade's chopping ability, but it bit deep into the green wood. The biggest part of these branches was about 2" in diameter, maybe a little less. The Alaskan cut through in 3 easy strokes. Smaller width stuff was cut in 1-2 strokes. (Nice clean cuts!)

The cottonwood was fairly soft and green, so cutting wasn't difficult. With a little wrist action it came apart in no time. I'll have to do some chopping with dried wood, maybe twisted pine, later.

 

[Rockywolf]

Hmmmm. I may have to get one. I like a fatty handle, how's this one?

 

[wildmike]

I really like that one. And with the thin edges of Koyotes knives it is a dikens of a cutter as well. Sweeet.

 

[Rotte]

Hmmmm. I may have to get one. I like a fatty handle, how's this one?

Rocky, likely it's not a question of 'if' you may have to get one, but rather 'when'.

I have big hands and like a fat handle myself. The handle on this one works fine and is comfortable, but I'd prefer it a little thicker and deeper. I think Christof has had similar feedback from some other forumites who have held this or similar knives.

I've got an order in for a second version of this baby with a slightly wider handle and no jimping. I was wondering if I'd want thicker steel, but this knife is performing so well that I'd keep the steel thickness the same. For that matter the jimping is kinda growing on me too.

I'm trying to use it as much as I can and will post more as I go.

 

[koyote]

Yeah, the handle is by no means small- I like big fat handles. but this one could use a hair more breadth, and I possibly trimmed the ipe on Rotte's a hair more than usual for thickness. 1/16 can make a difference. In any event, I'm doign them a touch broader at this point.

The design came from two sources- Rotte's idea of a knife for an extended alaskan road trip and the camp knife challenge. The order came in first, without a set time, but the camp knife challenge came on as I was thinking about it and really gelled everything in my head. I considered a thciker steel choice, looking at a tapering 3/16, but I really don't think it's needed for the tasks. And so far, it looks to be going well (We'll see how the challenge works out)

 

[koyote]

We've all seent he camp knife challenge (if you haven't go read it!!!!)

My thoughts on modifications at this point are the possibility of thinning the grind a bit and adding a secondary bevel- a tapered tall saber grind with a convex microbevel. Also, while I'm comfortable with the reverse grip as is, I'm also familiar with it, I might change the flow of that or add some VERY light filework to the inside of the curve.

I'm not stressing the thickness- I woulda probably changed direction ont he big chunk of wood but I'm also not terribly worried about what would have happened if he'd just kept banging. Plenty of people have with that particular steel and thickness.

 

[Rotte]

Camp Knife challenge was an excellent read. I'm a little surprised this knife didn't come out on top!

I also read with interest Brian's comments about the reverse grip. I can't recall that being an issue for me so far. I think one could choke up to close, but I haven't noticed it. I don't think file work on the inner radius is needed truthfully.

The geometry on mine might be slightly different from the Camp Challenge knife, but the reverse grip seems pretty comfortable to me. I'll have to play around with it some more with different cutting tasks.

Oh, the glint of sunlight off the edge? Yes, it really is that sharp. This knife take a helluv an edge:

I'd be interested to see your tall saber grind with a micro convex. For this type of knife, I really think a convex edge is the way to go, but a saber grind above that might work well.

I can't express how much fun it's been using this knife. It just dances in the hand. :thumbup:

 

[Rockywolf]

Dang, Rotte, I am going to break down if you keep this up! This knife reminds me of a chefs knife on steroids. ..

 

[kgd]

Hey Rotte,

Personally, I did sand down the drop down edge of my Mills pattern skinner. Not in reverse grip, but in normal grip I find my hand likes to slide down to the drop down edge quite a bit. In fact, because I know that drop down provides a natural guard I allow that to happen. I did find that the sides were a bit sharp for my liking and this is exacerbated by the 3/32". The fix took about 10 min. with 220 grit sandpaper, but this really helped.

Regarding placement, I think top 4th of 11 blades in such a competitive market was a real win. The interesting thing about this knife is that it really does reflect a lot of trade-offs in terms of size and thinness and Christof's knife really bucked the trend and basically showed it could hold its own.

One of Brian's criteria didn't involve carry weight. Having handled all of the knives there, Christof's blade certainly was the lightest knife, aside from the Fiddleback's hunter. One of the great things about both a long and thin knife like this has going for it is the ease of carry, yet the length to do what is necessary e.g the batoning big wood. Had Brian put in a category about carry options and sheath quality, Koyote would have creeped up in points. For myself, this is a rather important issue. I keep stating over and over again in my chopping tests, that the SOD and RD-9 outchop my big koyote leuku but only marginally. I don't even consider toting around those heavy knives though. The leuku often finds a place nestled in my pack

Some worthy points. Brian loved that penetrator tip. Damn Christof, next knife I get from you is going to have one of them!!! I'm also going to say, that having seen what Christof does with his wood (love his Jatoba, Ipe and wenge) that I'm a bit more partial to his wood compared to the mircata. Rotte, if I were to order this blade right now, you can bet it would be in one of the above mentioned woods. Don't get me wrong, I love micarta and Christof's is good by all stretches. But his wood is superb and it would have made his knife even lighter.

Brian did a great and tactful job on that review. Personally, I don't think I could have been as tactful as Brian. I think the top five deserved their due, no questions, but there were a few disappointments also.

Both Christof and Rick get extra points in my books for artistic license. Both of these guys produce knives that look like nothing else out there. I mean, sure, a classic drop point, straight back blade is functional and looks great. However, Koyote blades and Wildertools have a unique vibe all of their own. When you hear the phrase 'think out of the box', there is Rick and there is Christof! <---wait a minute, where the hell is the box????

 

[Rotte]

From Brian Andrews' review in the Camp Knife Challenge:

I had a much harder time with this knife during slicing. For the same reason a scandi-type grind is not good for this type of thing, is that the entire grind from edge to full knife thickness occurs over a very short distance (compared to a full flat grind). Therefore, the full thickness of the knife is reached early in the cut and results in the whole knife being pushed aside. That makes it difficult to get nice, straight, and even cuts. I had to hold this knife at quite an angle to get the cuts I was looking for, and definitely required more concentration.

I was thinking about tests of sharpness and cutting and thought that slicing a tomato was a pretty good test. As you all know, a tomato's skin is fairly cut resistant and if your knife isn't sharp you'll squish the tomato instead of cutting it.

Not a problem with this knife.

I think Brian is right though, that with the scandi-type edge, you have to angle the knife to keep it from being pushed aside during the cut. So it does require a little more concentration when using it. I don't think this limits it's utility though.

The potato revisited:

As easy to use as my Shun vegetable knife? Not so much. But given that it's designed for a wider range of purposes, I'll take these results any day.

As for the reverse grip question, I guess I haven't really used that except for peeling. I tried a little carving using the reverse grip and found that I did pinch up against the blade a couple of times. I repositioned my hand and kept going. It occurred to me that I don't use this grip much. I'm not sure why not, probably more power cutting away.

 

[Rotte]

This knife reminds me of a chefs knife on steroids.

Me too. I keep grinning using this in the kitchen.