New Becker-fan here! It's a mystery to me how I ever managed to NOT embrace the Ka-Bar Becker knives all these years. I've been a knife nut my entire adult life and have a large and eclectic collection to show for it; dominated by large fixed blade knives. In the past 12 months my interest and exploration of the
"bushcraft" discipline has been growing and my knife purchases during this time reflects that fact. My collection expanded into various
TOPS Knives models (including the Fieldcraft B.O.B.),
Schrade Frontier models and a
Condor Crotalus (AMAZING knife) but despite the huge fan-base and glowing reputation, I never chose to go for the Becker. That is until now.
I was looking for a One knife for everything solution and had reasoned a 5" to 7" blade knife would be the best choice for that purpose. Actually I was teetering on buying a
BK7 when I ultimately opted to choose the Condor instead since it too had great reviews and was in the same "weight-class" as the BK7 but a little less costly. After using the Crotalus and being impressed with it's quality and ability I began to re-think the Becker...after realizing that I felt I wanted to work out a Two-knife system I reasoned an X-Large knife for the heavier tasks coupled with my go-to "all-around" knife TOPS B.O.B. for the smaller and more precision work would be the way to go but which large knife would be the best choice? That's when the
Ka-Bar BK9 Becker Combat Bowie became the clearly superior choice. Yes, I had read volumes of first hand knowledge and reviews here on these forums; yes, I had reviewed countless Youtube videos but only until one holds the genuine article in one's own hand can you know the veracity of said testimonials. I am now a
"True Believer" in the Becker bloodline! The
BK9 is a magnificent piece of knife-AWESOMENESS!
What can I say about it that hasn't already been said by many others more notable than I? It lives up to the hype! That said; the ONLY minus I personally have with the stock model are the Ultramid handles...oh, they feel great in the hand except a little too smooth for a sweaty hand therefore a set of Micarta handles are currently on backorder from Tomar's for it.
In the meantime...it occurred to me that I've never seen a
BK9 with a paracord wrapped handle (I love me some paracord wrapped knives) so I set out to do that very thing on mine. It took a little bit of working out of the particulars for the method but in the end I am VERY pleased with the results. I even managed to create a perfectly sized palm-swell beneath the final Strider style overwrap and on my second attempt worked out the width of it to allow the sheath's retention snap to fit. O.D. Green is my favorite color but on this occasion I was inspired a little by the look of the now discontinued BK39 (shame on you Ka-Bar) and opted to use Gecko Green 550 cord. Below are a couple of pics to display my handiwork.