Question about batoning a Spyderco Police 4 Lightweight or VG-10 in general.

ceranoe

ceranoe

Joined
Jul 8, 2021
Messages
6
I know you probably read the title and thought "what the heck is this guy thinking?" but hear me out. While I am new to the forums, I am not new to knives, I am a very outdoorsy type, I build my own shelters, start my own fires, you get the idea. I use many tools on a regular basis including all sorts of knives and when I go out I always come prepared. I have a specialized selection of gear personally tailored for how I operate when I am in the wilderness. Now with that out of the way, I work as the head of security for a company within the pacific northwest. I always carry a knife on me at all times, in fact I always carry three knives in my work kit. A Buck 119 fixed blade, a Buck Selkirk folding model and until recently I used to carry a somewhat cheaper S&W folding knife. Good knife, nothing wrong with it, held its edge well but I had it for so long I wanted something new.

I recently looked over many, many knives and the Spyderco Police 4 Lightweight seemed to fit my criteria perfectly and thus I bought one. I love this knife, its razor sharp, feels great in the hand, its big but not too big in my opinion. Now I have almost no experience using VG-10 steels at all. While I was working with my partner, we got to talking about what happens if you get into a situation that you're NOT prepared for. If you have ONLY a folder on you, you are stranded, and that knife is going to be your primary tool to process wood to start a fire and stay warm through the night until you can try and get to safety, what details would you want in that type of knife. Now I know that while you ideally want a fixed blade if you get into that type of situation, though the reality is kind of grim, you may only have what you carry on you at any and all times, and most people are not going to be carrying 20-40 pounds of gear everywhere they go. This got me thinking if I got stranded somewhere and that Spyderco is the only knife I have, would that blade hold up? If I left the lock disengaged, and used a baton on it through some wood, would I damage the back of this blade? Would the blade break, snap or bend? How durable is VG-10 overall? I know the Spyderco P4LW has a relatively thick blade near the base, almost as thick as the Buck Selkirk, but it tapers quite heavily going down as it was made for puncturing. Would this blade hold up to that kind of use and would VG-10 make a good steel for a fixed blade heavy duty knife?

I appreciate you indulging my curiosity and look forward to hearing your thoughts. Perhaps one day I will buy another one of these knives to really stress test to answer the question myself for sure, but this knife is not exactly cheap and I would hate to throw another $160-$180 just to possibly destroy it.
 
Man, I'm an outdoorsman myself and am having a hard time visualizing a time when I'd be out in the woods without the correct tools. I absolutely would not consider a Police 4 as appropriate for batoning. It's not designed to serve in that role at all. It's a very thin, stabby, slicey blade that better serves as an EDC letter/package opener, and a self-defense tool in a pinch.

COULD it do it? Maybe? But if you're buying a knife specifically with that purpose in mind, that still needed to be a folder, I personally would be looking at something from say, Cold Steel.
 
If the blade breaks, it most likely will break through the Spydie hole.

For the remainder of the question, not sure how to answer you.

Is the question (a) if you should EDC another knife, better for batoning in an emergency ? Yes, there are many; pick one with thicker blade, no spydie hole and heavier pivot.

Is the question (b) whether the P4 will survive if that's what you have ? You'll have no choice, won't you. Even a SAK can be used for batoning if you have nothing else. The biggest stress is not the baton on the spine, but lateral wiggling that always is needed, IMO.

Roland.
 
Could it do it? Maybe. Almost definitely not for a prolonged amout of time, and I doubt that it being in vg10 is what would cause it to fail. What I will say is if all I had was one knife in a survival situation I would avoid damaging it. Chances are there is a creative solution that doesn't involve batoning with your folding knife.
 
The Police is slicey, not stabby. It's also a fantastically poor choice of knife and steel combination for batoning, even beyond the fact that deciding to baton with your folder is taking its structural integrity into your own hands. Like Fishface5 said, even the simple risk of destroying your only cutting tool is enough to make me disregard batoning entirely. How much energy can you actually save vs breaking up some longer pieces of wood and making do in other ways, like feathersticking, which the Police 4 is probably pretty good at?
 
Let me clarify, I did not buy this knife for the purpose of this proposed question. I already have other knives I carry that are far better suited for those more abusive tasks, I am aware this knife is in no way meant for that type of use. I bought this knife a while ago and then my co-worker and I started discussing it and it got me curious about the durability of VG-10 in general as I have no experience with that steel, and since I have this knife, which is my current EDC and the only knife I own in VG-10 I figured I would ask if it could not really if it should.
 
Again, VG-10, K390 or any other steel - look at it - it will break through the hole, steel won't matter too much. Check out online pics of broken spyderco blades (and I've had one myself).
 
VG-10 was used in the original Swedish Air Force Survival Knife (Fallkniven F1), admittedly a much more robust design than the Police 4. Great steel IMHO, but I wouldn't want to baton the Police 4 unless in a real survival situation. As a side note, a game warden friend of mine used his gorgeous stag-handled Puma folder to pound through spruce roots to build a fire after their jetboat capsized on the upper Atnarko River. It was pretty bent after that so he sent it to Puma for repairs, which they did, and returned it with a stern note that it was not made for that purpose.
 
You rightly state a knife is a tool.

What other hinged tool would you even consider battoning with?

Obviously, in an actual survival situation all bets are off and you do whatever you have to do.
 
If what Alberta says is true, I suppose I have two VG-10 knives then, my partner is from Sweden and former Swedish military, she actually has one of these knives. I have only ever used it a few times though. As for the knife breaking through the blade hole, I have only ever heard and seen a few cases of this happening. My last Spyderco actually broke at the tip. No idea how this happened, I was moving and when I grabbed it out of the box the tip was missing and it was completely flat. Pretty easy fix though, I reshaped the tip and it was good as new. I can believe that the hole would compromise blade integrity though I know that some manufacturers can still make a sturdy product even with such designs. As for the need to baton, I have had to do this quite frequently. When I am out in the wild on purpose, I of course have other, more generally suitable tools and knives for the more "abusive" purposes as needed. Imagine you're out hunting, you do not want to carry a ton of gear from your camp and a hatchet can be quite heavy when combined with other gear, not to mention it can often take up quite a bit of space in small packs. Say it gets late and you need to set up a small secondary camp before you either continue the hunt the next day or return to your main camp. Having a reliable knife fixed or folding would greatly lighten your load during these small trips. This is one such scenario where I have needed to baton wood. In some cases using a folder, that folding Selkirk to be specific works great, as long as you dont leave the blade locked. After all, a knife is at its core, a wedge, the most important part of which, is the blade itself, this is the part that will be doing most of your work, fixed blade or folding.
 
ferider said:
BTW, in the wild, you don't have pre-cut logs. It's entirely possible to make a fire without batoning at all. And you could use the P4 to make wood shavings.
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Let's not get bogged down with facts. This is clearly some sort of glamping version of bushcraft where the woods are seeded with nearly ready supplies and they drop you off on the 7 yard line. You just have to get the last few yards and then have a nice wiener roast.
 
You're right, getting a fire started is totally possible without processing larger wood and wood shavings are a great starter, but depending on where youre at, sometimes you need to break down wood to keep the fire burning over long periods of time. I would not want to have to rely strictly on small sticks and unbroken logs to try and keep my fire going throughout the night. I primarily asked a legitimate question about the quality of the materials of such a knife, I do not understand why you feel the need to insult me over such things. seems quite immature really.
 
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