- Joined
- Sep 30, 2009
- Messages
- 2,351
In May, I will be attending another JK Knives "Gathering" and we will be having a contest based around the idea of a "$20 Survival Kit". We'll have had several months to scrounge and hunt, assembling the best kit we can while staying under the $20 maximum (we have to have receipts for basically everything in the kit). At the end of the Gathering, we will exchange kits and vote for a winner (there's even a prize, a JK Custom!). We are allowed to modify anything we include, so I made this neck sheath for one of the blades in my kit. This is the first real sheath I've ever tried and I was pretty pleased with how it turned out.
The knife is a stainless kitchen knife (USA) and I think would serve most of the common cutting tasks like food prep, game prep and general cutting duties pretty well despite it's thin blade. I clipped the point on my grinder and removed the fine serrations to make it a plain edge (stones & a light stropping and it pops hair).
The leather came from an old jacket that our houseguest was throwing away. She saw an old jacket, I saw raw materials.
The sheath
I traced the blade onto a piece of the leather and then cut out a liner (welt)to help prevent the edge from cutting it's way out of the sheath. I then added the first layer, with top flap. I wanted to add a second layer to provide more protection from the point possibly pocking through and thought it might be nice to create two pouches. The front pouch holds a lighter, but could also hold matches, a whistle, fire steel, etc. The back pouch holds a length of paint stir stick with 220 & 400 grit wet/dry paper attached to use as a sharpener.
I may make another for one of my other blades (to keep for myself) as I kind of like the idea of having a few essentials close at hand in a small, light package.
My sewing skills have a long way to go (I also sealed each seam with superglue) but this was really a fun little project and I think it is a nice addition to my kit.
Just in case you are curious.....
Knife..........$.45
Paracord.....$.48
Lighter........$.33
Sharpener...$.05
Total cost: $1.41
The knife is a stainless kitchen knife (USA) and I think would serve most of the common cutting tasks like food prep, game prep and general cutting duties pretty well despite it's thin blade. I clipped the point on my grinder and removed the fine serrations to make it a plain edge (stones & a light stropping and it pops hair).
The leather came from an old jacket that our houseguest was throwing away. She saw an old jacket, I saw raw materials.
The sheath
I traced the blade onto a piece of the leather and then cut out a liner (welt)to help prevent the edge from cutting it's way out of the sheath. I then added the first layer, with top flap. I wanted to add a second layer to provide more protection from the point possibly pocking through and thought it might be nice to create two pouches. The front pouch holds a lighter, but could also hold matches, a whistle, fire steel, etc. The back pouch holds a length of paint stir stick with 220 & 400 grit wet/dry paper attached to use as a sharpener.
I may make another for one of my other blades (to keep for myself) as I kind of like the idea of having a few essentials close at hand in a small, light package.
My sewing skills have a long way to go (I also sealed each seam with superglue) but this was really a fun little project and I think it is a nice addition to my kit.
Just in case you are curious.....
Knife..........$.45
Paracord.....$.48
Lighter........$.33
Sharpener...$.05
Total cost: $1.41
