What Are Your "Hard Uses" ?

V

Vivi

BANNED
Joined
Dec 4, 2005
Messages
5,095
What cutting chores do you designate as "hard use?" How frequently do these types of chores come up compared to more "mundane" cutting? Have you ever attempted these things with knives not heavily marketed for hard use, such as a SAK, slipjoint or small one-handed like a Spyderco Spin or Kershaw Chive?
 
Nice question! That´s one of the things i would like to hear too. Same as "What is a moderate spine whack?"

Well for me hard use can be cutting up a tin can. But that is something you can do with a "ordinary" Buck 110, meaning there is no need for a thick blade, it has to be just hard enough. So, it is not really hard.

Hard use would be something like pulling out nails off something. I usually don´t do that with my folders nore the blades.
 
One thing I consider "hard use" (among others) is loaning your knife to someone else to use ... you just never know what chore they might have in mind for your knife and do not really care what might damage the knife ... I carry a cheap "loaner / beater" folder just for this and other nasty jobs.
 
Extremly good question ! Most hard use for civilians is pretty hypothetical , mine might be shelter building if an outing went sour , that type of stuff .

Chris
 
john w said:
One thing I consider "hard use" (among others) is loaning your knife to someone else to use ... you just never know what chore they might have in mind for your knife and do not really care what might damage the knife ...
Click to expand...

so true!i would say if i make a trip to the woods its usually hard use, so is prying, chiseling, cutting harder materials(metal) and stuff like that...:confused:
 
Not really a use, and I don't do it with normal (non-throwing) knives, but throwing is potentially one of the roughest things you can do to a knife.

I just say that because I see non-knife people do this a lot with knives, and attempt to do it with my knives before I smack'em around. :)
 
I consider hard use as cutting electrical wire, cutting hard plastic scraping gaskets off, cutting hard rubber and stuff like that. For those tasks I use my old Spyderco Delica and a cheap S&W folder.
 
I consider hard use to be batoning, heavy chopping and some prying. When I say prying I mean using the blade to dislodge chunks of wood for fat-wood or prying off sap to make pitch sticks. I include heavy chopping because it heats the blade up.
 
I once locked my myself out of a room and had to use my Spyderco Centofante3 as a pry for the doorlock....i applied quite a bit of prying force on the knife (to the point where I thought I would break it) for maybe 5 seconds....and to my amazement the knife still has zero bladeplay either direction when I was done "abusing" it .... It made me respect the knife's "build strength" much more after that :thumbup:
 
Chopping with a folder. I've done it with 2 S&W knives that now have awful bladeplay and my Ontario RAT 1 folder that has mild and corrected blade play. My Kabar Mule and CS Gunsite folder survived without any damage though. Any kind of prying or stabbing something that's really hard (wood, plastic, rubber). Any SD application, in the one in a million chance.
 
I'd say anything beyond the normal use of the knife is "hard use." Chopping with a folder is certainly hard use (and a waste of time, too), but chopping with a machete is just another day at the office (well, it really depends on the local corporate culture, but...)

For the type of small to medium fixed blades I like to most often carry, hard (potentially too hard) use is anything that involves abnormal use of force, batoning, prying, cutting very hard materials like metal cans and such. Use like that, of course, is very rare. With larger knives more designed for hard use, I guess it kind of stops being hard use, since they're designed for it. Wait, I'm not making much sense today. :D

SplittinHairs said:
This is hard use:D
:eek:
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=527297
Click to expand...

No, friend, THAT is SPARTA! :D
 
makes sense to me, Elen. I wouldn't call chopping hard use for an axe, which is a blade on a handle, so a knife that has similarities in reach and heft ought to be able to chop. Otherwise, why were they made.

Cutting around metal is hard on the tip or edge, which means more sharpening. But I think "hard use" is "bad technique" for the most part.
 
Working on cars usually gets the hard use. Scraping gasket surfaces, cutting old bushings or hoses, prying difficult things. All uses that other tools are probably more appropriate, but when I'm flat on my (messed up) back under a (often mid-engined) car, whatever's in my pocket gets called for duty. Hence, my affection for sturdy, but relatively inexpensive knives for EDC. My CRKT M16 seems to be indestructible for this use, though the steel could certainly take a better edge and hold it longer. That could also be my own fault; I'm certainly no pro at sharpening knives.
 
I am a service tech in the food and beverage industry. I am constantly cutting reinforced beverage tubing, zip ties and the like, I call that hard use. I'm about 85% hard use, 15% mundane cutting tasks during a typical work day. Slicing fruit at lunchtime would be a good example of a mundane chore. I have never considered using a light duty locking folder or a SAK while on the job. I've got my share of them, but that's what weekends are for:D
 
I rarely have hard uses, only hard use knives! I do go walking at times and the last time I took my AR and my BM 610 so that I could do some testing with them. Neither had problems with finger thick branches, or prying bark from a downed tree. My normal uses are going to be paper cutting, and soft vinyl cutting. This is a very interesting thread vivi!:thumbup:
 
It's amazing how hard on a knife field dressing and then butchering a deer or elk is. Cheap steel knives don't make if far thru a field dressing before they're dull. And catching an edge on bone can chip the harder steels like S30V etc.
 
I define 'hard-use' as anything that doesn't happen in an office. Bushcraft, military and industrial applications, etc.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top