Wilderness survival, having a small straight knife is your primary tool, you can use it to make almost everything you need, you can cut food or make beautiful crafts.
Outdoor survival tool selection
When I started teaching wilderness survival skills, I found that students had a hard time learning because their pocket knives were either too dull, too big, or just the kind of folding knives that weren’t sturdy enough. Hands-on experience has shown that even locked folding knives can break in the hand. These knives will not stand up to cutting hard because they will break at the fold. When choosing a pocket knife, consider the following:
Size
Don’t choose a small knife with a big blade, we don’t need to use a small straight knife to chop things, but to use it to cut. It is best to choose a knife with a blade that is 8 cm to 15 cm long. The broadsword needs to be selected separately. The broadsword is used as a machete.
Grip
The handle of the knife should be designed to be easy to grip, without finger grooves, as those grooves will prevent the user from automatically changing the way the knife is held. Symmetrical knives, because in dim light, or when you’re tired, you might cut yourself by using the back of the knife as a blade.
Blade Shape
It must be a straight knife with only one edge, double-edged knives are used for fighting. A pointed tip is ideal. This blade can be flipped over to cut bark or fur. Do not choose a blade with a very curved, raised edge or a recurved blade. In the final stage of the cutting action, slip on the cutting object, and do not choose a serrated blade, which cannot perform fine engraving work. Plus, you’re going to learn how to sharpen your blade like a razor, and serrated blades don’t have that advantage. The ideal straight knife is a one-piece full-length handle. That is, the length of the blade and the handle are the same length and the same width. It’s a sturdy design, but a slightly shorter or narrower blade can be touched if crafted well.
Handle
A small raised handle between the blade and handle can be useful, but by no means essential, as the handle can interfere with sharpening and carving.
Steel
Good quality steel suitable for knives can be used, both stainless steel and carbon steel, but must be easy to sharpen and not dull. My personal preference is to choose a high carbon tool steel (like 1095 steel, O1 steel, 52100 steel, 5160 steel, etc.) which can meet all of these requirements well. Although the above steel is prone to rust, this is a small disadvantage, but as long as you keep the blade dry and clean, this defect can be easily avoided. If you are mainly active in the wet environment of oceans, lakes, and river banks, then Choose stainless steel knives (such as VG-10, A2, D2, 14C28N, 154CM, 9cr18mov, 425M, ATS-34, AUS-10A and other stainless steel).
Blade Shape
Generally speaking, the shape of the knife edge is determined by the tool manufacturer for the purpose of ease of use and beautiful appearance. In the trial of various knife edge shapes, generally including flat grinding (Scandinavian edge), convex grinding (clam blade), concave grinding, large flat grinding, chisel grinding and so on. Different grinding methods have different blade angles, which have their own advantages in use. The clam blade has high strength and is suitable for chopping, but grinding is not easy; concave grinding is extremely sharp, suitable for razor shaving, but thin and not suitable for chopping; chisel grinding It can be polished with only one side, which is convenient for polishing, but limits the function of use.
I have found that the Scandinavian (flat ground) edge is best for cutting wood because it has a sharp edge for easy cutting and a clean cut. But if you cut a bone when you’re peeling a large animal, it’s easy to damage the blade. However, this damage can be avoided as long as you improve your meat cutting technique.
Use of outdoor survival props
Safety
Before you are ready to use a knife, you must pay attention to safety. Remember that when sharpened, the blade will be as sharp as a razor. Keep the pocket knife in a sturdy scabbard, or carry it in a large backpack if you’re hiking in a more civilized area. But if you’re going into remote areas, attach the knife to a belt, or use a sturdy string around your neck or shoulders. When the knife is not in use, even for a short time, it should be put back into the scabbard. The scabbard is preferably a K scabbard, but the leather scabbard is not resistant to water immersion. The scabbard must be kept clean, wipe the knife clean before putting it in the scabbard. There is a traditional principle in field survival skills, that is, never lend your knife to others, because if someone else uses your knife indiscriminately Damaged, can lead to broken friendships. However, if you encounter a critical situation, you still have to lend others to help you through the difficulties. Whenever you carry a knife, bring your first aid kit. Cut outward on the outside of your body. A common mistake is to sit and cut wood between the legs, which can cut the femoral artery in the lower extremity if the blade slips accidentally. Learn to place your non-knife hand behind the blade, not in the direction of the incision, and out of the way where the blade slips.
Cutting Skills
Every piece of wood has a grain structure that determines its strength and performance in various uses. Different tree species have different wood textures, this piece of wood may be suitable for properties that require elasticity, and that piece of wood may be more difficult to split. Woods with different textures have different degrees of difficulty in cutting. Once you understand how wood grain works, you will be able to judge how the wood will change after cutting, so you can cut more easily because the wood has grain to help you. 1. Think of a piece of wood as a bundle of fibers that are parallel to each other and tightly pressed together; 2. If you need to, you can use a blade or wedge to cut through one end of the fiber to split the wood; 3. If you If you want to cut the fibers in the middle, the best way is to cut along an angle, so that the fibers are stressed one by one, instead of letting the blade deal with the whole bundle of fibers at once; 4. If you can stretch the bundle of fibers until Tighten them, and you can cut them more easily, in the same way that it is easier to cut a taut thread than a loose thread; 5. If you are going to cut deeply into a piece of wood, you may It takes the end of the edge you want to cut, where the fibers are cut so that they don’t warp and break before the blade hits it. This “stop cut” is a basic technique for carving wood and requires prior planning and careful study of the wood grain; 6. When cutting in the opposite direction of the grain, you must use a lot of force, shallow Shallow cut.
Kaishan Tool Selection
The Palan knife is the most dangerous slashing knife used in field survival skills. It has the longest blade and uses a slashing motion to slash, which is difficult to control and easy to deviate from the direction. But when opening a road in the mountains and building a bridge in the water, the Palan knife is indispensable.
Therefore, we limit the use of the Palan to the rainforest, or other environments where you need to cut similar materials. Like all other tools used in wilderness survival skills, the Palan is in the hands of a skilled craftsman. A sharp and efficient tool. Like the axe, the secret to using the Palan is to use the weight and speed of the blade’s center of gravity to cut. The quality of different palan knives varies greatly, the degree of difference may exceed other cutting knives, when choosing palan knives, do not choose too long, 50~60 cm is suitable for most purposes, the blade should be hard and heavy, and also check The method of fixing the handle, Palan knives usually only have a narrower root, and this design may not be completely reliable. Choose a handle that is secured with riveted plates, and the base of the blade should be roughly the same length and width as the handle. Again, whenever you bring a Palan with you, you should also bring your first aid kit, put the Palan in a scabbard or keep it in a hardwood case, and when you pull it out, make sure you Hold the case by the panels, not the edges, so that the blade doesn’t cut through the rivets or stitches and cut your hands. Never allow other people or other things to distract you while you are chopping with the Palan, if you are being infested by insects or interrupted by someone else’s question you should stop using the Palan until Can refocus. Also, to avoid slashing and slashing, consider the most effective moves. Also, straighten your arms and the Palan, and draw a circle around your body, making sure there are no obstacles in the circle.
When chopping with a Palan knife, most of the movements of the wrist are required. To make an efficient cutting action, you must ensure that there is a complete follow-up, or enough space for the follow-up, so that your action can be used to cut the object. There is also an inertial follow-up movement, as long as you use smooth, confident and fast slashing movements, you can make the best cuts with the Palan knife. When chopping pickets, a good quality palan knife can cut the wood at an angle of 30 degrees to the cutting board. Palan knives must remain sharp, but nicks are almost impossible to avoid because palan knives usually do some rough work. Before slashing with the Palan, make sure that every part of your body is out of the line of the blade and that your partner is standing far away. Why bring such dangerous knives? Because the Palan knife is widely used, it can be used to cut down wooden stakes, clear open spaces and cut thorny rattan that hooks clothes. It can also be used to cut things in tropical jungles and obtain various foods, such as coconuts. Meat and palm tree core starch, etc.
