Surviving in the wild requires a fine-quality knife that can make your life a whole lot easier. You can always leave a lighter or twine, but you should never leave a bushcraft knife behind. It will serve you well when it comes to cutting wood for fires to building a tent for shelter. Without it, getting stuck in the woods might just make the whole thing less enjoyable. Picking the best bushcraft knife for yourself can become intimidating if you have no idea what to look out for.
Some might think why anyone should get a bushcraft knife to use in the wilderness when they can easily use an existing survival knife in their fanny pack. Are they not the same? Well, no. For one thing, a survival knife is heavier than a bushcraft knife. It is designed to survive in a critical life and death situation while a bushcraft knife is used for woodcrafting like making pot hangers, making feather sticks for fire kindling, or sparking a ferro rod to start a fire. To be able to make life more convenient and enjoyable for you in the woods, you definitely need a quality bushcraft knife. But what are the two main things to look out for when choosing the best one out there?
Design
A proper bushcraft blade is supposed to have an extended and flat sharp edge that comes up to meet a tip, located in between the handle and your grip. The tip should neither look too pointy and thin nor dull and curved. If it is properly flat, it could easily do regular chores like chopping vegetables or batoning wood for a campfire. When it comes to the blade design of a bushcraft knife, you also have to consider its length, thickness as well as style of the tang. Remember that you can live with a shorter blade since they’re quite strong and easily controlled while a longer one will just make any task a whole lot harder. Another thing about the tip of a bushcraft knife is that they are certainly used at about anything so it’s crucial that you pick really good steel, strong and functional.
Steel
When picking the best bushcraft knife, you can either choose one that is made out of Carbon or Stainless steel. They are both great metals when it comes to bushcraft knives. However, there are certain drawbacks to either of these metals and you have to weigh your odds and how you’re going to care for them before you decide which one to get. Carbon steel, while it is so much easier to whet, is harder to maintain as it could get easily tarnished if stored damp—which is typically unavoidable if you are working in the wild. On the flip side, Stainless steel requires very little effort to maintain as they are—you guessed it—stain less. Although whetting them can require a lot of effort to achieve the proper sharpness you desire.
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