How To Choose The Best Knife For You

Folks that are just getting into the knife world ask me this question all the time. And I love to help people find exactly the right blade for them. It gives me a deep sense of satisfaction to see something I’ve made with my own two hands go off to a new home where I know it will be useful and appreciated.

Some people might say, “A knife is a knife, right?” Well, yes and no.

We sort our knives into categories like Hunting, Backpacking + Survival and EDC (Everyday Carry) to give you a jumping-off point on your knife-selecting adventure. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a lot of overlap, where one knife might be just as good an EDC as it is a small game knife, or another knife be just as good a camp knife as it is for dressing out deer. Some people swear by a smaller blade even for large game, while others are more comfortable with a longer blade as their go-to, all-around outdoors knife. Personal preference and individual needs play a huge role in this decision, and there’s really no wrong answer.

As my grandpa used to say, “Ain’t no accountin’ for taste.”

No matter how good your steel is, if the heat treat sucks, then at best you won’t be enjoying the full potential of that premium steel you paid for, and at worst it will perform almost no better than a mass produced, big box blade. The heat treat needs to hit the sweet spot between being hard (good edge) and too hard (brittle), as well as having a bit of flex for strength and shock absorption. Many modern heat treats aim to achieve a single, uniform hardness throughout the blade, and run the gamut between hard and too hard by being just hard enough. This allows them to hold a decent edge without too much risk of chipping or breaking under normal use.

Then there’s something called differential hardening. The basic idea behind this heat treat is that the edge and ground portion of the blade is harder than the back or “spine” of the blade. This heat treat method was developed by Japanese sword-makers hundreds of years ago, and it allows a skilled maker to harden a blade’s edge several Rockwell C points more, taking a “hard enough” edge to a razor sharp edge. Then, to avoid making the blade brittle as a result, the spine is tempered several points softer, which creates a blade that is tough, shock resistant and has some flex. A quality heat treat is more than important; it will elevate a good steel into the best blade that it can be.

For plenty of folks, bigger is better. It’s also heavier. A thicker blade will have the weight and strength for all kinds of survival applications, including chopping and shelter building, while pulling double duty in the camp kitchen. The ones I reach for in this bracket are the Marauder and Marauder XL.