Coming up, the November 2025 Gentleman Junkie Giveaway
knife. We'll take a close look at one of my favorite backyard
bruisers. And then my favorite esk. That's
emotional support knife. I'm Bob demarco. This is the Knife Junkie
Pod.
Welcome to the Knife Junkie podcast. Your weekly dose of knife
news and information about knives and knife collecting. Here's your
host, Bob the knife junkie DeMarco.
Welcome back the show. It's great to have you here. One of my favorite comments
from this past week was from
requisite and pace 73. 92.
I'm sure I just butchered your name. Sorry about that sir, but it was about
the kukri and he says nobody knows what the C is for
anymore and that's that little notch right above the handle of the
kukri. We talked about that a bit last week. I've asked the
Gurkhas that I worked with, I've asked kukri salesman in
Kathmandu and I've asked the Gurkha Training center in
Pokhara, but no one knows definitively. It's
possibly a stress relief, possibly religious. Definitely
not to stop blood dripping because it doesn't work. I tried it with a
Gurkha captain. The only thing people agree on is the
purpose has been lost to time. How cool. Thank you so
much for that comment. I don't have any of that experience and
obviously you've, you've got a host of it. I think it's really
cool to to hear your input on it. This is what I got. A lot
of people commented on that little notch because I stated I didn't know what
it was for. Also, one More comment
from JR Bailey 3208 about the notch. He says
the notch in the kukri is called the cho or
cauti. It is a blood or SAP stopper from reaching
the grip and hand. It is also a cultural aspect
symbolizing a cow's hoof. Cows being sacred in
Hindu in Hindu religion. Cheers. From the oil patch
in central Wyoming. Thank you so much, junior.
I appreciate that too. Especially the cows
hoof bit. I have heard that before and your comment
sort of dislodged an old memory. I
remember hearing about that and to me that seems like,
to me that seems like the most
legit explanation for that notch in the shape of
it. It doesn't really trap blades like a Spanish notch though. I like to
think that that could be a reason also. Anyway, I love
mystery. There's a lot. There are few things in the world these
days that contain true mystery and that seems to be one of them.
Something that's been lost to time. All right, after all
that bloating, let us now get to a pocket Check.
What'S in his pocket? Let's find out.
Here's the knife junkie with his pocket. Check of knives in my front
right pocket. I have been carrying with some regularity over the past
week this beautiful knife from pyrotech.
This is called the Tsunami and it is a
beautiful, beautiful knife. To me. This is the
940 that I always wanted. It's got a really
cool blade. It reminds, it's, it's,
let's just say it's evocative of both the 940 and a straight
razor. This little notch here on the back of the blade does that for
me. Incredibly wickedly sharp S 90v blade
and it's surprisingly sharp given the somewhat
obtuse nature of the, of the blade. It's not obtuse
but it's, it's at about a 20 degree angle and man,
it is so sharp and you know, 20 CV just,
I mean s 90 volts just keeps cutting and cutting and
cutting. I, I have a lot of experience with it now
with Jack wolf knives. This is an interesting knife in that
the blade handles come off. They're on there with
extremely strong magnets. I will not embarrass myself trying
to pull them off here. But
these scales come off just by pulling them
hard. And it is a pretty cool
way of adjusting or taking
the knife apart or in, in this case you
may want to replace the Omega springs just in case they break.
They do send hardware and Omega springs in this
whole package. This knife is really, really cool. I don't know
much about pyrotech. One of the comments from
last week when I showed this off was from a good friend of
the show who does a lot of diving, has done years
and years of diving and made friends with an octopus. I was talking about
how my wife is obsessed with
octopus octopi. Octopi
and has, you know, books and documentaries and stuff and
is convinced they're from another planet. And a lot of
evidence kind of points in that direction. The weird thing about
octopuses is that they don't have
generational teaching. So each new octopus learns
all this stuff from scratch. But to watch them
camouflage themselves both with color and texture is pretty
astounding. Anyway, that's long way around to say I really like
this pyrotech knife. Pyrotech sent this to me
and kind of out of the blue. And I'm totally impressed. I think this
week I'll be shooting a close up video
of it. All right. Also in my front right pocket
was the first version of the Jack Wolf knives.
Midnight Jack. This thing is just so
awesome. The stout, stoutness of the spring
on these first production runs is really
impressive. I mean they're still very that they still have a great walk
and talk and a very strong pull. But I feel like the
earlier models were, were even stronger.
So I had this on me today. I needed a straight edged knife.
I love this knife. This is back on the
first run. Like I said, triple fluted bolsters. It is a Barlow. You can
tell by that one third bolster. And it's got this really nice
canvas micarta. Love that knife. I use this to cut
out shipping labels from my
pirate ship. Pirate. Lots of pirates. In this episode.
My fixed blade knife carry today. Excuse me, I think I might
be coming down with something. Was the
McNasty by Fisher Blades. Now I've seen the
new McNasty FS standing for full size. The large version
of this has come out. I've seen some of our favorite trusted
voices showing this knife off and
showing the new McNasty off and that definitely
inspired me to carry the McNasty today. I love
this thing. I love an EDC dagger. Like everybody else,
I'm no fool. And the new one, the big one looks really
cool. I love the shape of the handle. This is
the perfect shape pommel for capping with
the thumb. You've got an angle here and an
angle here for full thumb wrappage. If
you're using this thing in reverse grip, hopefully you don't have to,
but there it is. And this sheath, I've learned how to use
the. The little notch here at the front of that. The handle is what locks
it in. So it does take a bit of training to get this
out quickly. You can't just pull it straight out easily. You do
have to angle it a little or push off with the thumb and that's
a bit of a safety feature. Last up, my emotional support knife,
which is the main topic of conversation today. So this will not appear there
though this has done a lot of duty recently
is the Espada. I love the XL
Espada from cold steel. I'm not even going to try and get the whole thing
in frame here, but it's such a. Just a great knife.
I ate a true modern Nevaja.
The Nevaja, the Spanish fighting knife that was
created and adopted widely In Spain
in the 17th century when.
Or 18th and 17th and 18th century, when
swords were no longer permissible to carry. To settle your beefs
for the average citizen, they started carrying these giant
folding knives. And the Colt Cold Steel has done a great
job in pulling this beautiful historical knife
into the fold. I love this thing. This is an older one.
Oh, eight on this one.
I remember I bought two at the time. One for me and one for my
brother, and he's like, oh, surprise, I got you one. So we had a. We
had a funny little. Little exchange there, but that's what I had
on me today. My ESK was the XL
folding spot up from Cold Steel. I had the McNasty from
Fisher Blades right here in the
waistband. I also had two knives in my front right
pocket because my phone goes in my left. I wish we didn't have to carry
around phones, but someday we'll have a chip embedded. And I'll
say, I wish we didn't have chips embedded in our brains. I also had the
pyrotech Tsunami. What were you guys carrying, guys and
gals? Let me know. Drop that in the comments below. I
just wanted to let people know that there has been some demand for the
knife junkie Zippo. I ordered some more, but apparently I
didn't order enough, so I will go back order more. But
the Zippo. Awesome. We all know the wind. The
windproof lighter. This one, I've put my own insert
in here that has the double jets that I have to
refill. I like the. The butane
better when I'm smoking cigars, and that's what I use this for.
But it will ship to you with the. With the. With the
windproof wick. I cannot fill them up and send them to you, so
you'll have to buy your own Zippo fluid. But I am
astounded. I'm gonna put this under the knife cam for a sec. I'm gonna. I'm
astounded at how detailed they were able to
print my logo on here with those. All those tiny lines
behind the heart. They do a beautiful job.
I love Zippos. As a matter of fact, I just recently
unearthed a trove of old lighters from high
school when I was smoking
cigarettes. But I was only smoking them because I loved lighters. I'd
light one up and be like, throw it out. But at least I got to
light it. And I found a couple of old Zippos in there too, so
they're great keepsakes and heirlooms. Next up, I want to
mention our Gentleman Junkie giveaway knife
for November of 2025. That's right. If you're just listening, I
paused dramatically to show that it is a TKAL
knives agent 001. This one in fact with
the black and blue
striated G10. But these new,
this new run will be dropping November 1st
from TKL knives and they are now being
machined by the great and powerful Nick Chuprin of NCC
Knives up in New Hampshire. He does such a beautiful
job and it's no wonder because his
extremely sought after
folders are really, really amazing knives. He
does a, a bit of machining for Tkel and
other fixed blade knife companies and he does it
so, so incredibly well. I just want to point out the
chamfering on that jimping and the,
and the terracing on the bevels here. Such
a beautiful upgrade to the original Agent
001s, which are amazing. I mean my usual carry
is an agent 001 from the first run.
Here is another one. You'll be able to get it with this
Badger Claw Outfitters sheet which I really love.
I've been dropping this one in the pocket quite a bit. Even without a
clip it works great. And then this is featuring
the new battle lock GFN grips.
Gfn. I don't like that so much. That's what I
thought. Anyway, that's how I whined about it and then I got one in
hand and not only does it feel great, but the colors are super
intense and they have literally thousands of colors
that they can make this GFN in. It's the same, same
glass filled reinforced nylon maker for the
bodies of certain SIG models and
FN USA models. So really,
really high, high impact
gfn. So definitely, definitely check this out. This will be
the gentleman junkie giveaway knife. This one right here, the
blue one for November of
2025. How do I become a gentleman junkie? You say?
Well, join us on Patreon or right below, right
here, join us on the channel on YouTube. Become a member.
When you become a member on YouTube you are an
immediate gentleman junkie. When you go to Patreon
you have to choose that tier. We'll probably, we might
do away with the other tiers eventually. But anyway,
you can scan the QR code on the screen right here or
you and you can save 12% if you sign up for a
whole year. Again it's thenifejunkie.com
patreon thenifejunkie.com
Patreon want. To sell your custom knives Online with Launch
Cart you can easily create your own e commerce store, no
coding required. Launch Cart is designed for knife
makers like you with built in tools to showcase your
craftsmanship, manage orders and grow your brand.
It's fast, flexible and even includes low cost payment
processing to help you keep more of your profits. Start
your online knife store today at the knife junkie.com launch
and turn your passion into a business. You're listening to
the Knife Junkie podcast. And now here's the Knife Junkie with
the Knife Life News. All right, first up in Knife Life
News is from K Bar. This is a new folder
folded flipper from them called the Mark 25.
Now this is a followup from their first
folding flipper from 2018 people
and that was the Mark 98. Anyway, this one I think is
really pretty. I like this pretty in a tactical way of
course. You've got a 3.75 inch
DT drop point blade with a fuller
really, really good looking blade. I'm just kind of checking it out on
screen right now. But that fuller is sort of evocative of the
classic K bar USMC combat knife. And then it has
a really nicely shaped handle. I've never held one of these, but I could
just tell by looking at it it's very, very comfortable.
GFN scales there. So glass filled reinforced, not
glass filled nylon scales. This is
a liner lock, a very stout deep carry
wire clip on this one. I am looking forward to checking this
out. I, I, I, I intend on picking this one up
because I love the way it looks. Let's just face it, I don't need any
more super robust folding flippers. But I love
the way this one looks and you can tell that you can just kind of
nestle your flipping thumb or middle finger in that
fuller and flip that thing out. This is available now,
86 bucks is the MSRP so
you can probably find it cheaper elsewhere.
Next up is from Benchmade. Now this one is a successor.
This is called the successor and it's a successor to
the proper, their first slip joint knife. This
one is very much more premium,
let's say 2.56 inches
of M390 steel on this drop point blade. A
very sleek and beautiful design. I have to say they
learned a bit since the proper. I think this one
looks more proper. You've got a nail
neck in that blade, a sleek arcing handle. It's all
aluminum so you have gold or blue
anodized aluminum scales there with an
aluminum bolster. Now this one comes
with a leather slip With a clip. Interesting thing about
this is that you can take the clip off of your leather
slip and attach it to the knife
itself. So the knife does not technically ship with a
clip, but you can take the clip off the slip and put it
on the knife itself. So this thing looks cool. I really
like that sleek and slender blade and I think probably because
it looks somewhat tactical, but it's not tactical at all. It
is a slip joint. It's kind of a gentlemanly
looking knife. This one is available now at
2.28 ounces for
$250
MSRP.250. All right,
last up in Knife Life News is from Copus
Designs. This is the knife that got me very
interested in the Pikal style of knife in general, which I
have a sprawling collection of at this point. Should probably do an
update show one of these days. But this is from Copus
Designs and Ed's manifesto. That's Ed Calderon,
Ed Calderon's company. This collaboration
has expanded the the knife. If you're watching right now, the knife
at the very south of the screen is the original knife
except for the new handle color, but that's the original blade.
They now have a bunch of updates. Here you've got
the one with the thumb swale and then the thumb swale with
serrations, which is already sold out by the buy. I checked it
out. These are GFN handled knives.
154cm blade steel at 2.5 inches
in blade length, 1.2 ounces
and 1.95 ounces with the sheath.
The sheath does have a little hook on it, so you can draw
it from your pocket without a clip and have the the
sheath remain in your pocket and then you can go to town. These
are defensive blades that were inspired by the
fruit knife, the small curved fruit knife that Ed
Calderon's mother carried in Mexico back in
the day when he was a kid and he actually witnessed her
defend the family from a mugging with the fruit knife she was
always carrying around. She was carrying it around? Yeah, for
defensive that defense in that case. But she was really
carrying it around because it was her work knife. And he learned how
well that style of curved small knife works,
how easy it is to conceal on your person.
And so he has made a career, among
many other things from that knife design. And
he's got that knife design across a bunch of different companies and he's
a super cool guy. I'm sure you know who Ed Calderon is, but
seek him out either on the Knife Junkie podcast. We had a great conversation
with him years back. But he, he has his own podcast
and he, he's been on everyone's podcast. So he's very
out there kind of guy. These are available now.
125 to 142 bucks.
All right, we are going to get to the rest of the show.
Coming up, we have I'm going to talk about a backyard bruiser
knife because I didn't get anything new this week. I'm going to talk about
some, some an excellent knife I've used recently
to great effect. But also we're going to talk about some of
my favorite emotional support knives. These are
emotional support knives, Esk. I've carried a lot
recently. But before we do, let
us get to the first tool. You're listening to the Knife
Junkie podcast. Here's some cool knife history with the knife junkies'
"The First Tool". All right, first up. Not first
up in the first tool. We're going to talk about the buck 110
hunting. Boulder people, listen.
It's 1963 and America
is changing fast. The space race is on. Muscle
cars roar down the highways and hunters across
the country still rely on fixed blades.
Sturdy, sure, but a pain to carry day to day.
Out of that moment came a revolution in daily use
knives, the Buck 110 hunting folder
or folding hunter. Before the Buck 110,
folding knives were convenient but not exactly
trustworthy. They could be closed under stress
or hard use. And most weren't strong enough
for real field work. But Al Buck had an
idea. Take the reliability of a fixed blade and
make it fold without compromise. It took much design
and engineering, but when the Buck 110 launched in
1964, it changed everything.
The knife was solid brass, steel and wood. No
plastic, no gimmicks. It had a clip point blade
of high carbon stainless steel, but most
importantly, a rock solid lockback mechanism.
And when that blade opened, it locked with authority.
A sound that's as satisfying today as it
was 60 years ago. Hunters trusted it,
ranchers carried it, soldiers tucked it into their packs.
And soon the buck 110 wasn't just a knife, it
was the knife. The Buck knife.
In fact, it became so popular that it sparked an entire
wave of copycats. Every company wanted to sell their
version of the Folding Hunter, but the Buck name
engraved right there on the blade tang stood apart.
It was tough, dependable and proudly made in the
usa. You could spot one by its brass
bolsters or by the worn leather sheath on a well used
belt. Many of those knives have outlived their owners.
Still sharp, still functional, passed down as family
heirlooms. There's even a bit of irony here.
The buck 110 was meant to modernize knife carry, but
it became a classic almost instantly.
Today, whether you're buying A brand new 110 from Post
Falls, Idaho, this is somewhat brand new. Or
carrying your grandfathers from the 70s, the buck 110 is
more than brass, steel and wood. It's a piece of American
knife history. The knife that proved a folder can be as
tough as any fit. And that's why the
buck 110 folding hunter doesn't just cut.
It defines an era. Now let's get to
the state of the collection. Knife themed shirts, hoodies,
mugs, water bottles and more. Thenifejunkie.com
shop. You know you're a knife junkie if you love your knives more
than your spouse. Right here, people. Right here. Speaking
of classic knives, I had this all
weekend long with me. I did a bit of
outdoor fall cleanup. I've been sort of
neglecting the backyard because the front yard was on
display. We've got a bit of our, our, what do you call
it, the Halloween decorations and that kind of stuff out. And
sometimes when time is tight, I mow the front yard
but not the back just because people can't see the back because of our
fence. But this weekend we did.
I did a whole bunch of backyard cleanup and this is what I used.
I used the SP10 Raider
Bowie by Ontario Knife and Tool. And I just wanted to show it off
because every time I use this knife, I'm
incredibly impressed by it. The coating, as you can see,
has worn off because I use this as a
wood batoner. Not only was I cleaning up the
back, but I was also burning a bunch of stuff and I
always baton these nasty
logs I've had stocked up. They they're really hard and,
and kind of old and seasoned wood and they are
a pain in the butt to baton through. But I use this
1095 blade to span those,
span those logs and knock them in half and
well, that's what it does to the blade. And this is one of
the few coated blades I have that is this well used.
And so I kind of proudly show it off. I really,
really love this knife. I kind of wish Ontario Knife and Tool
didn't go out of business and then sell the Blue Ridge knives and then
move their most of their production overseas. It is hard to find these
right now. Hopefully they come back in full force at some
point. I wanted to show off this Handle. This
solid and thick rubberized handle is really,
really great for absorbing the shock of
batoning this knife through hard wood. However, it
is so grippy that it's sometimes uncomfortable to the naked hand.
So I have wrapped it in that baseball tape just to keep it
from crushing my hands. My.
My relatively soft and suburban hands,
I must admit. But that tape does a great job
on this knife. And if you look at the knife right now, it has a
beautiful Marine Raider Bowie profile.
And I. I'm absolutely smitten with this knife. Every time
I pull it out to use it, I love it more and more. I
do plan on seeking out other SP knives
from the spec. Plus, that's what SP stands for. Light
up. I think at this point, ebay is probably my
best choice. When the news in 2023 came out that they were
selling the Blue Ridge knives, it's just
breaks the heart. All of the other SP knives
sold out super fast, and so they're harder and harder
to find. But I do intend to hit up ebay to
see what I can find on the used secondary market. So
does anyone here have a. AN ONTARIO KNIVES
SP10 Raider Bowie? I'd be interested
and I'd also like to find out, you know, what you think of
it. Do you love it as much as I do? Probably
so. And by the way, this is one of those good knives to kind of
do this with. You just kind of hold
it up and twist it a little bit in the light. It's got such a
cool bow. All
right, we're going to get to my most carried esk.
Esk, if you're new to the show, stands for emotional support
knife. But first, I want to show off some cool
merch that Jim just came up with. My other hobby, the
strop. So not only do I collect, I strop
and I do, almost to the point of
diminishing returns. So be careful how much you strop.
You might create such a polished edge that you can't even cut
with it. It's so damn sharp. I know, I know. It's a.
It's a. An enigma wrapped in a mystery. But
anyway, you can get this really cool logo and
maximum emblazoned on a
tote bag, a backpack. You can get it on a hat, you can get it
on a mouse pad, a hot drink
holder called a cup or a. A
T shirt or a apron, whatever it is, that's your
pleasure. Now that it's getting cool again outside, I'm outside using the
Blackstone griddle a lot. Any excuse to Use the griddle
and cook outside. So if you're like me or you like your
grill. Kind of suck at grilling, but I do love
having a. A an apron on.
So go to the knife junkie.com/shop and check out all
the different stuff we have on our 25 pages
of merch. Now go check that out. You'll be
happy you did. If you want their traditional knife junkie logo,
you got to go way back to the beginning when we first
started putting out merchandise. All right, let's get to
emotional support knives. What's an emotional support knife, Bob? Well, it could
be anything. Actually, it started as fidgety knives like
this, where you can just open them and close them and open them
and close them. I'm gonna fiddle with this for a second. Sorry, guys.
I feel like this is falling down, and I want to make sure you
hear these dulcet towns. Okay, Open, close. Open,
close. That was my first sort of version of emotional
support knife, and a lot of that came from writing
at work and needing something to fidget with and.
But it's changed my emotional support knife now, as
you'll see from this list, is more what can I
defend home and hearth with? Or more importantly, what can
I defend myself with on the go? So these emotional support knives,
all but one I pretty much don't carry on my person, but
I usually have in my personal EDC backpack.
First up is no stranger to the show recently. It's
my beloved and newest favorite
Bowie knife. This is my Hog Tooth Knives
fighting Bowie. This one is an homage to the
Bagwell Hells Bells style of Bowie. Already starting to
get a little munged up here on the handle, but that's okay. That's why
I had Matt Chase of Hog Tooth Knives
make this in monosteel and not his preferred
Damascus, because I did not want this to be
precious to me. Yes, it is precious. I paid a
pretty penny for it, and it took a while to get, and it is a
fine, fine knife, but I wanted this knife to be
more of a go to fighting knife if need be. Of course,
I don't have a go to because I don't get a knife fights. But
in this imaginary world in my head, I thought, I want a
Bowie. That that is a dedicated fighting knife,
but that isn't so precious, like with all
the fancy, fancy materials that I would be afraid to use it.
So this is W2 blade steel, the beautiful
hormone across not only the primary edge, but also the back
edge. I told him I wanted this with a sharpened
Swedge to which he obliged in
spades. It's, it's nice and sharp for that obtuse angle.
And then I wanted a coffin shaped handle and he gave me this
beautiful handle with a ringed gidgee wood from Australia.
And then the guard, I wanted that sort of
devil's horn style guard with the accompanying
Spanish knot. And when you have that Spanish notch and
a guard like this, you want the guard to be a little bit taller than
the notch so you can apply pressure and leverage on a
blade that may get trapped in there. That hasn't
happened yet. But if I get in the knife duel,
this is the one I'm going to bring with me and I'm, I
will also bring my sub hilt folder or a sub hilt
fighter also from Hog 2 sheath knives which I rarely
carry as an esk because it does have those precious
materials. And let's face it, I'm, I have a
lot of safe means here. But before I put this away, look at
this beautiful sheath he made. Really, really dark brown
leather, beautifully tooled. And then he turned that
belt stud from wrought iron
and brass. Beautiful, beautiful sheath,
beautiful knife. This one not only brings emotional support for its
capabilities, but also for its pure beauty.
Next up, the only folder on this list, because I've been
carrying it a lot because it's new ish to me, is
the Mayhem from Cold Steel. This one is the
Mayhem and I got the Snaggletooth
MF on there. Fits absolutely perfectly. This is
custom, not custom made for me, but this model of the
Snaggletooth is made to fit the Mayhem Mayhem
only. This was a knife I put off buying for a long time.
But I'm really glad I finally got it. It is
beautiful. You've got AUS 10
on this version. They do. They did make a special version with
S35en, but that's a 6 inch
clip point blade. A bit of a swashbuckler with that
full belly. The whole thing is belly and then you've got
that really dramatic swedge. These three
notches on the top are not jimping for the thumb
I don't think because that's a 90 degree spine, you can
definitely throw sparks with it. And those three little
notches are great for trapping the ferro rod and,
and throwing sparks with though I can't imagine this being anyone's
primary camping knife or survival knife. I mean
it could be, could be used. It's very, very tough with that Atlas
lock which is sort of a, an a
riff on the shark lock.
I know it's got some differences, but definitely inspired by the
Demko Shark lock and a Great
and big G10 handle here. You can
choke all the way up here. You can come back here or
you can go to the back and get some serious reach
with that 6 inch blade. That's about 10 inches of reach here
with this knife. So you can see why this has ridden in my
pocket but more frequently in my backpack front
pocket. As an emotional support knife.
It gives me that emotional support to know that if
any huge task comes up with the knife, I
could handle it with this and it'll stay locked shut.
All right, next up. This is one I've had for quite a while, but I've
been falling back in love with.
And that is the partisan,
the number two knife from Station 9.
Station 9 has a bunch of models of a knives but
also self defense implements. And they number each one, which I
think is cool. This is the number two called the Partisan
and it's inspired by the knives that French
soldiers carried into the trenches in World War I.
Oftentimes modified chef's knives,
modified butcher knives, kitchen knives. This one
modified with a swedge making it easier to
thrust. This is 1095 blade steel, super,
super tough and springy. The way this is heat treated and I'm
not saying that from personal experience, but I've seen a lot of people
use and abuse these. Chief among them Volwest and
Tony Lopez, the two guys involved in
Station 9. I've seen them put their partisans through
hell and they just keep coming back for more. This is one of
the original ones with that stonewash coated
1095 blade steel and then also beautiful
canvas micarta handle scales. Now they're out with
a new run of these. These went away for a while, but there's a new
run and I just got a sneak peek at that because my good
buddy Jock from Jocks knives had
one sent to me before. I'm going to send it along to him. And that's
got a green G10 handle scale and it
does not have or handle scales I should say. And it does
not have this belt,
what are we going to call that slip thing on the sheath.
But the sheath is the same shape. Everything about it is pretty much the same
except for the handle scales and the with that. And
this leather sheath
belt holder thing is great. Especially if you like to
carry your belts under or carry your sheaths under the
belt. And that's how I like to do it. So that works out really great.
Just like Jeremiah Johnson carried his knife.
That's the Station nine number two
hardens it. Next up is
a knife from one of my absolute favorite people
out there in the world and also one of my favorite knife makers
and also one of my favorite knives. This is from TEL
Knives. This is the
Outrider. The Outrider, which is the
updated version of the Sapper. You'll know you,
you have a sapper when you see that engraved line,
not engraved, but laser etched line going down the
blade for poking around in the sand for
landmines. This is the updated version of
that. Because there aren't too many landmine hunters or sappers
out there, they have sort of rebranded this as the
Outrider. This is based on the,
the collaboration design between Emory Morgenstern.
That's his, that's his maker's mark right there.
He's an IDF soldier who is a
specialist in
eod, so explosive Ordinance Disposal. And
so that's why it was the original version of this was called the Sapper
and Tim renamed this knife the Outrider
because Emory is also an outrider. He's a badass and he's
a. After October 7th, two years ago, he
moved back to Israel and has been fighting the good fight over
there. And this is his knife design
with him. I really love this. You know, you can tell it's got that
center line point, the swedge. It's like a clip point and a
kukri put together. So a recurve clip point. I don't know what you want to
call it, but just a great blade shape.
A lot of people use this as their prime outdoors
knife. Tim has learned this would make an awesome camp
knife. I bet to me it looks like an awesome fighting knife.
You've got a great handle, you've got a finger guard, but also a
finger choil that you could ride up and do your
close up tasks at the camp or whatever. Nice
bird's beak pommel and a rounded pommel. That pommel was
originally rounded for this purpose right here to nestle
in the palm. When you're poking around in the sand, you want to know
exactly where that point is. And you get feedback through that
curved pommel into the palm of your hand, all the way up
your forearm. So beautiful design.
I think these are on offer currently. You know, TKL knives,
they're semi custom, semi meaning they
do batches of knives and you have to kind of catch them
when they're releasing the knives you want. And I believe that
the Outrider is a, is a currently available
knife. If you want one you can go to the knife junkie.com
teak hell. And we have a coupon code there. Knife
junkie in the coupon, a little, little bar
there. You save 10 off your purchase, I get
a little kickback and Tim gets a sale. So it
we all win here. Made in the USA, of course. And
that this one is 80 CRBT. And I have to
thank Tim. He gave this one to me and
he'd given me a number of knives in my day and I really appreciate
that. But this one especially, I always wanted one
of these. And when I saw him at Blade show, he knew that. He's like,
here, take this. I was like, oh, I couldn't possibly. Okay,
thanks. You know, I don't want to be rude. All right,
next up. This is probably, I think this is the smallest
one in the line. But this one's been getting a bit of carry
especially since my most recent interview with
James Williams. This is the HZ6
from CRKT. Look at that. I mean there's one
purpose for this knife. You can just tell by looking at it.
The, the, the
HZ6 is based on a
traditional Japanese fighting knife.
And this style is a shrunk
down version of something that was a bit of a short sword
and, but also a smaller
tanto. This also comes in a 4 inch version, the
HZ4 or from CRKT or you can go to
James Williams Design and see if they have.
They sell out like hotcakes right quick. But he does some of
these with other makers and they
are so fun. They're, they're, you know,
more custom and more refined than the CRKT. But
the CRKTs are awesome, I gotta say. I have an
old Hisatsu also from James Williams
and CRKT does an especially great job with these James
Williams knives. But I'm showing this the spine of the blade right
now. You can see that full length swedge and you can see how
stout the blade remains right up to the tip. This is definitely
a thrusting knife. You're going to have no trouble getting into
whatever you're trying to get into with this thing. You've got that
traditional style handle with sort of a
symbolic representation of the Tsukamaki
wrap you'll see on a traditional Japanese knife. And
then you have incredible jimping on the top, which is also part of
that Tsukamaki design. But
it gives you jimping all the way up and down the spine and the belly
of this handle. So even though it has no guard, which is there
on purpose, so it doesn't snag up on anything. If
you're carrying this concealed but need to draw it to use it and
the jimping your the fat of your hands
and your fingers will sink into that jimping and
really keep you on that handle.
Also I love that this thing has a pommel. Has
pommel. Gyms
Williams Design 2927 is the model
of this. If this is too much for you at that 6 inch blade length,
check out the HZ4 which came out recently.
Here's the sheet and I have a discreet Carry Concepts
style clip on it. This one by the way makes a
great sweatpants or running shorts or
round the house pajama knife, I'll put it that
way. Next up, this is a classic. I mean this is one of
this has been an ESK for many years, but it's been back in
heavy rotation. This is the Praether War
Bowie by Tops Knives. I just
featured this recently on another podcast
or no no in my collection
selection videos. I love this knife. Everyone's a
huge fan of this knife. This was back by popular demand. I know
it went away for a while. I was lucky to get one
before they put this on hiatus, but they got
such a hue and cry about it being gone that they came
back out with it. Just a beautiful bowie knife. That's a 7
inch blade, 1095 blade steel
with that high traction black coating there. Real long
swedge, which I say this every time. I wish that were sharper came
with an option for it but the swedge is
thick enough that that's not even they don't even intend that to be
sharpened. Very, very sharp. I've seen
this being used by outdoorsmen as
a great outdoors knife, batoning with it and all that. But
to me this is a trident. Well, it's not
tried and true by me. This is a born and bred fighting
knife. You've got sort of a French profile with the
blade being a lot wider and broader than
the tapered portion of the handle and that acts as the
guard widens out towards the pommel
in sort of a coffin handle shape
which we're which resists centrifugal force. If
you're swinging this and slashing and hacking and chopping.
Just a beautiful, beautiful knife and it instills me
with confidence and that's a huge part of what an ESK
is supposed to do. Like I said, whether it's the
fidgety thing to dispel excess energy or it's
the just in case I want to make sure I have a knife that I
can go to war with on me at the time. And that's what
my esks have been lately. This is the Praether War
Bowie wearing one of the best Kydex
sheaves I've ever made, which I'm happy
about because they send that in one of those kind of lame spec
ops or whatever they call them.
Nylon sheaves. I just don't like them. Not. Not befitting such an
awesome knife. Anyway. Next up. This
was one that I put off buying for a long time and then
finally pulled the trigger on. I love this
knife. It's probably my favorite Ka Bar knife. I'm being 100%
honest and I'm barring all sentimental
attachment to my other K bars which have a lot more sentimental
value to me than this. But I really, really love this one.
This is the Doghead K Bar and this
was design and designed and intended
for those who love using their K bars for
camping and out outdoorsy bushcrafting of
stuff. To me it's still just an awesome version of a
fighting knife. But the what they did to
make this more outdoors friendly is
make it a, a, an asymmetrical guard. So the top
guard for the thumb is very small. So if you want to use it
in a saber grip and, and push your thumb against the guard and still
have something to view, something to push against there.
But if you want to use this for close in kind of carving chores
and that kind of thing and you want your thumb on the back of the
blade, you don't have a huge thumb side guard
to or dorsal guard to, to put your thumb
over it works really great for that. Also the guard is much
thicker and the four finger guard extends
considerably. You've got that stacked leather handle which I'm an
absolute sucker for. I love it. I, I love it. I'm
a huge fan of stacked leather in general, but Ka bar does
a superlative job with that. And then the, the
butt cap here is thicker than the usual Ka bar
and it extends into sort of a teardrop shape
and you can use this to hammer in tent stakes or
whatever you might use your pommel for in a
hammering sort of fashion. So these are all the
reasons why they consider this sort of their bushcraft knife.
But like I said to me, this is still a combat knife. It's
just a different iteration of it comes with the
usual great leather Ka Bar basic Ka Bar
sheath. But I mean you don't need more than this. This thing is
awesome. And yeah, this has gone in my backpack and done
Esk duty A lot since I've gotten it.
I just. I don't know, man. Something about this has an extreme
charm. It's
got these. The unsharpened swedge that you're
finding now on all the modern K bars. I do have a K
bar that was released in the early 90s, maybe
1990, and it was a
reissue of the 1941 or 1942
design with that sharpened swedge. I love that too. It'd be
cool if they came out with a dog head with a sharpened swedge, but they're
not doing the sharpened Swedes at all these days, so that won't happen.
Doghead. I love it. All right, next up, this one is
from Spartan Blades. This is the Les George Raider
Dagger. They call it the Spartan George Raider
Dagger for short, but here it is. This is
a modern full tang. Full tang to the point where the,
the tang even extends to the very length of both guards.
But this is a modern full tang version of the Raider
Dagger which saw some production and some
use at the beginning of World War II. It was quickly phased
out for the M3 trench knife which had a.
A half sharpened back edge. These were known
to be very delicate and the tips would break off, so guys
would break it off before the fact and
then sharpen the front into a sort of a chisel, the
front tip into a sort of chisel. They also
had these very brittle aluminum
handles that had another. They were aluminum alloy
and I can't remember what the secondary metal was in it, but that
metal would start to flake as it oxidized and the
handles would crumble and the blades would break it. It was just kind of
a. A misstep in manufacturing because at
the beginning of our involvement, all being the United States
involvement In World War II, materials were going to a lot of other
places than knives and compromise really
showed in the, in the knife itself. I'm holding it on the side. You can
see the beautiful swelled a palm
swell handle. So contouring is just beautiful no matter
how you turn this knife. And you've got
jimping all the way around. So really
great grip on this knife. And these
GRN handles are nicely knurled. You get great
grip. It's an outstanding thrusting knife.
And of course you've got a bit of belly, not too much,
but you could still use this in a slash, but all day
long. This is a rusting knife for
those sort of chores that a Marine raider might find
themselves being pressed into. Also has a great
Kydex. This is not Kydex. A a great
thermomolded plastic sheath that
it. It does not seem like any extra even though it
is a pancake style sheath. But it also has a lot
of different lashing options. I have it with the.
This one of these sort of cheap clips on here and this one also
works great as an around the house gym shorts or
sweatpants or pajamas knife. And yes, I'm
always, always armed, does not matter. Don't always have a
gun on me, but I'm always armed with a knife. It doesn't matter what I'm
doing or where I am unless I'm at the airport
in which case I've forgotten to disarm myself. And they've taken.
That has happened. So. All right, penultimate in this
list is the Black
Bear classic. The cold steel
classic classic cold steel version
of a classic knife. The Loveless Sub
hilt Fighter. This is one of my favorite knives period
in my collection. I love this. I took so long to
get one of these. So long that for years and years and years they
haven't had this leather sheath. I had to find it on
ebay and I did and there it is. And it is
fantastic. I love this. This one is in a 440
stainless steel. I think it's 440C.
It's been ages since cold steel has used 440
blade steel. That just goes to show how old this one is. Someone kept
it in their basement which is apparent from the smell on the sheath which is
basically all but gone away. And
it's got this gorgeous polished G10 handle.
Look at the palm swell on there. This thing is so comfortable in
hand and you've got the dual
edges. Very, very sharp, long slender clip point
blade. Those are hollow ground bevels. So you
have quad hollow ground bevels. And then the Ricasso
is crowned. So you have a nice rounded
off Ricasso. Really, really awesome
aluminum double quillian guard and
aluminum sub hilt here. The fit and finish
of this is awesome. Like I said, it was obviously in someone from
the box and the sheath obviously in someone's basement for a long
time nothing has separated. Everything is still
fully flush in those handle materials. These are
complex builds. If you look at this, you've got 1, 2, 3,
4, 5, 6 pieces here and then
seven with the, with the lanyard hole. And
then you have so like 12 pieces all together
including the pins. Pretty complicated handles on some hilt
fighters and none of that has separated. It's just beautifully
manufactured in Taiwan. Here's the
leather sheath with the D guard and the Dangler belt
loop here and then you've got a really nice Arkansas
Whetstone in that in that pouch there on
the front. If you love the Black Bear Classic,
I do suggest you get one. Whether you get
the the one with the new modern sheath
which to me does not fit the whole look of the blade,
but you might not be as concerned about that. I can't
recommend this thing more. It is an impressive knife
and beautiful to look at and really just feels great
in hand. If you're someone who likes to practice your knife
skills in the air, this, this one is great.
I do do recommend it. I'm a huge sucker for the Loveless
designs, especially the the sub hilt fighter and
the New York Special. I think it was called the New York Special and
then the shoot knife, all three of them super cool. Bob
Loveless design. Bob Loveless was one of the original members
of the or formative founders
of the American Bladesmith Society along with a couple of other
people. Yeah, chief among them, Bill
Bagwell. He was a part of that scene too. All right, last up, my
most. One of my most carried esks recently has
been this beast. This Speaking of Marine
Raider Bowies, this is the
work tough gear V44X. This is in
the K329 steel, which I'm told
is a really, really awesome steel. I'm not sure about
that, but I do know it has lived up to the limited abuse I've given
it. I've pounded this through endless logs
in the backyard. Maybe not endless, but many, many logs in the
backyard. I've also used it for sapling removal and
we have these fast growing sumac trees here and
it's done a beautiful job on that. It's just a
great excuse to have an awesome raider style Bowie on you.
Designed by Reese of well Regulated. You
can see his incredible collection of
vintage Marine Raider Bowies. He's a former Marine
on Instagram if you go to well underscore Regulated
and he's been on the show here recently talking about this design
and others. He's. He's got a pocket version of
this, a 4 inch bladed version of this knife that's kind of.
Well, he's had a number of customs made of it and we're
hoping to see Work Tough Gear release it sometime
soon. I know that they have plans to do so, but we
just haven't seen it yet. A great handle,
G10 contoured. You got a bit of a palm swell there.
Fits great in hand all the way back here
to chop. You've got this kind of straight back
for recoil and then this hook here to keep it in
hand. Excellent knurling on the handle itself and
a beautiful orange liners. You can see also here
it's chamfered where the thumb goes, but you have a,
a very sharp 90 degree spine for throwing sparks
and other and other for shaving
off bits of fatwood or whatever you're going to use that
spine for. But very nice sharpened spine. Great chamfered
choil here and a nice finger guard. This thing
is the perfect representation of a modern
Marine Raider Bowie designed by a modern
Marine, former Marine, but I guess once a Marine,
always a Marine. All right, guys, thank you so much for joining me on my
Esk journey. I use Journey with a little bit of
irony. But. But do you have an Esk? Do you have an
emotional support knife? You carry a knife that you're most likely
not going to use, but you use it to bring your, bring
your mood, stabilize your mood because it's a fidgeter, or
stabilize your mood because it's something that you could defend your life with
even, even though you know that that will probably not come up
hopefully. Let me know. Drop it in the comments below.
I'd love to know what your esk is and maybe we'll
mention it next week in our next midweek
supplemental of the Night Junkie podcast. All right, for
Jim working his magic behind the switcher, I'm Bob DeMarco saying until
next time, don't take Dull for an answer. Thanks
for listening to the ninth Junkie podcast. If you enjoyed the show, please
rate and review@reviewthepodcast.com for show notes
for today's episode, additional resources and to listen to past episodes,
Visit our website thenifejunkie.com youm can also watch
our latest videos on YouTube at the knifejunkie.com
YouTube
it.