I know this is not the usual knife for bushcrafting...but I thought a few of you here may have some of the same thoughts I do. While I do love the bush and spend as much time there as life will allow I Admittedly lean more towards the "survivalist/prepper" philosophy on things in general, I really can't help it as it stems from habits started as a kid growing up in the "Cold-War". Living in a rather large city that is surrounded by nuclear power plants, chemical processing plants, and a few fuel depots...then watching things deteriorate before my eyes here due to the recession and seeing the gangs grow in numbers does nothing at all to alleviate those thoughts and habits. Thanks to a lot of the friends I have made here I have learned a lot of things, among those is that I really don't always need a knife as large as I once thought I did, and for that I am grateful as small knives have the inherent ability to be carried more discretely. A knife that I cannot carry does me no good at all. Lately I have been putting together a comprehensive kit that will work for me in an urban environment as well as in the bush. One of the tools I got for this kit is a H.E.S.T. (Hostile Environment Survival Tool) made by RAT Cutlery, now ESEE cutlery, and designed by Robert Young Pelton. Some seem to think of it as a tactical knife but with an over-all length of less than 8 inches/20 cm, and a cutting edge of only 3 inches/7.6 cm... tactical is just not a word that comes to mind for me when I am looking at it. It is made of 5mm 1095 steel and having a few of their knives I can say that ESEE does a fantastic heat treat and an impossible to beat no questions asked life time warranty.
The day I got it I only had time to check it out a little but really liked how it handled, and liked the hollow cavity in the handle.
It did make a great improvised snow scraper to clear my windshield wipers. I even used the pry bar to open my frozen door once (no pics of prying the door, it took two hands).
It's a small-ish knife but using a two finger grip, which the pry bar really comes in handy for by the way, I was able to chop so far and then break some solid branches really quickly.
Then batoning them went really well, the handle scales never loosened or gave me any problems at all.
Then I decided to try something a little bigger so I tried it on a piece of seasoned, forked, Black Walnut. And that was no problem either and still no loosening of the scales. I'm liking RAT's system of adding scales to skeletonized handles, I will likely get some for my Izula.
I used it with a baton to split off some pieces of fatwood off of a fatwood log I found a while back.
Then I did a little more whittling with it. First in fatwood, and then a piece of Black Birch I found laying around. I am well pleased with how it handles and how it cuts.
You can always tell when I really like something when I end up getting multiples...at least when I can afford it. I'm reeeally liking the H.E.S.T.
Personally I could do without the bottle opener most of the time, but it never gets in my way or makes the knife uncomfortable. It did come in handy the night I wanted to quietly celebrate my first published writing
, and has come in handy on a couple of other occasions.
Here is a picture that may help put it's size in perspective for some people with it side by side with my Swiss Army Soldier Knife Which I am assuming is the same size as the One Hand Trekker.
Then there was a pot of soup I made...it did really well too.
I like the carry options it offers, even though they were the same in the factory sheath I did have a custom sheath made for it that is Bi-symmetrical for my own personal reasons....I have a thing about symmetry I suppose.
I can carry it down low and attached to the Janus pouch on my shoulder strap like this
I can carry it up high on my sternum like this.
using the same cord and cord lock I can make a belt loop to wear it on my belt and now I have it rigged up with almost 2 meters of paracord so that I can see how it does around my neck
This is what it looks like without the scales. Either way I carry it it is 3 inches/7.6cm over flat ground, razor sharp steel with a great heat treat that I can keep a great grip on.
.
The day I got it I only had time to check it out a little but really liked how it handled, and liked the hollow cavity in the handle.
It did make a great improvised snow scraper to clear my windshield wipers. I even used the pry bar to open my frozen door once (no pics of prying the door, it took two hands).
It's a small-ish knife but using a two finger grip, which the pry bar really comes in handy for by the way, I was able to chop so far and then break some solid branches really quickly.
Then batoning them went really well, the handle scales never loosened or gave me any problems at all.
Then I decided to try something a little bigger so I tried it on a piece of seasoned, forked, Black Walnut. And that was no problem either and still no loosening of the scales. I'm liking RAT's system of adding scales to skeletonized handles, I will likely get some for my Izula.
I used it with a baton to split off some pieces of fatwood off of a fatwood log I found a while back.
Then I did a little more whittling with it. First in fatwood, and then a piece of Black Birch I found laying around. I am well pleased with how it handles and how it cuts.
You can always tell when I really like something when I end up getting multiples...at least when I can afford it. I'm reeeally liking the H.E.S.T.
Personally I could do without the bottle opener most of the time, but it never gets in my way or makes the knife uncomfortable. It did come in handy the night I wanted to quietly celebrate my first published writing
, and has come in handy on a couple of other occasions.
Here is a picture that may help put it's size in perspective for some people with it side by side with my Swiss Army Soldier Knife Which I am assuming is the same size as the One Hand Trekker.
Then there was a pot of soup I made...it did really well too.
I like the carry options it offers, even though they were the same in the factory sheath I did have a custom sheath made for it that is Bi-symmetrical for my own personal reasons....I have a thing about symmetry I suppose.
I can carry it down low and attached to the Janus pouch on my shoulder strap like this
I can carry it up high on my sternum like this.
using the same cord and cord lock I can make a belt loop to wear it on my belt and now I have it rigged up with almost 2 meters of paracord so that I can see how it does around my neck
This is what it looks like without the scales. Either way I carry it it is 3 inches/7.6cm over flat ground, razor sharp steel with a great heat treat that I can keep a great grip on.
.
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