By all accounts they are pretty effective and bomb proof. The only concern, if I was to use it as a 'recovery' spade, is its short handle (one needs to reach to the centre of the chassis if one has got bellied in the desert ).
What kind of improvements would you be looking for?
Longer handle being one of them.
I have both of the folding spade models. The German and the Austrian i think? I purchased both because I wanted to inspect both mechanisms side by side.
I was thinking , for winter use , a large shovel head that could be wing nut tightened to the main head for moving larger quantities of snow. So would be a large Alu shovel head that could be connected to the main shovel head as and when needed
Other modding design ideas to be , ermm... ironed out. <need rum to ruminate... >