Favorite Fighters

When I was going to one of the most rotten places on earth to run gensets for denuclearization process I did not want to be unarmed I ordered this Starett straight edge with sharpened edge and a big roll of Duct tape
http://www.starrett.com/metrology/p...traight-edges-parallels/Straight-Edges/385-24
figured to get me an AK with that and then a mig

Bagwell Hell's Belle or Loveless Sub-Hilt

Gordon

When I was going to one of the most rotten places on earth to run gensets for denuclearization process I did not want to be unarmed I ordered this Starett straight edge with sharpened edge and a big roll of Duct tape
http://www.starrett.com/metrology/p...traight-edges-parallels/Straight-Edges/385-24
figured to get me an AK with that and then a mig

Click to expand...

Sounds like a plan...

Gordon said:

When I was going to one of the most rotten places on earth to run gensets for denuclearization process I did not want to be unarmed I ordered this Starett straight edge with sharpened edge and a big roll of Duct tape
http://www.starrett.com/metrology/p...traight-edges-parallels/Straight-Edges/385-24
figured to get me an AK with that and then a mig

Click to expand...

Ala Firefox!
Don't forget to think in Russian.........

This-

Your favorite will depend on your training, I suspect; I need a blade that will cut both ways (double edge or sharpened swedge), will protect me from the edge on hard stabs (a guard) and will let me get it out of something it's stuck in (either finger grooves or a groove/grip at the rear of the grip.) It has to work forward, reverse, icepick and hammer grips. Ideal length is around 5-6" of blade.

Larry

Just picked up two of these. Do I have any practical use for them whatsoever? Absolutely not. But it's a Spyderco and a Lum design and the biggest fixed blade Spyderco has yet made (with some lovely sculpted black micarta handles)- and a one-time-only flash batch; and unlike many blades this size (blade just over 10.5", just shy of 10" of cutting edge, just over 16" in total length), it's in one of my favorite stainless steels, CPM154. Obviously the Lum original, like many of his knives, bears a lot of Chinese heritage, this one being basically a short niu wei dao, or oxtail saber.

Bought two, and I know the Spyderco market pretty well, so hopefully I keep one minty for a few years and can sell it and pay off both.

I made this one. not really a fighter, but in the words of Doug Marcada, "It will kill"

JShirley said:

Punch knives lack range and versatility. The only "good" application I see for them is as last-ditch defense for someone with absolutely no knife training.

Click to expand...

Absolutely! If I'm in a situation where I have to defend myself with a knife I'd call that a last ditch, and I sure don't have any formal knife training, lol.
Wish I had time and money for that (sigh)- I'd do kendo and fencing too.....

So, for me, a pusher is perfect. Now when it comes to handgun proficiency, well, that's a whole 'nother story.

JShirley said:

It's a beautiful knife, and I was considering it, as well. How does it feel?

Click to expand...

Sorry boss, no clue yet. I jumped on them when Blade HQ got them on Monday, but Blade HQ is somewhere in Utah where all their outgoing packages go through the Bermuda Triangle on the way out. Always takes a couple extra days for tracking info to report correctly, and I usually expect five days for delivery instead of the three from basically the rest of the country.

hso said:

I got to handle it at Blade and it would make you smile.

Click to expand...

All the early reports on BladeForums from people whose shipping was faster than mine say the fit and finish and the feel in hand are amazing. I'm thinking Sal knocked this one out of the park, and I hope we get a resurgence of Lum Spydercos.

JShirley said:

I'd definitely love your input.

Click to expand...

It's well balanced at a point a bit forward of the handle, as you'd expect on a chopping knife. The handles are beautifully done and well contoured with a Coke-bottle swell and a flare at the butt. Polished very nicely. The grinds are gorgeous, and the blade has a perfect, even satin finish.

Again, I have no conceivable use for it, but it just oozes quality, and I'm pretty glad I got two, even if they're just going to sit on the shelf. They come in a large, padded zipper case like most high-end Spydercos do, and it has a tag on the case with the serial number of the knife. I got #239 and #552.

Glock knife or a Old Timer Deer Slayer with the 2 1\2inches of the top sharpened for the back stroke!

My favored karambit is something like the PS, made by Strider Knives, in collaboration with Steve Tarani. I did not buy one of the semi-production PS Karambits, before Strider Knives went away, but did buy two hand-made MSC versions, one titanium and one Stellite. In actual practice, I have carried a Tarani Masters Model Karambit folder, daily, since about 2004. Steve Tarani, himself, has stated that karambits of this size are back-up weapons.

“Fighter” implies something a bit larger. The Randall 1-7 seems to be an ideal “just right,” or nearly so, a balance of portability, utility, and enough blade length to easily reach the vital bits inside a human body. I really like the Randall 1-7, and have two of them. Handling seems quite intuitive. The Randall 14 may be a better idea, with its beefier tang. I have attended a very small amount of FMA-based blade training that used dull-edged replicas of the Randall 1-7, but it has been quite a while ago.

I have an Ontario-made Bagwell Helle’s Belle, and while I enjoy handling it, I am not sufficiently skilled to find its handling to be intuitive. I would be less a danger to myself if I used something more like a Randall 1-7, if desperation compelled me to fight, using a knife.

At Blade Show 2015, I bought a Kasper Scorpion from the maker, Wes Crawford. This may well be the perfect compact fighter, for me. The handle shape and dimensions are perfect for my hand. Because I can legally carry a handgun more places than I can legally carry a fixed-blade knife, and because many places have blade length limits, the Crawford Custom Kasper Scorpion may become my default favorite fighter. It is large enough to be a serious “primary” weapon on its own, but is small enough to be carried as a secondary weapon. I may well add another one or two of these this year. (When I really like a knife, I know to acquire one or two spares! Knife makers age, and a maker younger than me may get out of the business due to injury or other cause.)

In terms of what I currently own--I carry either a Voyager XL (5.5 inch blade), a 6 inch CS folding skean dhu or 6 inch Holdout with a Kobun or Culloden for a discrete fix blade as am occasional carry. I have older CS barong and sax machetes in both 12 and 18 inch length as well as their cutlass machete for inside the house or hiking defense

JShirley said:

The Darn Dao feels like a pure fighter to me*, though it would also probably work well for chopping.

If you're in the market for a large dedicated fighter, the DD should be an excellent choice, if you're willing to invest in a fighting knife that costs as much as a decent handgun.

*It's probably wise to note that powerful chops are the fastest way to end a conflict with a blade, excepting an extremely well-placed stab in just a couple of places, so it's silly to just think of "fighters" as just very stabby knives!

Click to expand...

Makes a great collector piece to bring out and fondle occasionally, as well. Gosh it looks nice.