Picking the Best Survival Knife

Most preppers love knives, tools and gadgets. I am among that group of preppers. With thousands of options for survival knives on the market today, do you really know what to look for when hunting for a survival knife. Do you know what you will need to use you knife for, what steel is best, what blade shape and blade length is best?

Today, I am going to cover the details that you should look at when buying a survival knife, and things you should take into consideration.

What Survival Knife?

First off, try and steer away from all the hype, yes, Gerber make some great knives, but the Bear Grylls survival knives are just shit. Inferior steel for the price, and the heat treat could be better.

When looking for a survival knife, take a look at some offerings from Fallkniven, Bark River, Casstrom, LionSteel. These are all great knife makers, and you can pick up a high quality knife, for a decent price.

So, lets get into the details now, as there are a few things you should consider before buying your survival knife.

Blade Length

Firstly, we will look at what blade length is best for a survival knife. There is no real rule for the best blade length, though, many survival experts tend to prefer smaller blades, than large blades. I myself, prefer a blade in around 4-5 inches in length, it is just the perfect size in my eyes, small enough to do delicate work and carry on your belt, large enough to skin large game, baton kindling with and do other survival chores like cutting paracord, making traps, shelters and so on.

The bigger the blade, the heavier the knife will be, the harder it will be to carry around, and the harder it will be to do small delicate work with. If you want a knife for chopping logs, clearing bushes or whatever, you should maybe be looking at an axe or machete instead. After all, that’s what they are made for.

Conclusion: A blade between 4 and 5 inches is perfect for a survival/bushcraft knife, it can process food, process fire wood, clean large and small game, gut fish and do all you other general chores without being too big and heavy to carry around comfortably.

Tang

When looking for a survival or bushcraft knife, you will always be looking for a fixed blade knife, but not just any old fixed blade. You want to find something with a full tang construction. A full tang means the metal runs right through the middle of the handles.

Why a full tang? It is stronger, and impacts to the blade will be spread out throughout the whole tang, and not limited to the blade portion.

Handle Material

There are hundreds of handle materials available today for knives, a whole range of wood, G-10, Micarta, rubber, the list goes on. When looking for a survival knife, you want a knife with a solid handle material, one that you can get wet, covered in animal blood, dirt…. without it doing any damage.

Stabilised wood is also a good choice, it shouldn’t absorb water, or any other fluids, and is also nice to look at.

So, what handle material should you get? For a full blown survival knife, I would say G-10, Micarta, or Thermorun.

If you are looking for more of a bushcraft style knife, or even hunting knife, any of the above materials will be fine. Generally speaking, G-10 and thermorun is at the top of the strength table, followed by micarta, then wood.

Note: When looking at handles, if you intend to use you knife in very cold weather, you might want to pick a knife with a hidden tang. What I mean by this is, the handle material fully covers the tang of the knife.

Steel

In todays knife world, there are many different steels to pick from. To a new knife buyer, this may be confusing, or you may not even take it into consideration when looking at a knife.

Starting with stainless steels. To become stainless, there must be more of the element chromium added to the steel. With this, comes softness, though don’t let that put you off. The blade isn’t going to bend like rubber, though, the edge will dull a little quicker.

Now, looking at high carbon steels. The more carbon in a steel, the harder it becomes, though it is also more prone to rusting.

So, how do I know which steel to go for? A supersteel, such as CPM 3v, or a Stainless Steel, such as VG-10.

Talking from my experience with knives, and I have a lot of knives, in all different steels, I would say go with stainless for a survival knife, and if you are looking for a hunting knife, then go with a supersteel, CPM-3V is my choice. If you are searching for a bushcraft knife, either of these steels will be good, even O2 (K720), which is a high carbon tool steel. It is very tough, and also easy to sharpen, though, due to the carbon content, rusts easily.

Note: The harder the steel, and the higher the wear resistance, the harder the knife will be to sharpen. A survival knife should be pretty easy to sharpen in the field, where as a bushcraft knife, or hunting knife can be sharpened at home on proper sharpening stones.

To prevent my knives rusting, I carry a cotton pad soaked in oil, and give the blades a rub down after use.

Knife Grind

This is a topic that confuses a lot of people. The blade grind refers to how the blades cutting edge has been shaped. The best grind for an all round knife, such as a survival knife is a convex grind, which the Fallkniven F1 and Bark River Bravo 1 LT both have.

For hunting, I also like a convex edge, they are very strong, and despite what many people say, they are the easiest edge to maintain. You can keep it shaving sharp with a piece of leather!

For bushcraft knives, many people like scandi grinds due to their ability to get close to the wood when carving. A scandi grind is a bit more fragile than other grinds, due to how thin the edge is, so if you are looking an all round survival knife, I would steer away from this grind.

Convex Grind – Strong (Best all rounder)

Scandi Grind – Bushcraft (Weaker edge, but great for wood work – Can get them scary sharp pretty easily)

Flat Grind – Almost always a secondary bevel

Serrations

Useless, just useless. That is all I have to say about those.

Uses

Think about what you will be using your knife for. Like I said, I have many knives, and I would be happy to use any of them in a survival situation, though, survival is not the main purpose for many of my knives.

I use my knife a lot, and so, I make sure I pick the correct design, and materials for the job.

If you are going to be taking your knife to the coast, near salt water, stainless steel will be what you want, and possibly a micarta, G-10 or thermorun handle.

If you knife is for bushcraft, then a tool steel, such as D2, A2, K720, even a stainless steel, or supersteel will be great.

For a hunting knife, again, any steel will be fine, but edge retention is favoured, so I would be more drawn towards a supersteel such as M390, Elmax, CPM-3v…

There is no such thing as a do it all knife, though the closest thing I have found to it is my Fallkniven F1 and Bark River Bravo 1 LT.

Sheath

Without a good sheath, you knife isn’t much use. It will be dangerous to carry around, and just plain awkward. Make sure whatever knife you choose to buy, pick one with a decent sheath, or have one made for it.

Conclusion

If you are just looking for a great all rounder knife, then any modern steel will be up to the job.

If you are in the market for a survival knife, something that is easy to sharpen in the field, stainless and well built is what you need to find.

If you are searching for a bushcraft knife, again, any steel will preform well.

My Most Used Knives

I have a Fallkniven F1, and I would say this is my favourite knife. Yes, it looks kind of ugly, but, it grows on you. I have come to love the design, simplicity and ruggedness of my F1, and can easily say, it is my most used knife. I use it for hunting, fishing, gardening, bushcraft, everything really. I am actually going to buy a second F1 I like it that much!

My second favourite knife is my Bark River Bravo 1 LT. Just a little bigger than the F1, and in CPM-3V supersteel, I find this knife great, though it is a little harder to sharpen than my F1, but has a higher wear resistance, meaning I don’t need to sharpen it as much. Being CPM-3V, it is not a stainless steel, though it is as close to stainless for a Carbon steel blade. Many call it semi-stainless.