How's your knife...

Sheldon

New member
recieved this a few days ago, sage advice from someone that knows....

Ten Points About The Fighting Knife

1). The knife is always with you, even in places where the gun cannot go.

2). It becomes the first line of weaponry when the pistol is not available by choice, policy, inaccessibility or loss.

3). If things have gotten bad enough to need the knife, the use of the knife should be aggressive, brutal and terminal, and not "defensive".

4). There is a place for using a knife against the unarmed adversary if that adversary is younger, stronger or faster than you are...or more numerous.

5). There is a place for keeping them away with your edge, but there is also a place for closing and stabbing.

6). A knife worthy of combat carry should facilitate stabbing and be simple and instictive to use.

7). The more complicated and complex a knife is, and the more elaborate its system of use, the less desirable it is.

8). Conversely, the simpler the knife and the system and more gross motor dependant it is, the better it will do in a fight.

9). A fixed blade is more desirable than a folder, but a folder may be required in some applications. If a folder is used, the lock should be robust and not technically clever.

10). Learn to be violent with your knife



Ten Attributes To Select Your Fighting Knife

1). Sharp as hell and pointy as f***, you can't stab anyone or cut anyone with a dull round nosed blade. If this sounds vulgar, it is. There is nothing dainty about ramming a 3" piece of steel into a man's thrioat and tiwsting it as he fights to get it out.

2). Point in line with the handle. Upswept blades may be the acme of the knifemaker artist, but they suck eggs for ramming through a clavicle.

3). Long enough...but not too long. We hear that about lots of things.

4). Rough handle. Either G-10 or rough designed zytel handles. When you stab another man, his juices will get all over your blade and hand.

5). Solid lock. Liner locks suck. I don't care how graceful or cool they are...they suck. Axis lock as seen with benchmade or with Cold Steel is the way to go, or with an old style lockback design.

6). Solid opening method. This being 2009, and the "Wave" concept being as old as the pyramids now....a combat blade should have a wave feature if it is a folder.

7). Good steel. That does NOT mean stainless. I don't give an airborne fornication about stains on my knife...I WANT IT SHARP!

8). Again, if a folder, it needs a movable clip so operators may carry it as desired. The more I work on this Killing-focused system, the more I am liking reverse grip - edge in. That means for a righty, you carry point up- blade forward.

9). It must be cost-effective. Notice I did not say CHEAP. Cheap knives are for fags. Cost-effective means that if I decide to ditch it, I will not be heart broken to lose my special one-of-a-kind....nor will that special one-of-a-kind be tied to me.

10). There should be a boatload of them out there in society....like Glocks. Thus you cannot be identified or tied to the gear you use.

If some of this stuff sounds like it comes from the world of the criminal rather than the world of the law abiding good guy, it does. One does not go to a clean shaven altar boy to learn to cut a throat.


Ten Points About Using The Knife In A Fight

1). A fighting is knife is fueled by rage and ferocity, not by cleverness and showmanship. I recall seeing CWS go ape (or was it AMOK) on a knife expert we brought in one year. The best the very clever and artistic knife expert could do was match CWS stab for stab. But that was after CWS had stabbed him three or four times.

2). Learn to stab....HARD

3). Learn to hold the knife in a way that you will not lose it when you STAB HARD.

4). Since few of us go about with a 10" bowie, learn your targets. You may not be able to behead an attacker, but you can in fact rip out his jugular even with a 2" box cutter.

5). Footwork gets you off the line of the attack, but also gets you close enough to STAB HIM HARD.

6). The instant you pull steel your intent should be to stick it in his neck and rip it out a different way, and not to spar, fend, or ask him to stay back.

7). The grip area of your knife MUST be rough enough to stay in your hand if your hand is covered with blood (hopefully not yours).

8). The point must be in line with your stab. A Cold Steel Scimitar of a Spyderco Chinook do not have this, but a Cold Steel AK-47 and a Spyderco Endura do.

9). To train it, each knife must have an identical trainer (dulled knife) and a wooden/rubberized trainer (like Nok's). The identical trainer is used for technical and access drills. The wooden type trainer is used for attacking the heavy bag or the stabbing post.

10). Contrary to the advice of others, use your fighting knife for everything. From opening letters to cutting cheese or tomatoes. Handle your knife daily, keep it sharp, keep it handy. make accessing it as natural as scratching your butt.
__________________


Gabe Suarez

One Source Tactical
Suarez International USA
Christian Warrior Ministries
 

Liner locks suck.

I agree, but knives with the "old style lockback design" aren't very good for defense either.

I prefer a frame lock or Benchmade style Axis lock. I don't mind a liner lock if it has a backup mechanism to prevent unintentional disengagement of the blade, like some CRKT and Gerber knives feature.

I always carry at least two folders, typically a Zero Tolerance 0301 and a CRKT M16-14SF. If I want lighter weight, I substitute my Benchmade Mini-Griptilion for the Zero Tolerance knife.

My fixed blade of choice is the Bark River Knife & Tool Bravo 1, which was developed with the assistance of the Training Unit of the Force Recon Division of the U.S. Marine Corp.

The 1st rule of knife fighting: Don't!!
The 2nd rule: Have a good knife.
 
The 1st rule of knife fighting: Don't!!
The 2nd rule: Have a good knife.

Yeah being attacked by someone wielding a knife scares me more than if they were to have a gun. I have taken several of Gabe's classes one of them about knifes, and it is scary work....
 
Automatic

Anyone carry a fully auto side folder? I am thinking of getting one. Maybe a Boker, Schrade, CRKT or drop the dough and get a Buck auto. Link Removed
 
I picked up a Kershaw K.O. Tactical Blur K1670TBLKST last week and I'm very impressed with this knife. Great grip, sharp point and a very fast solid spring assist. I'm a fan of Tanto blades so I had to buy it.

Link Removed
 
I love my Kershaw but no auto knifes here in MI and Kershaw was considered an automatic knife my our last AG which happens to be our soon to be EX govenor.... our present AG fixed it in a ruling that they are not automatic as it requires you to instigate the opening of the blade manually and it is considered a spring assist....
 
I really like the Emerson's as well. I just wish they had something more confidence inspiring than a liner lock. The wave opening feature is awesome. It's actually faster to deploy than a switchblade. I have the Super Karambit II. I really like it other than the tendency for the blade to partially open in my pocket. I just don't put my hand in that pocket when I'm carrying it.
 
More Knife stuff from Gabe...

We will discuss the use of the knife in Reverse grip, or what the WW2 folks call the Ice Pick Grip. This involves holding the knife with the blade protruding from the bottom of the fist rather than from the top. The edge can be either edge out or more preferably edge in.

Now there are those who like this grip and others who disdain it. Believe it or not, there are even instructors today who claim to have invented it and lay claim to its ownership.

I have seen the reverse grip pictured in old tapestries in castles in Europe and in old "fight books" from the era. There are vague references to it in the bible as well as I suspect Jael used a reverse grip when she stabbed the king in the ear.

I first saw the reverse grip being used in 1973 when I studied Tanto Jutsu as a weapon system in my Kyokushinkai Karate studies. Later, in 1978 I believe, I saw it again in the hands of Mike Echanis, first in Black Belt magazine and later in his book on knife fighting.

And of course, who can forget the grand daddy of the reverse knife arts, Norman Bates and his "sensei" Alfred Hitchcock!


The reverse grip offers a benefit over other knife grips - POWER. If you give a spike to an untrained man and ask him to stab it into a tree, I will bet a C-Note he uses some sort of a reverse grip.

The reverse grip has advantages for the modern knife man as well. Most of us rely on the pistol as a primary self defense weapon. If we have to use a knife for defense, things have probably gone very wrong. This is no time to be worried about legal issues or civil liability, or any of the other things that consume the majority of "civilian" knife training.

Quite to the contrary, the goal should be to terminate the adversary, or adversaries (more likely) as soon and as fast as possible. As my friend James Keating says, "deanimate him".

So to that end, rather than staying at "largo mano" or long range and sniping at him with snap cuts, you would select to close and crash, and stab them to the ground. For this use, examine the placement of the knife in an edge-inward manner. This allows you to stab just as hard as any other manner, but it also allows you to cut on the pull back. With the edge outward, you can only cut as you push away. This is not as powerful and if you couple this with the tendency of the adversary to pull away from a cut, the contact with your edge may be marginal at best. The same pull back reflex will deepen your cut if the knife is held edge in.

Now some might say, "what if he has a knife too?" Then you have to be careful with your timing, but nevertheless, you do not want to delay at long range and give him the same opportunity. Consider that there are few knife on knife conflicts and that you may be using your knife against a larger, younger and stronger, but unarmed adversary. There may be several of them. He may have an impact weapon. The fight may not be the classic blade on blade event.


No methodbe perfect for every circumstance. If you want to have a valid response to every eventuality you need to make your education complete.

Gabe Suarez
Suarez International USA
Infidel Edgeworks
 
I agree, but knives with the "old style lockback design" aren't very good for defense either.

I prefer a frame lock or Benchmade style Axis lock. I don't mind a liner lock if it has a backup mechanism to prevent unintentional disengagement of the blade, like some CRKT and Gerber knives feature.

I always carry at least two folders, typically a Zero Tolerance 0301 and a CRKT M16-14SF. If I want lighter weight, I substitute my Benchmade Mini-Griptilion for the Zero Tolerance knife.

My fixded blade of choice is the Bark River Knife & Tool Bravo 1, which was developed with the assistance of the Training Unit of the Force Recon Division of the U.S. Marine Corp.

The 1st rule of knife fighting: Don't!!
The 2nd rule: Have a good knife.
well said, i have a gerber ez-out folder a s&w extreme ops and my fixed blade is a gerber mk.1 commando dagger, served me well for 13yrs in the army!
 

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