$27 - Gerber Gear Ultimate Knife, Tactical Knife with Fire Starter, Sharpener, and Knife Sheath, 4.75” Blade

[The Heretic]

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B085JXWCBP?psc=1&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER&ref_=chk_typ_imgToDp

About a year or so ago I came across this knife and have since bought three (one for me, one for each of my kids) of them as my favorite Survival Knife. I just ordered 3 more - one for each vehicle I own.

This is a pretty good price - I usually pay $32-$34 at BiMart for these.

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[bionic knees]

not a fan of stainless blades in general but just ordered one anyway. Amazon is just too damned easy!

 

[Trapdoor45-70]

Thanks for sharing this.

I have a couple already but am glad to be able to outfit other gear bags with more of these at a great price.

I, too, am not a fan of stainless for a blade but can live with it nor do I find the serrations very useful but can live with that, too.

 

[The Heretic]

I like stainless everything, especially for knives that may be sitting in a bag/box and exposed to the environment over the years.

Maybe I am not discerning enough to tell the difference?

For a general purpose knife I like serrations, they seem to cut some things, like tough rope, easier.

I think for the price, these would be a good value for a gift or barter.

YMMV

 

[Yarome]

Is that full tang or 3/4?

 

[The Heretic]

Is that full tang or 3/4?

full

 

[bionic knees]

mine came in today, I am plenty happy with it, it will most likely spend the rest of its life behind the seat in the pickup but it is good to know that it is there.

beefy knife with a good grip tossed the pos whistle but the rest is good to go.

I think I will order a couple more!

 

[ilikegunspdx]

I like stainless everything, especially for knives that may be sitting in a bag/box and exposed to the environment over the years.

Maybe I am not discerning enough to tell the difference?

For a general purpose knife I like serrations, they seem to cut some things, like tough rope, easier.

I think for the price, these would be a good value for a gift or barter.

YMMV

Wow they don't even list what steel it is. That would be a show stopper for me and likely means it's the ultra cheap Chinese steel (think gas station knives). Design and fire starter etc is all cool though.

Looks like the other gerber survival knives list the steel and those are already kind of lowest acceptable steel (420hc which would not be acceptable to me at all because I had 420hc in my skeletool and it was horrible in edge retention, so bad that I gave it away). I wonder what steel these use.

This knifesteelnerds chart doesn't list anything lower than 420HC and you can see where that is one in edge retention (worst).

Other more expensive gerber knives list their steel as 420HC and this one just says "stainless steel"

 

[bionic knees]

Always somebody to poo poo whatever, for the money this is a deal!

 

[The Heretic]

Choose what you want.

I have an even cheaper made Gerber folder - a BG folder. I wear it on my belt and use it daily. Someone on another forum once said it was cheap brittle steel, so I tried to break it by batoning it into a firewood round, then pounding it sideways. The only thing I succeeded in doing was making the lock a little looser, but it still held.

What do you expect for $27??

 

[ilikegunspdx]

Choose what you want.

I have an even cheaper made Gerber folder - a BG folder. I wear it on my belt and use it daily. Someone on another forum once said it was cheap brittle steel, so I tried to break it by batoning it into a firewood round, then pounding it sideways. The only thing I succeeded in doing was making the lock a little looser, but it still held.

What do you expect for $27??

Cheap blades with those low edge retention steels would likely be the best at batoning. Look at the chart above. The lowest edge retention steels are the best in toughness. Also easiest to sharpen of course. If that is the type of use you want it for it should do good for that.

 

[The Heretic]

I don't use knives for batoning, I consider that abuse. I only did that to prove a point when someone said the steel was "cheap Chinese steel that is brittle".

And yse, I mostly want my general purpose knives to be durable. As long as they cut what I need to cut, then that is fine.

 

[Yarome]

The steel is listed as 7Cr. Is it top of the line shtuff? Nah.... but it ain't exactly scraping the bottom of the barrel, from a company I trust, and for it's intended purpose as an all-in-one BOB type "survival" knife... for 27 bones... I'm happy to toss one into my rigs glovebox (and figured my boys wouldn't mind the same in their rigs too.)

For a survival knife though, full tang is an absolute requirement in my book, and batoning isn't "abuse". It's simply part of the job desciption for any "survival" and/or bushcraft knife, IMHO. The built in sharpening steel.... mehhhh. Kind of gimmicky when an average rock will get the job done... or a ceramic mug... even better, but a full tang with a 90degree spine and a built in ferro you can actually hold on to... and long enough to actually throw good spark... that works for me!

Mine haven't arrived yet, and certainly won't be replacing any bushcraft knives we already own, but looks promising for it's purpose.

 

[The Heretic]

The steel is listed as 7Cr. Is it top of the line shtuff? Nah.... but it ain't exactly scraping the bottom of the barrel, from a company I trust, and for it's intended purpose as an all-in-one BOB type "survival" knife... for 27 bones... I'm happy to toss one into my rigs glovebox (and figured my boys wouldn't mind the same in their rigs too.)

For a survival knife though, full tang is an absolute requirement in my book, and batoning isn't "abuse". It's simply part of the job desciption for any "survival" and/or bushcraft knife, IMHO. The built in sharpening steel.... mehhhh. Kind of gimmicky when an average rock will get the job done... or a ceramic mug... even better, but a full tang with a 90degree spine and a built in ferro you can actually hold on to... and long enough to actually throw good spark... that works for me!

Mine haven't arrived yet, and certainly won't be replacing any bushcraft knives we already own, but looks promising for it's purpose.

The spine is almost 90* with a bit of rounding on the edge like most knives have, but there is a sharper notch cut into the spine to make sure that you can throw as many sparks as you see fit.

I consider batoning abuse because I have a belt axe for that purpose. To me it is kind of like using a knife as a pry bar.

 

[ilikegunspdx]

The spine is almost 90* with a bit of rounding on the edge like most knives have, but there is a sharper notch cut into the spine to make sure that you can throw as many sparks as you see fit.

I consider batoning abuse because I have a belt axe for that purpose. To me it is kind of like using a knife as a pry bar.

Batoning reminds me of this review of the <$25 cold steel outdoorsman light. He is beating the crap out of this knife. The tip abuse is interesting to watch. He described the top bone breaker portion of the spine as for scraping which is incorrect.

The more expensive $44ish cold steel SRK is considered by many to be one of the best low budget survival/outdoor knives.

This $17 one is also really interesting because it's all one piece of metal and you could easily attach a handle to make it a shovel, pike, machete, or even attach stick to make impromptu lean to roof support. Same metal as SRK.

Cold Steel Bowie Blade Bushman Knife + Sheath & Fire Steel (7" Black) 95BBUSK - Blade HQ

The Cold Steel Bowie Blade Bushman knife might be one of the strongest survival/outdoor knives in the world! There is no joint or seam between the blade and handle, which gives the Bushman unparalleled strength. The single piece SK-5 high carbon steel is cold forged, heat-treated and tempered to...

www.bladehq.com

 

[The Heretic]

The more expensive $44ish cold steel SRK is considered by many to be one of the best survival outdoor knives for the low price.

I have several SRKs that I got early on and I don't care for them. I found I liked the Gerber survival knife blade pattern better. I prefer a straight level spine with no drop at all at the point. For a general purpose knife I like some serrations, a grippy rubberish handle/scales, and pretty much a very upswept point.

I have a number of knives for more purpose oriented work - like the CS Master Hunter or Fallkniven F1 for skinning and close in to the bone work, the F1 being better for smaller game, as it is lighter and smaller than the Master Hunter. Neither one would be good, IMO, for heavy duty chores, and the "survival knives" not very good for skinning or game processing IMO.

The Morakniv are good for even more delicate work on even smaller game, and for cooking chores and such.

I have a new knife from CRKT called the Catchall that I think might be good for some special chores, maybe skinning too.

But I almost always have this on my belt - I think I paid something like $16 ea. for half a dozen of them:



That is the blade pattern I like for a general purpose knife (similar to the other Gerber survival knives like the Prodigy, LMFII and Ultimate), although I would prefer that it/they had no drop at all on the point and that the spine was straight/flat and thick almost all the way out to the point.

Despite my pounding on it (within reason), I have not been able to break it. I am sure I could if I tried hard enough, but I doubt I would ever need to abuse it that much.

 

[ilikegunspdx]

I have several SRKs that I got early on and I don't care for them. I found I liked the Gerber survival knife blade pattern better. I prefer a straight level spine with no drop at all at the point. For a general purpose knife I like some serrations, a grippy rubberish handle/scales, and pretty much a very upswept point.

I have a number of knives for more purpose oriented work - like the CS Master Hunter or Fallkniven F1 for skinning and close in to the bone work, the F1 being better for smaller game, as it is lighter and smaller than the Master Hunter. Neither one would be good, IMO, for heavy duty chores, and the "survival knives" not very good for skinning or game processing IMO.

The Morakniv are good for even more delicate work on even smaller game, and for cooking chores and such.

I have a new knife from CRKT called the Catchall that I think might be good for some special chores, maybe skinning too.

But I almost always have this on my belt - I think I paid something like $16 ea. for half a dozen of them:

View attachment 1194889

That is the blade pattern I like for a general purpose knife (similar to the other Gerber survival knives like the Prodigy, LMFII and Ultimate), although I would prefer that it/they had no drop at all on the point and that the spine was straight/flat and thick almost all the way out to the point.

Despite my pounding on it (within reason), I have not been able to break it. I am sure I could if I tried hard enough, but I doubt I would ever need to abuse it that much.

I find serrations to always come in handy in outdoor environment. I found this guy in or city who does the Veff serrations as a service. Pretty cool. I'm tempted to have him add serrations to my skeletool 154cm blade but I don't know what he charges. Ckrt used to sell his serrations sharpener which is one of the few (maybe only outside of big $ commercial sharpeners?) that use the right size sharpeners instead of tapered sharpeners.

Veff sharpening service:

About Me

veffsharpening.com

VEFF SHARP™

Tom Veff is well known as the preeminent professional knife sharpener in the Pacific Northwest, and also as the designer of our patented Veff™ Serrations. He is truly

www.crkt.com

 

[Yarome]

I find serrations to always come in handy in outdoor environment.

I think it varies by person and what your typical usage might be. Personally, I hate serrations on a field craft/camp knife. It makes close up precision work extremely awkward with poor leverage points trying to use the portion of the blade you really need. Not to mention severely shortening your blades "useable" length for those tasks. Serrations have such a specific and limited purpose.

I much prefer a blade that makes 98% of tasks that much easier, and struggle a little more through the remaining 2% of the time, than the other way around. Under normal camping conditions though you're not really giving up capabilities since it's likely you'll have a hatchet/ax and/or saw along, anyway.

In a "survival" knife, like in the OP, I can live with it since the range of capabilities in one tool is more critical... even though it may not particularly excel in any one capability. When you're down to "survival mode" and it's the only tool you've got...

 

[ilikegunspdx]

I think it varies by person and what your typical usage might be. Personally, I hate serrations on a field craft/camp knife. It makes close up precision work extremely awkward with poor leverage points trying to use the portion of the blade you really need. Not to mention severely shortening your blades "useable" length for those tasks. Serrations have such a specific and limited purpose.

I much prefer a blade that makes 98% of tasks that much easier, and struggle a little more through the remaining 2% of the time, than the other way around. Under normal camping conditions though you're not really giving up capabilities since it's likely you'll have a hatchet/ax and/or saw along, anyway.

In a "survival" knife, like in the OP, I can live with it since the range of capabilities in one tool is more critical... even though it may not particularly excel in any one capability. When you're down to "survival mode" and it's the only tool you've got...

I agree about specific use. I like serrations for things like cutting rope or even when you need some type of "saw" but don't have a saw. Back when I had the crappy skeletool it had a combo blade and the straight blade went dull so fast I always had to use the serrated portion even if it was kind of completely wrong for the application. Kind of drove me nuts. But it was the only part still sharp!

Currently I'm trying to find the ideal combo for everyday carry. I have a good straight blade knife but I'm still trying to find a way to carry a serrated knife for rope or for when I don't want to beat on my good knife. I'm trying the tiny automatic mini kalashnikov at the moment (these are made and sold as manual open and a third party converts them to auto). Really thin and light so it disappears in pocket. D2 steel and about $45. I think I'll call that or city guy next week and see how much he charges for serrations cuz I already always have the 154cm bladed skeletool with me all the time so that might work too as a secondary rope cutting/save the good blade knife.

Here is size of mini kalashnikov with pocket carry clip removed. About the thickness of those "old timer" pen knives but much taller. Weight is 2 oz.

 

[The Heretic]

BTW - this is still on sale