Hi folks
Ive been trying and carrying a lot of different layouts through the weeks, not posting much but walking my path on the cutting edge journey.
Inspired by some folks here I tried the smaller knives, how they work for me in my day to day duties and off day carry.
The smallest one is of course the peanut, and Ive bought and used some knives which in fact dont offer much more cutting edge but feel a lot different.
Let me sum it up in numbers. The Wenger SI is just for reference.
Lenghts in mm: handle / blade total / blade sharp part / overall
Peanut: 71 / 54 / 49 / 125
Barlow: 84 / 63 / 53 / 147
Medium Jack: 91 / 65 / 57 / 156
Wenger SI: 93 / 69 / 62 / 162
On the pic with bladelength the blades are lined up to the sharpening notch / start of sharp portion.
As you can see, the Barlow and Peanut are very much the same when it comes to cutting edge. Will you notice the 4mm more sharpness? Probably not.
The difference is in the blade length verall. 9mm more blade length might be the difference of messing up the joint when cutting food, and the 13mm more length in handle, adding to that the way larger handle proportions will give you a complete different cutting experience.
While the Peanut in my view is a nice office cutting tool or for light urban tasks like opening packages or slicing pre prepared food, the Barlow shines when doing real work.
Having really large hands I cant get a proper grip on the Peanut when whittling or cutting wood. It just doesnt feel good in hand, getting leverage is not easy.
On the other hand the Barlow: I really can understand why this pattern is a real workhorse. You get a nice useable bladelength in a handle that allows for heftier cuts and fills your hand way better than the peanut. I carried it yesterday on a Sunday Hike/walk with the family and kids and made walking sticks for the small ones. Worked great.
If this knive would have a 10mm longer blade, it would be awesome…
…which led me to buy the Medium Jack.
The Medium Jack is basically a medium Stockmann minus one blade. It uses the exact same frame while not having a sheepfoot blade sticking out oft he handle.
It has the longer bladelength I was asking for, but like the Peanut somehow lacks a bit of volume in hand to be a real working knife for my hand size.
Like it, the longer bladelength really comes into action when preparing food (I often just pack some bread and saussage, cheese and so on and prepare sandwiches on the trip).
So the journey continues, and I am looking around for the next step.
Michael