Well we got back from TX last night. The hunt successful and the knife got a workout. It was used as directed by my buddy who gave it to us for testing. We had 6 hunters in our group. The knife was used on the following critters.
1- hog
1- Axis deer
1- Red Deer Cow
1- Sika Deer buck
The first person to use the knife was Dan who took a small hog at roughly 60#'s live weight. Dan tried to use the knife to make the opening around the vent. The knife seemed to be cumbersome for making and plunging cut and a circular cut. We knew this going into the hunt so no real surprise. Dan said that flipping the knife over and sliding the tip under the skin of the legs and sliding down to open the skin was effortless. It was able to pop ribs on the young hog. Skinning was easy and worked well as a whole.
Brian took a Sika buck, Red Deer Cow, and a 150# hog. Similar things reported. The knife was not able to pop ribs on larger more mature animals, Yet skinning was not bad. A little more effort involved than reported by Dan. We put on a fresh blade and kept going. Brian and I both felt the handle of the knife was way to long. I understand the concept of being able to use both a skinning and filet blade in one knife. Yet the skinning blade the knife while light weight seemed off balance. Several times during these three animals we reached for our regular knives.
The last animal we tested the new knife on was my Axis buck. I had shot the buck at 7:00 ish on Saturday evening. The shot being fairly long I hit a small branch. So the arrow entered farther back than wanted. It was still a pass through at 40 yards. Smelling a little gut on the arrow I quickly backed out. We returned 4 hours later and found the buck quite dead at 150 yards. He dropped in the trail having never bedded down. He was stiff as a board so he had been dead for sometime. Hey better safe than real dang sorry. I field dressed the animal and we started dragging him out. Not getting back to camp until after 1:00 a.m. I rinsed out the cavity and hung him up in a walk in cooler. Got up at 4:30 Sunday morning and went back hunting in search of piggies. I got back around 12:00 ate lunch relaxed and then went to work. Long story short the deer had hung in the cooler for around 13-14 hours at 28 degrees. If anyone has ever seen a axis deer they are flat beautiful. I called the taxidermist and settled on a price for a semi-sneak shoulder mount and the rest of the usuable cape being soft tanned into a small throw.
I started skinning out the deer. Skinning was a little difficult with the cold hide it peeled down alright. Making slow deliberate movements the knife slipped a couple of times. I made one cut through the pelt in what will be the throw. Got pissed and tossed the knife aside and went to my normal skinning blade. Which worked alot better IMHO. Finished caping the animal out, cleaning up the hide and placing back into the cooler. I once again switched back to the havalon knife. I removed the back straps with little to no problem. Trimed off flank meat and neck meat. The internal tenderlions also came out easily. Finishing up the upper portion of the animal. I made my cuts around the spine. Tried twisting to pop the upper portion apart from the lower. The knife was not able to withstand the pressure needed to make good enough cuts to seperate the spine between vertabrae. So once again I switched to a normal knife and it worked like a charm.
Back to the havalon knife the rump roast seperated well. Yet while trying to follow the femer to remove other cuts of meat the edge had a tendency to burl over. The blade being to thin. A minute with a steel has it we were back in business. Finshed up and came up with these conclusions.
Pros
Sharp as all get out.
Light weight
No need to sharpen just pop in a new blade.
works good for skinning if done quickly after taking the animal.
Cons
Off Balance
Not stiff enough for popping ribs, joints, or making a vent cut
The handle is to dang long
Blades are thin and the edge will burnish or curl
Blade needs to be more rounded and come to less of a point.
As a overall yes its a good lightweight knife. Made for folks that are either concerned about weight or do not like to sharpen a knife. The knife certainly has earned some sort of place in my gear. Yet will not do the job by itself. It would not even come close to replacing my normal knives.
Perhaps for folks that process a animal without gutting it. Making your slice up the back and removing the straps, and front quarters. It removed the front shoulders with relative ease. The hind quarters well good luck if you dont have a saw and or a well built knife.
Worth $40 bucks but IMHO not much more.
