Morakniv Carbon Steel Fixed-Blade Bushcraft Survival Knife With Sheath and Fire Starter, Black, 4.3 Inch

I own several Mora knives. They are superb values and work very well for the money. This is the TOUGHEST Mora yet. It has a relatively thick spine (thickest Mora spine), it throws excellent sparks with little effort thanks to the carbon steel. The handle ergos are superb and comfortable. The tips is strong (strongest Mora tip yet), it’s sharp out of the box (though you can make it keener) and it’s HIGHLY durable. I spent three days with this knife collecting pine resign for camp candles, batoning fire wood up to 3.5″ thick and 4 feet long – yes 4 feet! (I found a good, dry piece of maple and wanted to see how it would do, it split it with little trouble.) I started fires, made feathersticks, opened packages, cleaned under my nails, notched, sharpened wood, made tent stakes, cut paracord, you name it!I’m a knife collector, user and reviewer and I put the knives I get through some heavier paces to see how they will hold up if the demand is every put on them. No sense carrying a knife deep into the wilderness if it’s not going to do what you need it to. I’m a big fan of Bark River, Blind Horse, ESEE and Fallkniven knives. Typically, I’m hesitant to recommend Moras to friends who are really heavy users because they lack the toughness and lifespan of full tang knives. In my experience the Sandvik steal has also be a tad soft, esp. toward the tip of the blade. This knife has changed my view of what a Mora can do.For general camping – esp. car camping where everything is close by, etc. – any Mora is a great option and most other blades are a bit of overkill. The Mora I’ve most commonly recommended for general use in camp – opening packages, food prep, fish cleaning, rope cutting, etc. – is the Mora Bushcraft Force. The handle is comfortable and the knife is inexpensive and sharp. For those looking for a bit more strength, I’ve recommended other brands. [NOTE: Cody Lundin, a well-respective minimalist and survival expert has long used the Mora 1 and 2 as his knives of choice and has put them through some moderate tasks without little complaint.] I am certainly NOT saying a $15 Mora can’t handle tougher tasks, but it’s likelihood of failing in heavier use is higher than more robust and therefore, more expensive knives.Enter the Mora Black.This knife is what we all knew a Mora could be. It’s basically the good ole Bushcraft Force, but with a thicker blade, tougher edge and in carbon steel. The knife is light enough to carry without noticing it, but heavy enough to usher in confidence. I put this knife through the ringer and it held its own very well. I happened to be testing it alongside a $160 and $225 knife and thought it wasn’t a comparison, I couldn’t help but admire how well the Mora did, esp. given the affordable price point. The short scandi grind makes for a tougher blade, but the zero edge allows it to be a wicked slicer.It doesn’t baton wood quite as well as $200 BRKT or even a $100 ESEE, but then again, it’s not in the same price or build class and for around $50 with the fire steel, it’s superb at this chore. For me, it’s a little easier to make feathersticks with a convex or asymmetrical edge (like those that come on many Barkies or those I add to my other knives), but this certainly does a marvelous job and the scandi grind is actually the grind of choice for many bushcrafters, survivalists and traditionalists – it’s simply preference.The blade DOES, however, slice and notch as well or better than almost any knife I’ve used and that’s saying something. It is a very strong blade for the price and it eats through all but the toughest tasks. It easily baton-chopped through a 4″ tree for shelter prep, made kindling and tender with ease and threw sparks to get our warm fire going in about 20 seconds.The handle is great for even long use and it’s comfortable in most holds – though the protrusion behind the index finger, while being great for slip prevention and general comfort, can become annoying in chest-lever style grips. The material becomes only slightly slippery compared to many other materials when wet or bloody and I’ve never been fearful of it slipping – thanks in large part to that locking style finger protrusion.The only complaints I really have with this knife are:1.) I’m not a fan of plastic sheaths. Yes, they dry out quickly and are really no-nonsense, but I’ve always preferred free-hanging leather danglers myself.2.) Full tang would be awesome.There’s not much to dislike about this knife. It’s a cheap, fairly robust, sharp, convenient, simplistic workhorse. It’s an admirable batoning blade, an incredible slicer, a remarkable feathersticker, a superb spark-thrower, holds an edge pretty darn well and restores relatively easily on strops for all but the deepest chips (which aren’t really common in my experience) and is surprisingly rust resistant thanks to the coating – which is nice. The entire package weights less than many “survival” blades alone and with a far more comfortable handle than many of those.Bottom line: Buy it. It’s the best bang-for-dollar knife under $100 I’ve tested yet and in my Top 5 favorite knives overall. It does everything admirably and most things superbly. I wouldn’t use it as a pry bar, but other than that, it’s at home with virtually any task. If you want a sharpened pry bar and have $100+ to spend, look at the ESEE 4 and work your way up from there. If you’re a Mora fan and have been curious, give it a go. It’s not your traditional 1 or 2 design, but that superb Mora blade will bring a smile to your face and when you see what all it can do for the money, you might just laugh out load. I did.Is this my FIRST knife of choice for wilderness use? No. But can I make it work for me if it’s the knife I have? Absolutely.I love this knife. There’s simply no good reason not to.

Morakniv makes outstanding knives. Nordic (or Scandinavian depending on your sensibilities) quality at an incredible price. Your typical Morakniv – Morakniv Companion Fixed Blade Outdoor Knife with Carbon Steel Blade, Military Green, 4.1-Inch – is a knife which will last you a very long time and typically costs just over $10. I have several of those very knives stashed here and there and they are excellent. But let me talk about this knife.As Morakniv goes, this is a high-dollar knife. You can purchase about four of the basic Morakniv for the price of this one. Is what you’re getting here worth the extra cost? Yes and no. More simply put, “it depends.” Many manufacturers slap “tactical” in the name, coat it black and then charge more. To some extent, perhaps Morakniv did a little of that here. A little. Overall, it’s a little longer (232mm vs 218mm in the other). It’s also a little thicker (3.2mm vs. 2.0mm in the other) and the blade itself a little longer (109mm vs. 104mm in the other). Other than that really, the sheath material is the same (plastic) as is the grip material (rubberized).Morakniv has included a sharpener with this, built into the plastic sheath itself. Ok, but nothing amazing and I find it somewhat awkward. You can get yourself an excellent sharpener – either Lansky PS-MED01 BladeMedic or Smith’s PP1 Pocket Pal Multifunction Sharpener, Grey – for around $10. If you get the standard Morakniv linked to above, adding in the cost of one these sharpeners, you’ll be at around $20, and will have a sharpener that can be used on any knife and is easier to handle.But what about that firestarter also included? It’s nice, but here too, nothing to write home about. It’s a firestarter. Get yourself something like Ultimate Survival Technologies SparkForce Flint Bar or Gerber Bear Grylls Fire Starter [31-000699 ] and you’ll have one just as good, if not better, also for no more than $10. So, if you pick up that basic Morakniv, the sharpener and one of these firestarters, you’ll be at around $30 or so. Give or take. And you’ll have three pieces of gear that you can truly depend on, anywhere.So, again, is this worth nearly double the cost of picking all those items separately? Maybe. You do get a slightly thicker, slightly longer knife. But, all Morakniv products are incredibly tough, incredibly well built and are backed by limited lifetime warranties. My other Moraknives are still going strong, after taking far more abuse than they deserve.This is truly probably a 3.5 star product. However, half stars are not allowed here and, frankly, the quality in this knife is just incredible. But I simply removed stars for this just being not worth the cost, in my book. If it dropped to a price point somewhere between $30-$35, maybe $40, it would have garnered more stars. In the interests of full disclosure, there is a version of this knife which does not feature the firestarter and sharpener – Morakniv Bushcraft Carbon Black Tactical Knife with 0.125/4.3-Inch Carbon Steel Blade and Plastic Sheath – but, at near $50, it too suffers from the problem that the most basic Morakniv is so darn good, for such little money, that you’re better off going with the basic Morakniv.

First, note that I am not a hardcore bushcrafter, but am an avid camper. For that, my typical use cases for a knife include food prep (and eating), repairs, rope cutting, wood batoning, and fire starting. In addition, I have used this knife for more mundane household chores like assassinating cardboard boxes.-Blade length and shape, especially where it curves, is basically ideal for food prep and the next best thing outside of an appropriately deep belly chef’s knife. I don’t mean just cutting meat; despite the wide angle of the blade and generally thick spine, you can actually mince garlic and such very well with it with a surprising degree of accuracy. The blade is about 4.3 inches and this “feels” like a good heft and size for a fixed blade knife.-The firestarter works as advertised. Nice beefy sparks made by swiping across the back of the knife makes it easy to start kindling and gas stoves, and it doesn’t really take much effort once you’ve worn away the black coating on the ferrorod to use.-The hardest use case for me is batoning, and I use this knife often for that purpose because I fly into camp sites and don’t want to bring along a hatchet or kukri for my firewood. So far it has held up to at least 6 instances of one-week camp outings where it’s been used to split firewood each day. For this, it held up pretty well. I did notice that the blade had a slight edge fold after a week of beating on it, but after sharpening the blade came right back and ready for more. Surprisingly, despite this abuse the black coating on the blade has held up very well (it’s worn away from where I sharpened it, of course).-The handle is by far the least sexy looking part of any of these Puukko style knives, but ergonomically they are excellent. The rubbery grip never gets loose even when wet, and provides a good amount of shock resistance during batoning abuse. There may be a question of long term durability here though, as I noticed that there were random splinters stuck in (and actually through) the grip material. Despite the lack of a full length tang (allegedly), this knife is still rock solid and not loose on the handle.-I’m not really a fan of the sharpener on the sheathe. I suppose it works in a pinch if you have a massive edge issue with the knife, but it works about the same as using a rock as it’s not particularly fine grit so I use a separate knife sharpener instead. The Scandinavian grind makes it pretty trivial to sharpen- if you don’t have a knife sharpener, a piece of sandpaper flat on a table works just as well.-The sheathe is very versatile, even if it’s starting to verge towards overly tactical. I prefer plastic sheathes in the woods because there’s a tendency for moisture to collect, particularly since I use this in the Rockies where it could rain any time of the day in the early summer. The sheathe retains the knife very well, as the knife “pops” in and out of it. The option of different belt loops and ability to either use it dangling from a belt (my preference) vs. straight attachment is appreciated.-The knife is very cheap for all you’re getting. At the time of this review, the knife came in under forty dollars, and for that you get a durable workhorse that simply works.

I’m just not a fan of the sheath, it’s cheap plastic

BUT… I love it! Comes to you quite sharp already. The options for the belt loop or clip on is very nice. But I think the clip on should have a spring assisting as it’s all too easy to pull off a thick belt (like mine) or pant pocket. The clip on just seems too easy to lose your knife. It doesn’t grip enough. I had it clipped on my belt and my dog jumped up on me and knocked it off me completely. So less than ideal in the bush when you’re climbing and having to slide down a hill while wearing on your side. Maybe incorporate more teeth in the clip on or a tether connecting the knife and the sheath together with a belt loop.