Best Fixed Blades Of The Year 2020 Edition

well guys it's been a crazy year here in 2020 but we've also seen some crazy cool blades and in this video we're gonna take a look at the best fixed blades that i tested and reviewed for 2020. now for you veterans of the channel you know how this video goes but for those of you who are brand new maybe checking out this video for the first time you're unfamiliar with how we kind of do things here at gideon's tactical what i do is we review tons of stuff here at the channel tons of blades particularly and every year i take a look at the knives that connected me with me the most that we tested out for that year ones that were either really unique had a really interesting design really kind of surprised me blew my mind whatever it is all about what connected with me the most for this year and so that's what we're going to take a look at and just kind of go back down memory lane and see what was crazy in the blade world for this year dude this lens failure is like insane i hope it looks amazing on the thing okay now it's too bad that lens flare was getting intense let's go ahead and change the camera here slightly so you want to see the knives i want to show them to you so let's jump right in with the rocker knives and i'm not even going to try to pronounce it corpus i sorry i wish i could speak finnish this is a finish made knife the wording that i'm annotating in for you means wilderness warrior and what's really cool about this design is that we're getting a full tank construction with a really nice rubberized handle all the way through glass breaker on the back 90 degree spine just about four over four inches overall blade length really robust and it basically has a convex grind using 80crv2 steel which is a really good tough steel but then rockwelled with a differential heat treat and stuff all the way up to 63 and i've had tons of use with this comes with a very streamlined polymer sheath that matches with a lot of different attaching points and options and the designer has served in the finished military and really wanted to produce kind of like a woods focused military style knife that could kind of be this crossover you know bushcraft tactical blade and i believe it was accomplished almost flawlessly so just a very very cool design for us here in the states to get shipped over it costs about 150 bucks and then i believe it's a little bit cheaper for those of you in europe and so woods craft meets tactical accomplished with this raqqa knife and it's number one on our best fixed blades of 2020. and throughout this video guys we'll have links for you below in the description box where you can check out the blades that i'm listing for you a lot of them have you know customizable options or different types of shoes that you can do so you can just hit those links it'll take you over you can investigate see what you like don't like what connects with you and we do appreciate it when you do use those hyperlinks there's something that connects with you throughout this video well guys the temperature's dropping the sun's going down let's jump back to the property and see what else we got all right bouncing back to the homestead going through the tubs i love this because just like going down memory lane and how many sweet blades we saw this year now you guys know the bk16 been around a long time great companion blade designed by ethan vecker well this year we got the bk 18 from ethan becker in collaboration with k bar so we got a usa made 1095 high carbon steel blade crow van full tank construction what's really cool is not only do we get this really wide big harpoon shaped belly i really like the blade shape and style of the knife but it comes with a polymer sheath that's completely amidextrous and it takes the exact same micarta handle scale option that you can do for the bk 16 and the price is great at about on average about 75 to 80 bucks without the micarta and then those handle scales about 30 to 35. so you're looking at 100 to 105 dollars to get yourself this usa made only having to upgrade the handle scales whereas on the bk16 you got to get a either custom leather kydex because that nylon is barely doable that it comes with standard and it's just a really cool blade that has a lot of different capability regardless if it's you know back country you know hiking camping stuff or in a more tactical utility role so guys when i came onto the scene on youtube about eight years ago and started reviewing knives gerber outside of just a few of their models was kind of on the downward slope in my opinion lots of chinese made stuff the quality was not there was very kind of low end lots of like orange and gray with bear grylls name stamped all over it and they just didn't perform if they had been that way but like good materials you know that would have been fine but just bad materials but what i've really seen in the last like two to three years is gerber really turning a curve in their u.s production and coming out with lots of new designs made here in america and their designing and their quality i'm really happy with and i'm looking forward to seeing what the next year brings and this year in 2020 i picked up this knife ended up being a really great compact bushcraft style blade and that's the gerber principle now this is about a three and a quarter inch blade length scandy grind full tang construction made in their us factory out of 420 high carbon steel got a rubberized handle that just feels so natural it looks very like sci-fi esque when you look at it but there are zero hot spots and fills out that hand very nicely really have enjoyed that held up well for me with all my use 90 degree spine polymer sheath with a lot of different lashing options and what's awesome is this edge geometry on this blade this scandy edge bites into wood like a croc into a water buffalo i mean it it takes out chunks if you need to you almost have to like relearn how to use a scandi grind to readjust your your cut angle because when i use my mora's i'm used to a particular angle and getting like you know the carving that i want or the chunks that i want this one is just such a biter that you just remove huge pieces of wood with zero effort so it and it will do the fire stuff extremely well but you almost are like whoa this is taking off too much and you got then you kind of oh that's where the edges wow and it was very very impressive to me for what you're getting now in my mind it's still a little bit on the steep side for the materials at about 60 on average if you find it on a deal you know you can get it for maybe like 45 to 50. but at 60 dollars i think it's a little on the high end but still for everything you're getting a great option if you like all the features that you've seen you like those compact scandi ground knives gerber is definitely starting to make a footprint in fact they have kind of followed that series and we're going to see here in the new year the terracraft just giving you a saber ground larger version with s30v steel so we'll be looking at that here in the coming year but uh this particular model definitely connected with me and i love using it you know doing a little woods craft work and projects it's a very precise tool and you guys know these knives you gotta attach them with something right it's your belt well i want to give a shout out to our sponsor for this video grip six now grip six is a belt company that is based right here in america where they make all of their products which is super awesome i've been using their belts now for a few years and i love the friction design of the belt buckle so they're very slim very minimalistic micro adjustments so it fits perfectly particularly if you're putting different types of gear either in your waistband or on your belt i really dig that aspect a lot they have all sorts of different color combinations they have slimmer ones they have big thick work belt styles and everything in between and so it's a great gift option this holiday season and grip six is offering a free priority shipping in order to get it to you by christmas and if you just select that when you are purchasing something off of the grip six website they will get that to you by christmas so you can go ahead and check out that link below you can hop on over there see what they got going on and see what they have to offer because i love this usa made product and it helps me carry these blades that we're looking at today now i love a sleeper knife or gear item you know that you just were not expecting a whole lot out of and then it blows your mind well that's what's going on with this next knife from joker knives in the lynx now what's really cool about this blade is that it's made in spain out of bowler n695 steel which is a great kind of stainless steel saber grind my carta handle scales super well contoured i mean the fit and finish on this blade is amazing about four and a quarter inches about 0.16 on the thickness holding a great edge lots of sheath options both kydex and leather some come with matching fire steels if you decide to go that way 90 degree spine on this bad boy and what's so cool is like i had seen this brand in this particular knife and i've thrown it in my amazon wish list for like a year and just had never pulled the trigger on it um and on a whim this fall i was like you know what let's do it i'm kind of getting into these high vis colors they have lots of different color combinations love is too if you like that but let's just do it let's just see i haven't done a knife from spain in a very long time and let's just see what they got cranking out and it just blew me away at 80 and some can go as low as like 75 and they have a whole lineup of knives using sandvik uh 14c 28n um all this bowler steel and some high carbon steel as well that easily flow between like 75 and like 120 bucks just depends on the designing the you know all those different things we're going to look at a few more over this next coming year 2021 but this just like blew me away and for the price you're getting a phenomenal phenomenal knife well it only took years but finally sc has updated the se6 with contoured handle scales from the factory in years past they were pretty blocky on the sc 5 and 6 particularly they were doable but it really kind of helped to upgrade and you know go custom basically or there are a few places that you could do that um without it coming from the factory these now come from the factory with contoured either micarta or g10 depending on the version that you pick up and the pricing has basically stayed about the same i think it might have gone up by about five dollars the se6 is a staple here at the channel if you just want a one and done usa made 1095 you know a full warranty do everything mid weight survival knife and now you don't really have to do anything the polymer sheath really gets the job done now not having to do anything after market it's like the one stop shop for that mid-weight survival knife and has been performing for years for me i've gone through several different versions over the years all of them holding up so well so tough and durable and you know it's a great size and weight class to do the more compact stuff but also get some medium to heavy stuff done in a pinch but i would be remiss if i didn't highlight this knife in our list this is really honestly one of the top two knives i used all summer long earlier that raqqa knife when i was out hiking doing our backpacking trip up to wyoming all that stuff you know i have tons of blades to choose from this was one of the two that i just kept coming back to over and over again this year and it's kind of a hybrid it's really interesting it can comes from the knife connection it's a design that they exclusively sell it's their brand called the architect series or architect brand it is a design that they've come up with very familiar lines which is awesome produced by tops knives so usa made 1095 differential heat treated high carbon steel what's awesome is that basically you can customize the heck out of this blade you get a high saber grind you can get all sorts of different handle scales that are just amazing all sorts of different color combinations trick it out over on their site they have this knife builder site and setup and uh can do leather or kydex cheese straight from the factory and it's a sick setup for about 155 i believe 160 is what i paid for my setup and it's what's really cool is most knives like this they're usually going to be about 3 16 even almost a quarter of an inch thick for this about five inch blade here so that means that you have a lot of capabilities you know about a five inch knife full full handle big ergonomic comfortable but it's thinner than even the se6 that i showed you just a moment ago so it has even though a saber grind it has a great precision slicing capability food prep capability and it's a great great companion blade uh phenomenal one of my favorite knives of the year and absolutely on this list the best fixed blades for 2020. now it's really cool is that recently in the last year or two condor knife and tool has started using 1095 steel i've never been a super big fan of their 1075 always seemed a little too soft for my usage but they now with their 1095 are coming out with some pretty sweet designs and this one really connected with me for some reason this year there are aspects to it that are just cool and for a value you get a lot of tool you get a very simple broom handle kind of style handle full tang construction out the back 1095 full handle right there really like that you got a 90 degree spine you got a cool kind of wash on there to fight against rust and this is their bush glider about a four and a quarter inch overall with a nice swedge here unsharpened if you wanted to sharpen you probably could full flat grind so it's a good food prep knife but it was also a good woods craft knife and kind of that really nice cross over with a very simple but and basic but very usable ambidextrous polymer sheath just latches right in there going to come in about 42 dollars so for that price point you're getting a lot of crossover capability between like food prep camping and woods craft that you may want to put a belt knife like this through now they do have the pterosaur that is full tang same exact handle just a scandi grind so if you're into scandi grinds and you're wanting something that's a little bit different than a mora maybe like a little bit of a step up with that full tang construction that is an option as well so this knife the bush glider was just really cool and it just has this good niche and when you're on a kind of a tighter budget but you're wanting a good belt knife it has that great kind of do everything capability next up we got the gck which is the ground combat knife from buck knives this came out early in the year kind of flew under the radar i was not expecting it uh and then i saw that it had dropped and for a hundred dollars what we're getting here is a full tang with my car to handle scales made out of 50 160 high carbon steel uh combat knife basically you can get it with this spear point or natanto version it comes with a polymer sheath with a nylon backer like you see here with lots of lashing options and tension screws all of that with that really good full-size handle good blade reach for the design and if you're looking for more of a combat field knife i think this should definitely be on the short list just because of how tough and durable it is and buck has been using that 5160 for a while they know what they're doing with it and it is this is just a really well-built combat style knife and should definitely be on that list particularly if you're thinking of someone who does serve as a first responder military those type of things i think that it has a lot of capability with their different blade shapes and just with the overall design and hitting that really good price point about 100 bucks it's very competitive with what else is on the market now this one i say kind of with a heavy heart because we don't know what's going to happen for those of you who are kind of unfamiliar cold steel has recently been sold lynn thompson has sold it to gsm outdoors he says that he's going to still keep working with the company most of the people are still there they're gonna try and take it to the next level partnering with this company um but he's no longer at the helm who knows what type of designs quality control is going to exist i hope it's all good could be a lot of times when big conglomerates pick up stuff it's kind of boom crash and burn so i'm hoping that is not the case particularly since they're keeping lynn around but this design may not be around much longer so what we're looking at here is the cold steel cold steel drop forged survivalist now what's really cool is they came out with this drop forward series a few years ago but i kind of shied away from the bigger knives in that collection because they didn't come with handle scales and you had to kind of wrap it and it was just didn't quite connect with me then about i think this year or last year the end of last year they came out with handle scale versions so they put these nice textured handle scales on there very very cool and it's all just one hunk and piece of metal just two little holes in it boom you're ready to rock and roll and it's got 50 to 100 high carbon steel which is a phenomenal tough durable steel this big buoy design basically a full flat with that great swedge good stout robust no hot spots because of the nice contouring on the guards you know so many of these style combat style knives have that really abrupt straight t-bar and it becomes very hot on your hand and you don't like using it this is very contoured very nimble quick in the hand and just bomb proof you're getting that polymer sheet that we know you know from cold steel 90 degree spines would be a great if you're into this style you know bigger survival knife and just has a lot of capability had a lot of fun taking it out with the family and using it on uh one of our camping trips as well as just a bunch of other work that i did with it so you're getting great steel and when i bought it was 60 bucks so i mean if they're still available that's a screaming deal for that type of steel and design and we'll see if it sticks around and where the future cold steel in general is but man this was like for the money it's like a steal of cold steel knives with what you're getting particularly if you like that big buoy indestructible kind of style so we've been doing a lot kind of comparing the se6 that's why i had to be on that list because it is king but there are great options and features from other companies as well as i've been showing you today and this is another one coming in at you that makes the list and it's the work tough gear elbrus if you're unfamiliar with the work tough um brand they are a small batch basically company almost like a semi-custom shop over in taiwan they use sk85 japanese steel and then also some k-110 steel as well as what i've seen in the past but um what's really cool is that there's this level of attention to detail that is amazing and on almost on mid tech level from multiple knives now i've purchased several of them i have about six of them the steel is holding up super well i put it on par with most us 1095. it's very tough very durable been through all kinds of stuff what's different a little bit about this than even like the se6 and some other models out there is obviously you get that full tang you get g10 handle scales very full contoured zero hot spots on those handles very nice scalloped big finger choil good blocky jimping nothing sharp there 90 degree spine but you're gonna get on this model a high saber grind with a little bit of a swedge kind of in the middle there but still giving you you know really good slicing capability because of the convex edge that they put on this model so it's really cool and gives you kind of like a step up it's about an ounce and a half heavier than the se6 and say with the bk7 so you get a little bit more chopping power behind it still good reach at over six inches with that blade length and that saber grind whereas actually has like a full flat and then you know there's different aspects notes finger choice on the bk7 it's kind of a blending of the two if you will and giving you a great mid-weight survival knife so if you're in the market for mid-weight survival knives i think that this is definitely something to consider kydex sheath it comes with uh and definitely one of the better knives i've you know tested and reviewed this year not only in quality but also in design i mean you can have a good quality knife but the design is bonkers then it doesn't really matter um usually about 130 bucks on average because it's small batches they will be available like on amazon and then sell out and then be available so if it's not available now you can always check back or you can always check the work tough gear website as well which i'll have in the links for you guys below so who doesn't love a cold steel srk great knife we reviewed it in the past it's been on the list in years past but there are some aspects to this design that maybe some people are looking for you know a full tang versus rubberized crayton i know over long periods of hard use they can kind of start to wear out over the long haul maybe you just want something that's even bigger and more robust um than what you're getting on the srk well tops knives has done that this isn't a new knife by any means and it's the apache dawn what this is designed as is basically a giant field knife you're getting over six inches of blade length a short saber grind there great relief edge though i was a little about the capability of it because of that quarter inch thick stock with those g10 scalloped handle scales but i was very happy because of the relief edge the capability it's still you know a field knife in that design you know so like a full flat grind with a high thinner stock you know is going to obviously slice a little bit better but this still has a lot of woods work capability obviously piercing and stabbing capability and can still split like nobody's business the ergonomics are really good fill out my large size hand you got that nice choil so you can choke up and still control the knife very very nicely it's going to come in about 130 to 150 just kind of depends on who what when where why now currently it comes with kind of a cruddy nylon sheath so just as a quick tip two options if you want to go kydex you can always go check out azwelky my link will be below they do tons of kydex here at the channel i've always been super happy with what al does over there but if you not want something a little bit cheaper you can just go to amazon and you can get the eight inch spec ops usa made universal sheath this fits perfectly in there just a little bit of room to spare it's got pals webbing attachments on the back it's got a nice adjustable snap and a lot of blades will fit in here not just this apache dawn but this guy goes for about 40 bucks i think for this sheath and it will even hold that upside down very very nicely so that's a good little nylon option or again custom kydex over at ez wilkie is always a good plus if you want to upgrade the sheath on your apache dawn well guys that's my list and i'm sticking to it i hope that you have enjoyed this video and the best of 2029s that i've tested and reviewed here at the channel the ones that just connected with me that i've fallen in love with this makes the list i can't wait to see what 2020 one brings and i'd love to hear your guys list if there are a few knives that maybe i missed that you think i need to check out in the new year that might make next year's list or just ones that you connected with i would love to see those comments in the comment boxes below love to see that would be awesome to hear what your guys best blades of 2020 were and guys finally as always check out the other video popping up invite you to subscribe again if you haven't yet subscribed and until next time always remember stay equipped stay prepared and we'll see you out there

Channel: gideonstactical

Views: 276,980

Rating: 4.891995 out of 5

Keywords: hunting, survival, bushcraft, edc, edc gear, knife, knives, swiss army knife, best survival knife, best pocket knife, best bushcraft knife, best fixed blades of the year, gideonstactical, gideons tactical, buck gck, buck ground combat knife, esee 6, esee knives, cold steel knives, buck knives, gerber gear, gerber knives, gerber principle, Rokka Knives Korpisoturi, cold steel drop forged survivalist, condor bushglider, field buddy 5.5, tops knives apache dawn, work tuff elbrus

Id: RL8B8I4_kIA

Length: 23min 39sec (1419 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 12 2020