As luck would have it, my smaller Dead On Tools Exhumer™ showed up in the P.O. box not long after I finished yesterday's post.
To recap, the Exhumer 8 (MSRP $19.79, Home Depot $9.99) measures 8-5/8 inches long. Turning it over in my hand I notice that it's slightly thinner and significantly lighter than the Exhumer 9, and the inside of its "cat's paw" is designed a bit differently.
The larger tool will be a better nail-puller and a better hammer -- leverage, mass and all that -- but the Exhumer 8's size and weight make it an excellent choice for my grab'n'go kit.
One sure way to ruin a perfectly good blade is to try prying something with it. We hear that caution shortly after being issued our very first knife -- and still we insist on learning our lessons the hard way.
Carrying a pocketable pry-bar helps me avoid the temptation to abuse my knives. And like many KintlaLake Blog readers, I'll wager, I've settled on a CountyComm Widgy®.
The tool is offered in three sizes -- the Pocket Widgy is four inches long, the Micro Widgy three inches and the Pico Widgy two inches. Priced from $4.00 to $5.50 each, they're made of D9 steel.
The mid-size Micro works well for my everyday carry, and the other models have found their way into various kits. It's common, I'm told, to apply a cord wrap to a Widgy, adding a personal touch and helping to muffle pocket rattle. (Check out the video tutorial here.)
As handy as it can be to have a tiny pry-bar along, sometimes a more substantial tool is called for -- nastier than a Widgy but more portable than a FuBar. Enter the Death Stick® Exhumer™ 9 from Dead On Tools.
I learned about Exhumer nail-pullers just last week, through an e-mail preparedness newsletter. The Exhumer 9 (MSRP $23.10, Home Depot $14.99) is the second-smallest of five offered by Dead On, and I have to say that the mere act of holding it in my hand makes me smile -- it feels as wonderfully wicked as its name implies.
Overall length of the tool, which is made of S5 steel with phosphate coating, is 10-5/8 inches. The "cat's paw" end features an opposing striking face. On the back side is a saw wrench and -- no kidding -- a bottle opener.
The simple paracord wrap (pictured) is my addition.
Now some folks may look at the Exhumer and imagine only carpentry and light-duty structural demolition. But if a hunk of investment-cast tool steel with sharp claws on both ends inspires you to consider its personal-defense potential... well, you're not alone.
With that in mind, then, my Exhumer 9 is going to live in the door pocket of my TrailBlazer, within easy reach of the driver's left hand. I'll also be adding a smaller, lighter Exhumer 8 (MSRP $19.79, Home Depot $9.99, 8-5/8 inches long) to my grab'n'go kit.
I mean, there's no telling when I'll bump into a nail that's just begging to be pulled. Y'know?
I like doing business close to home, and I've said so here many times.
The "Made in USA" label carries weight with me. Buying goods made locally and services offered by members of my own community means even more. Sometimes it's either impractical or impossible to exercise my commercial preferences, of course, but I do my best.
Early this week I found myself on the outskirts of Columbus with time to kill. I dropped into a military-surplus store, browsed a while and emerged with a hank of polypropylene utility rope and two 100-foot bundles of 550 paracord.
I noticed right away that all three items carried the name of Atwood Rope Mfg., tags prominently displaying the U.S. flag. Later, a visit to the company's website revealed that Atwood Rope is located in a neighboring village, just ten minutes from here -- a pleasant surprise.
The next time I'm braiding paracord, which should be soon, it'll be good to know that I'm using a local product. And what the hell, a trip over to Atwood Rope's offices may be in order, too -- we'll see.
Yesterday the postman brought a small box from Lighthound, one of my sources for lanyard supplies, containing the breakaway connectors I'd ordered the other day. It took me all of three minutes to add one of these little 75-cent gadgets to my Little Creek necker rig.
After snipping the fused joint out of the middle of the paracord lanyard, I threaded the cut ends through the two halves of the breakaway connector. I then poked at the ends to fray them, followed by a shot with a torch-type butane lighter and another poke (this time with a wet fingertip to prevent a blister) to "mushroom" the ends.
I let the melted paracord cool and harden before pulling it back into the connector halves. The mushrooms keep the cord ends from popping out.
The last step was to join the connector and yank-test it a few times. It works.
Although my original fused joint served as a reliable breakaway, I present this (arguably less elegant) alternative for those who'd rather go with an off-the-shelf solution. Without a doubt, the plastic connector is a much better (and much safer) choice for kids who are just learning how to work with paracord.
Earlier posts
Re-sheathing the Little CreekUpdate: Little Creek necker
Links
LighthoundBark River Little Creek (@KnifeForums)Bark River Little Creek (@KSF)
Ordinarily I don't cultivate a lot of crosstalk between KintlaLake Blog and its corresponding Facebook page, but today I'm going to make an exception. My previous post generated this comment: "I would never carry 550 [para]cord wrapped around my neck. Sounds like an accident waiting to happen. ... It's an easy way to strangle yourself if it ever gets caught on something."
The reader makes an excellent point. What he didn't know (because I didn't explain it) is that I fused the ends of the paracord with a torch-type butane lighter (rather than tying a knot) specifically to avoid the unpleasant outcome he described.
It's possible to fuse a very strong joint, practically as stout as uncut cord, but that'd be a colossally bad idea for a neck lanyard. Done right, however -- and it takes practice -- a carefully fused joint holds fast under normal use but acts like a breakaway for safety's sake.
An alternative to fusing or knotting, of course, is a breakaway connector. This morning I ordered a handful of these inexpensive plastic gizmos, and in a future post I'll talk about installing them.
Now, having said all that, a neck lanyard isn't a wear-it-all-the-time proposition -- breakaway or no breakaway.A hunter probably wouldn't don a necker, for example, until the hunt was done and it was time to field-dress his kill -- and then he'd slip the rig back into a pocket before packing out. I might wear my Little Creek around my neck in camp, but not while hiking or climbing.And so on. It's simply a matter of being smart about it.
From the moment that I first picked up my Bark River Knives Little Creek last month, I've fancied it a candidate for neck carry. The bushcraft-style sheath supplied with the knife, however, wasn't quite what I had in mind.
While cruising about on KnifeForums the other day, I spotted a second-hand Bark River sheath for sale, one originally intended for a Mini Canadian. I did some eyeballing and cyber-measuring and, figuring that $10 was a modest price for an experiment, I bought it.
The sheath arrived from its previous owner in Texas in yesterday's mail. To my delight, it turned out to be an absolutely perfect fit for the Little Creek, so this morning I tackled the question of whether or not I could turn the combination into a decent necker.
I threaded a three-foot length of ACU gray paracord through two of the sheath's eyelets and then through a double-feed cord lock. The cord lock will allow adjustment of the rig's "ride height."
On the back of the sheath, I crossed the cord under the belt loop (for stability) and fused* the ends rather than knotting them. The joint is hidden under the belt loop.
The result, I'm pleased to say, is a near-ideal neck rig. It balances well, rides flat and doesn't insist on twisting when I lean over and the sheath dangles away from my chest.Best of all, in my opinion, the centerpiece of this mixed-and-matched setup is one dandy little knife. Ten bucks and five minutes simply gave me a new reason to look forward to carrying it.*See update here.
It took me just fifteen minutes this morning to turn out a basic tether for my new Victorinox Farmer.
This is what I'd call a medium-sized survival lanyard, packing about ten feet of intact paracord into a relatively tidy bundle. It's woven in a double (overlapping) cobra stitch, with a spring clip on one end and a split ring on the other. Nothing complicated, nothing fancy.No skull beads this time.
The knot, by the way, is a figure-eight-on-a-bight. Depending on my mood, it seems, I tend to go back and forth between that and a stevedore knot, which essentially is a figure-eight with an extra wrap.
Later I'll do a simple paracord fob for the Farmer, maybe capturing a tiny firesteel, for those times when I want something less bulky. If I had this lanyard to do over again, I might make it with a shorter run of double cobra, but as-is it'll serve my EDC purposes just fine.
Weaving paracord is good therapy. It soothes mind and soul in the same way as, say, playing golf -- either it eliminates the need for prescription medication, or it's an express trip to the pharmacy.
I don't play golf.
It's been a year or so since I first took up the paracord pastime in earnest. I braided the practical stuff into lanyards and fobs, tethers and bracelets, Incorporating clips, rings and, of course, the requisite skull beads. If I do say so myself, some of the results were pretty damned cool.
After several months, however, the creative tide ebbed and my interest waned. I found myself making useless baubles, mostly from scraps. Boxing up the remaining supplies, I stowed them in my office closet and moved on.
A length of paracord is an essential part of any survival kit or bug-out bag. A couple of 100-foot hanks live in our family emergency stores and we keep a bundle in each vehicle. A homemade bracelet is an easy way to carry 20 feet of paracord on my walks in the woods.
Its utility is endless -- I just got tired of working with it. Then yesterday, I put paracord together with another essential, a firesteel, and started weaving again.
I'm not the first to capture a firesteel within a cross-braid. Given my penchant for preparedness, though, fashioning two must-have survival items into a handy fob seemed like a great idea. A half-hour later it was finished -- one full-size firesteel (sans handle) surrounded by about ten feet of intact (not gutted) paracord, with a small split-ring on one end.For a first attempt, it's not half bad. The next one will be better.
The Shakers, known for their simple furniture, take a great approach to design and craft:
"Do not make a thing unless it is both necessary and useful; but if it is both necessary and useful, do not hesitate to make it beautiful."
The humble object I created yesterday fulfills necessary and useful quite well, I think. I'll keep working on the beautiful part.
