Knives for Servicemen-Maker input wanted

Justin King

Well-Known Member
(Note: edited to include a list of contributors and volunteers, see below)
With Tracy (Bossdog)'s blessing I am asking for input from other makers (especially U.S. makers but not exclusively so) to help see that our military men and women are well equipped to perform their widely varying tasks when it comes to edged implements.

I posted recently in the Custom Knife Forum about a small knife I was planning to send in a care package to a deployed Army unit which was requesting small fixed-blade knives. I was contacted by another forum member who saw the thread and was wondering how he could do something similar, which lead me to search the military contacts further to see how many are asking for knives in particular. Note that these are all deployed personnel and in many cases their PX is chronically short of stock or dosn't exist in the first place. The number who are asking for knives is considerable.

I am hoping there are more makers out there who would be willing to donate their work in some form, so that as a group perhaps some of us can make a real difference in helping these men and women be able to do their jobs as effectively as possible.

I do not have a formal organization or plan in place to make this happen so I am asking for input on any level. I do send care packages overseas to deployed units regularly, and am familiar with that end of things to some extent, but how to organize things on the maker's end is wide open and will depend on what kind of participation there is from other makers. So what can we do?

I would like to open a discussion and get a feel for who might want to get involved and how we might make it work. I have a contact in mind immediately that represents 6 guys, who could really use some good, fixed or folding knives for technical/rescue applications. Any help would be appreciated by more than just myself.

Edit: I want to thank everyone who has volunteered or donated in any way to this effort. I will try to keep this list updated, if I have anyone misrepresented or misspelled, I apologize, please let me know so I can correct it.

List of Contributors:
Aldo Bruno/New Jersey Steel Baron- blade steel
Dave/ Great Lakes Water Jet- water cutting services
Tracy/Midwest Knifemaker Supply- Micarta scales, and the public platform to make this effort possible
Big Smitty/Possum Knifeworks-PR for sheath and misc. donations
Doug White/Whiteeugene-micarta scales, ss tube, corbys
Bruce M.-micarta scales
Ironwolf-multiple design contributions
R.Keith-future donation to cover shipping/misc expenses
Bill T.-misc. hardware as needed

Volunteer Makers, in no particular order:
Rodney J.
Big Smitty/Possum Knifeworks
Randy Haas/HHH knives
Murphda2
Nowicki
Bill T.
Denny Eller
Tune_up
Cal Harkins
Justin King
Carey Quinn
Jerry Bond
Gahagan
Rudy Joly

I would like to take a moment to thank Murphda2 who has been instrumental in this effort out of the gate. I really appreciate your help.
 
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If we don't have a short timeline, I will gladly send one. Unfortunately, my new training cycle just started and I have a few blades on the bench I need to finish in the next week.

If you need design ideas, I have several small tactical fixed blade designs that I can share.
 
I am looking for any and all help, Murph. This probably will not be quick or simple to put together. The possibility for maker involvement is wide open-from just making and donating a knife to selling/raffling/etc. a hand-made knife to buy production models to send. We can do multiple maker build-offs, where one guy profiles a blade or blades, another drills and bevels, another does the HT, etc. If it goes this direction then we could open it up to donations from suppliers for the materials as well.

I want to err on the side of discretion when discussing deployed personnel, but want to illustrate the need that some of these guys are in. A contact representing 6 men in an Air Force firefighting unit is asking for anything sharp enough to cut seatbelts. They are apparently using kitchen knives for utility tasks, their PX is chronically out of knives. Your crappiest pocketknife could make a real difference here, so the possibilities to help are open to a lot of people.


I have seen some amazing things happen on this forum out of the goodwill that this community seems to have in abundance. We also seem to have a unique ability to fill this particular need. I am hoping we can get a ball rolling here. I have a knife going out today and am ready to put another package together at any time to go over. I need knives to go in it, anyone want a spot? If nothing else, there will be some Wal-Mart cheapies in the second box.
 
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Justin, I think this is a great idea and I will do anything I can to help. I have wanted to do this for some time but I don't know how to contact the units I would like to support. If anyone can offer advice on how to get contact info for a specific unit please let me know.
 
This goes way up at the top of my "Awesome Stuff" List...
Thanks Justin!
Also,this would be the perfect place for all those serviceable but cosmetically flawed knives that makers
don't feel are saleable...(re: my "What do you do with knives that aren't perfect?" thread)
I'm keeping this thread high on my radar and will be doing something as soon as I'm relocated and able!
 
A thought-however this goes, we are going to need at least one person who will be responsible for getting knives boxed, filling out the customs forms, addressing the packages, and shipping them. This is the most tedious and perhaps the most critical part of the process, technical knifemaking issues aside. It involves at least a moderate investment of time and the addresses and forms have to be filled out correctly or the boxes may not reach their destination.
I am familiar with the process myself and am happy to do it, but I think that some potential makers/donors may be more comfortable with a more well-known and trusted personage (on the forums) recieving the knives and sending them off. For this reason, and also to open the door for non-makers to get involved, I would welcome any suggestions or offers about who might be willing to help with this part of the process in the future. I am already sending packages out every month or so, so it is not a critical issue for me either way.
 
I had thought of asking about doing something similar in a few months. My brigade will be heading to Afghanistan in about a year, and I always have young soldiers in need of a quality knife as opposed to the "PX junk" that they end up buying to carry. I have several designs I have been working on for such an effort and I'm getting close to finishing up the first one now. I'll keep you all posted on how it turns out. The first one will be getting a workout in the mountains of Colorado in a few weeks when my brother heads up for his elk hunt.
 
Ok, just what kind of knives are we talking about? Fixed? Folders? Size? So on and so on. Quantity? I need info to devise a plan of attack.
 
Ok, just what kind of knives are we talking about? Fixed? Folders? Size? So on and so on. Quantity? I need info to devise a plan of attack.
Thank you for your enthusiasm!

That depends on the needs of individual units. Many of the requests coming from these units are for tactical folding knives, but some are for fixed blades and some are unspecific. Many of them are support (non-combat) units and are probably well served by relatively compact knives, either folders or edc/utility fixed blade types. There do not seem to be many requests for large tactical fixed blades, although I did see one fellow asking for a Ka-Bar, so there is a place for some of those too, I expect.
We may encounter a bit of a disconnect if they need mostly folding knives and many of us are making fixed blades. We (fixed blade makers) may want to come up with a strategy to sell or raffle our knives to use the funds to purchase folders.
The requests from these units are often given in the form of links to items on webpages, but I think this is for expedience in most cases. Their needs in some cases may be very specific but the majority are not terribly picky. Many of them deployed with cheap knives from the PX, have broken them through hard use, and are unable to replace them with anything decent. In this scenario just about anything you send them can be used, including cheapie pocketknives and multi-tools if that is all we can send.
If you want to read some of the requests from these contacts PM me and I will direct you to the webpage. The contacts are representing anywhere from 2 or 3 guys to a few hundred, so quantity is entirely up to you and what you want to contribute.My thought is to try to get a feel for how many/what type of knives we can come up with, then select a unit or a few to try to affect with our effort, but I am waiting to see what others may have in mind.
 
From a soldiers perspective, I find that smaller blades are more usefull for multiple tasks. The ones I have been working on lately to test for my next "vacation" are approximately 9" OAL. Here is a photo of a couple I am working on now. Please excuse my mistakes.

Tactical Utility.jpg
 
The military issue of Blade said most service people will not carry a fixed blade over 5". I think this project might be a wonderful opportunity for makers to make their cosmetic seconds useful and still be proud of their work! Just add a 2nd stencil over the makers mark or under it that says 2ND so there can be no doubt!
 
I bought some cheap (10$ each) locking folders and my wife dug up some old swiss army-type knives, to add to my "volunteer" knife, and I shipped them out along with some other items this afternoon to the AF firefighters I mentioned earlier in the thread. The folders are pretty crappy but the best I could come up with on short notice and a modest budget, and they should be sufficient to rip a seat belt. I saw to it that they were sharp at least before boxing them up, so if nothing else they can clip them someplace in a vehicle or something where a spare blade might come in handy.
k4s 004 (2).jpg







MY wife and I will be sending more packages out within the next month or so and my intent is to try to round up some more knives to send. I am going to extend an open invitation to anyone who wants to donate a knife, either handmade or production, used or new. If you get it to me I will send it on to a unit that is requesting knives. PM me if anyone wants to do this.

Alternately, if anyone else decides to send a package over and is willing to send some knives along from other folks, please post here in advance. I think it is best to gang up our efforts/donations into a single package and try to save these guys the trouble of deciding which 1 or 2 guys in their unit needs a knife the most.

I have sent quite a few packages myself and will offer any help I can to anyone who is having trouble with the details/customs forms/etc.
The forms do not seem to be well designed for this purpose and can be a bit confusing the first few times.
 
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David from Greatlakes Water Jet did a help the military knife give away sometime back. I helped by getting some sheaths from Spec Ops donated and Alex S. donated his dog tag knife also. I think there was 20 knives made. From his posts here he appears to be willing to help. I would be willing to help in any way in colaboration with everyone. We could look at doing a mid tech straight knife and look for donated material ect and get some help from the forum members with blade beveling and profile clean up and look for some help on heat treat.

How many knives are you looking for? Here is a design that may work. It has a 4" blade, 9 inch overall length and 1.25" tall. Just let me know how I can assit.:35:

PDSMilEDC3.jpg
 
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David from Greatlakes Water Jet did a help the military knife give away sometime back. I helped by getting some sheaths from Spec Ops donated and Alex S. donated his dog tag knife also. I think there was 20 knives made. From his posts here he appears to be willing to help. I would be willing to help in any way in colaboration with everyone. We could look at doing a mid tech straight knife and look for donated material ect and get some help from the forum members with blade beveling and profile clean up and look for some help on heat treat. How many knives are you looking for? here is a design that may work. It has a 4" blade. Just let me know how I can assit.:35:

Maybe you and I and Dave should get together and see what we can come up with? I am not exactly a heavy hitter in terms of production capability but I can grind, HT in limited numbers, shape and mount grips, and bend kydex, among other things.

As for how many knives, the more the better is the only answer I can really give. It may be complicated to try to select a particular unit and produce enough knives for all of them. I will PM you with more info.
 
God bless ya'll,this is gaining some great momentum...
I wish the heck I was set up,and had the skill to contribute something to this.
If I had some $$ and a shop set up right now, I could at least profile some blades.
Once I AM set up I'd like to do what I can: I'll rough out some blades if someone can grind the blade bevels and h.t. them.
 
Hey Justin,
I just noticed we are practically neighbors. I am in Gilbert. Anyway, I am sure David will come along and comment with his thoughts.
 
Smitty, I was typing you a PM but the ghost in my computer got hungry again and ate it...it may be just as well since my brain is trying to go a few different directions at once with this, I think I'm just about used up for today.
I am going to suggest a modest goal for the moment: I would like to send 5 more small fixed blades or stout one-handed folders to the group of guys I mailed the package to this afternoon, so that all 6 of them have at least one nice knife. For now I am off to bed so will leave it at that for the moment and pick this up again tomorrow.
 
God bless ya'll,this is gaining some great momentum...
I wish the heck I was set up,and had the skill to contribute something to this.
If I had some $$ and a shop set up right now, I could at least profile some blades.
Once I AM set up I'd like to do what I can: I'll rough out some blades if someone can grind the blade bevels and h.t. them.
I would welcome your involvement in any way you can/want to help. I want to leave his effort open to as many people as possible. There are frequent requests for things like multitools and flashlights also so donations of money or merchandise of that type can be added to the list of items. I am a little sensitive about asking people or businesses for money but the possibility is there to do some good that way too. This is very much a throw it in the pot type of effort right now. I have packages going over regularly already so I can piggyback just about anything someone wants to donate into an outbound box and select an appropriate contact on the fly to send it to.
 
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