11-inch Camp Knife
December 9, 2010, 9:18 am / Categories: Camping, Hiking
By T.C. WORLEY
Various normal as well as serendipitous occasions as of late have allowed me to put a new uber-knife from SOG to the full test. Indeed, during the past two weeks alone, wielding the company’s big, bad Aura Camp knife I’ve field-dressed a deer, whittled sticks for over-the-fire hot dogs, trimmed branches for firewood, conducted a knife throwing contest, cut up vegetables to cook for dinner, and chipped through four inches of lake ice in Wisconsin to make an ice-fishing hole.
At 11 inches long, and with a 6-inch blade, the Aura is no small knife. In fact, it’s almost a small hatchet. Based on a 1838 “Bowie”-style knife, but with some redesigned touches, the Aura has a straight edge, a stainless-steel blade, and a glass-reinforced polymer handle over-molded with a rubber grip. It costs $53 and through my serious employment of the blade over the past month it has not let me down.
It cut and diced with ease, from pine bow to carrots. The knife is weighted right and feels good in the hand. While winter camping, the handle and grip survived many high-speed impacts with frozen ground during a knife-throwing contest.
Extras include a hidden carbide sharpener that unscrews from the end of the handle for touch-ups in the field. The small sharpener also has a groove for sharpening fish hooks. SOG includes a stiff, belt-looped nylon sheath to carry the knife at your ready.
Given its size, the knife will better serve the sportsman crowd than gram-counting backpackers. (It weighs a half-pound.) But during my four-day camping trip this month, the knife’s usefulness brought remarks from camp mates like “ideal for this trip,” “super handy,” and “tough!” For wilderness trips and primitive camping, the SOG knife has earned a spot in my pack.
—T.C. Worley is a writer and photographer based in Minneapolis.
Thanks for the review. Within the SOG line I would also recommend the Seal Pup Elite as a great camping companion. It is available with a partially serrated blade which I find very useful over just a straight blade. SOG also offers the Aura – Hunting version with a zipper blade for field dressing. I like the SOG product line.
im still trying to decipher which wild animals youd want to kill with this knife … im sure there it can probably decapitate bears in one fell stroke … however unless you want to slaughter every critter you encounter there are better choices
a kitchen knife will do any reasonable task that most backpackers will want to do in the woods … in fact most decent knives will
i guess if you want to clear cut trees this may be a good choice … leave every rather than no trace
now if this was one of those hunting or survival forums ….
Chan,
who said anything about killing animals with the knife? The review is clearly written about a camp knife. And at the very reasonable price point on this SOG I’m confused as to where you are going to find a “kitchen knife” that will hold up to the same abuse in that price range?
Mr. Chan, you do realize that the site you’ve found is called Gear Junkie? That means most of us are here to see what cool new gizmo’s/gadgets/knives are on the market, this SOG clearly being one of those items. 101 uses for a kitchen knife sounds boring for a website, which is probably why it doesn’t exist. As a matter of fact, I think that I’m going to buy one of these just for kitchen duty.
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a good 1/2 lb kitchen knife will work just as well