I don't think battoning is necessarily wrong. I do think that it should be restricted to green wood. Seasoned wood of the size that broke the blade can also pinch the blade so tight that it's putting huge lateral (perpendicular)loads on the blade. The whack of the baton 90 degrees from the lateral loading pushed it to the breaking point. A smaller stick driven in at the split would have kept the blade from pinching/binding and (probably) prevented the blade from breaking.

As for sticking to green wood, I've mostly considered battoning to be for the construction of shelter. Once you have a fire going you don't really have to chop and split big pieces, you feed them into the fire. The caveat is a true life-or-death emergency situation. If I think battoning through a steel girder will just maybe save me or a loved one, then I'm going to baton right through that girder.

+1 on that. Until we find Unobtainum, I think we might have found the max of what we can do with blade steel without improving some feature at significant cost to another.



OK, I know I get that reference, and probably Blast does when he reads it, but how many others do....

BTW, Mithril is a titanium alloy in all likely hood.

I would've never guessed that benjammin was into RPG's.

Yep, I caught it and I'm still stunned!

-Blast

I don't know if this would work in this particular situation, but one thing you can do to split a log is to cut a long wedge from the side of the log, sharpen it and then barely baton a slot with your knife, then use the wooden wedge and baton on it to finish splitting the log.

I thought they would have had better service but maybe battoning a knife is considered outside normal usage.
cheers

Hi all, When that knife broke on Thanksgiving day while my wife and I were camping it was a shock. When I talked to Mike from RAT, he told me that at the time we were talking only one other knife had broke and it was run over by a tank. Mike also told me that he prefers the 1095 steel for being in the field over the D-2 just incase he has to sharpen it on a river stone. When that new knife arrived a week later I took it out and battoned with it and had no problems. I take it as just a bad mishap.
Well take care all,
Bryan

P.S. I bought a MK-3 in January of this year and have battoned with it and had the handle scale come apart and well I called the place you order them from and the guy I talked to did not understand that the little screws that hold the handle on srew into a treaded part and that I needed to get that part. he sent out 4 srews and not the right part I just took off the scales and wrapped green para cord around the handle. I really like it that way now.
Take care every one,

Look on the bright side. Now you have a new RAT-7 in 1095 and a new KLINGON-7 in D2. The broken one looks like a knife a Klingon might carry.

I guess that is one way to look at it aloha.
Bryan

Except maybe the Bears Grylls $700 knife.