Admiring my shiny new Coghlan's Commando Saw (deluxe stainless steel version, naturally), I saw where, in addition to sawing, it claimed you could use it as a snare by threading the smaller pull ring through the larger one. That sounds a little far fetched to me. Has anyone actually had any success at using their wire saw as a snare, or even tried it? Or is this just Madison Avenue hype?

I considered trying it, but I didn´t for the following reasons:
- the big ring wouldn´t lock when the snare is closed
- if an animal is snared and yanks hard the wire will kink, this makes it useless as saw
- it´s shiny and hard to conceal
- it´s a hassle to fix the loop to a certain size (once again the ring is too big)

IMO it´s not worth trying. I carry better wire that´s useful for a lot of other jobs.

And another query about wire saws: How do you keep the wire saw "blade" from destroying other items in a tightly-packed pocket PSK? I can see where mine could punch or wear holes in the aluminum foil (not that big a deal), the water bag (very big deal) and other items it comes into contact with. Is the key careful packing or enclosing the wire in something? If so, what? <img src="images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />

Find some teflon tubing it will slide into. You now have a drinking straw for water seeps.

i put the fragile stuff on the bottom and put triple layered ducktape on peel off backing on top of it to act as "armor". other things around the saw are more resistend to damage and are at some places protected with tinder (cottonwol+ vaseline). the stuff stored in side the rolled up saw are "protected" with brass wire to protect the bobbin of wire inside. just make sure everything fragil or easily punctured is away from any sharp stuff inside.

Thought about that, by my Coghlan's wire saw has those enormous 5/16-inch brass swivel eyes on each end. I finally settled for slitting a length of telephone 3-wire casing and putting that over the wire saw "blade." True, the casing isn't much use for anything else, but it's all I could come up with that would not take up more space in my trusty Altoid's tin.

And then there was the matter of getting the wire saw to STAY in the Altoids tin. I finally had to resort to some brute force "training" to get it to hold its shape while I packed the rest of the goodies inside. Darn things have a life, and mind, of their own, it seems like.

if you have to force it in, or rol it up to tight it will get that shape in his "memory", so you will end up with a spring shaped saw, with's is annoying to use if you don't tention it.
i keep the saw in mine kits unused in his original rolled up condition, beacuse they won't get a annoying "memory". Use the unrolled one's, for normal use or practise.

this is what happend to mine wiresaw wenn i forced it in in mine altoid tin PSK ( retired now ).


The rolled up shape will stay and you won't be able to remove it, wenn you have to use it. so using it without tensioning will become harder and it will brake easyer

Wow, that's an impressive kink you've got there. What I did was remove the split rings from mine, then press it around the inside edge of the Altoid's tin so that it closely followed that rectangular shape. Then I stuffed the rest of the space with paper towels, closed the lid, sealed it shut and left it sit for several hours. When I opened it, the wire saw seemed to hold that rectangular shape, more or less, without trying to sproing out of the tin.

if there's a lot of tension of the saw, it will get a memory over time......
Only time will tell weather your way works...

Maggot,
I have a similar wire saw. I just wrapped some nylon twine around the saw. It took about 10 feet to cover it. This should cover up the sharp edges.

I'm not obsessive about wire saws, but ... Mine came with two enormous metal split rings to use to pull the saw back-and-forth. I substituted two smaller pull rings so it would fit in my mini-PSK Altoids tin. But in studying the kits Doug has reviewed, I notice that most of them don't include ANY pull rings, which means you can't use the saw until you improvise something. I can see a lot of arguments for being able to cut your way out of or through something in a hurry, so this deletion of the pull rings puzzles me. What do some of you do when packing the wire saw in your PSK - pull rings, no pull rings, or something else?

I kept mine. So the saw is ready to use and I might need the rings for some other pupose. I don´t see any need to ditch them as long as I don´t need the space for a more important item.

well depends on the kit, in mine PSK i don't have pullrings. BCB makes 2 wiresaws, one has swivels and rings, the other has a big loop on the end of the saw, i use the latter one in mne PSK, i got plenty of rings on mine key ring, but if i really need it i could use something else 2 ( loops are big enough ) like small branche or something. The lack of swivels and rings make it much easyer to pack, thats] the mine primary reason i took that one.

I swapped one of the rings with the ring from my key chain, which is a slightly smaller diameter so it fits inside. That way the two rings only take up the same amount of space as the larger ring would by itself. I've considered hollowing out the top part of my tealight candle so that the split rings would actually fit inside it - I think the impact to the candle's usefulness would be negligible, (although I understand that a lot of people here don't have a high opinion of the usefulness of a tealight in the first place, anyway <img src="images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> ) Of course, I still have the original ring on my keychain if I need it, but if I don't have time to remove the keys from the ignition before the car sinks in 14 feet of ice water, then I'd rather have a self-sufficient PSK in my pocket <img src="images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I don't have a wire saw (i can't find one in any shops locally), but this is how i would , theoretically have mine...

It should have swivels at each end. THis is to stop the saw from kinking while it is being used.
I'd ditch the split rings (space), and thread some paracord through the swivels. this will take up less space, and probably be more comfortable.
I'd place it along the inside of the PSK container. this , i think will save the most space (in my case), without damaging or kinking the saw, if it was rolled up into a tight coil.

these are just my thoughts, so I don't know if they are actually valid points.

I once made a wire saw for fun. It's quite easy. You basically rap wire around another strand. You do this about 3 times (round seperate pieces of wire), you then twist these together, fold over, add swivels, crimp and there you go. Its best to use leader or strong steel wire. Hope this is helpful.

Good idea about using two sizes of split rings so they will "nest" flat for easier storage. I did find that I HAD to take the split rings off the wire saw in my mini-PSK, because there was no other way to cram it into the Altoids tin.