Resurrecting this one for consistency.
Just made a necklace which seems to be the one I could actually EDC. It's quite minimalistic, but I guess that's exactly what makes it wearable for me, as it's lightweight enough and always staying organized so I can totally forget it is there.
The content1. Titanium 2" dogtag knife in the rubber frame with a hole on one end, a half round notch on the other, and one of the longer edges with a 1/8" wide razor sharp blade. Purchased online a while ago. So far I have my name and email address (in my own domain) engraved on one side. The bottom notch is great for producing rich sparking from the ferro rod, and for wire stripping.
2. 1.5" long 1/4" diameter ferrocerium rod with 1/10" hole. Could be 2" to match the tag's length, but 1.5" is what I had at hand and it works just fine. Drilled the hole myself, burning a hole in my synthetic pants twice along the way, before putting on my leather apron and a drop of motor oil into the hole.
3. 5" of 20ga diameter steel wire in a transparent plastic sleeve. Both ends are needle-sharpened, covered by the sleeve, and tucked under the tag's frame on the front. Besides its utility, it's forming a simple three prongs central pendant, which holds the 1 and 2 securely together, also making them easily detachable without even removing the necklace. Though there is a very little chance the lock I made on it is coming off under any random tension. Another advantage of this design is that this rather short necklace (it is head tight, so I can wear it on the forehead or on the ears to rig other gear) behaves like a twice longer one on the neck (i.o.w. it sits wider on the chests top), what helps hiding it under the collar of the shirt. So, I cannot feel it and cannot see it (primary annoyances of my previous attempts to wear something on the neck)
4. ~15' of black #8 nylon thread braided in a chain pattern using the four finger loops method (does not look perfect, as that's my first try to braid a thread, so I may redo that later). For an unknown reason I cannot find the instructional video for that anymore, even though I had it on Youtube on my phone and on my PC; but I have memorized the simple and fast technique well (there are some other four loop techniques on Youtube, but they look overly complex). I've connected the single length of the thread into a single loop first, then coiled it 2 more times to form 4 equal loops or 8 strands for braiding. I've bundled the starting end-loop of the resulting ~2 mm thick cord in a trivial overhand knot (easy to untie) but left the other end open for now to see how it might unwind and wear per strand under the EDC conditions.
The necklace wears really well so far (3 days). I don't feel it at all under the shirt or even when sleeping. Perhaps, the fact that the tag is riding between 2-nd and 3-rd shirt buttons rather than against the solar plexus is helping as well. The pendant's wide arms seem to prevent typical shifting of the necklace over the chest efficiently and, sure thing, it's not rotating at all, what prevents the ferro rod from touching the wet skin, reducing the corrosion chances (Titanium is inert, the steel wire is in plastic sleeve). Perhaps I should cover it with nail polish anyway for protection.
Also I plan to add an HD sewing needle as the wire is not really ideal for sewing (still possible, though). Most likely, I'll make a flammable thin film insert under the dog tag and place the needle in between.
Another idea is to try braiding the fishing line (mono or braided) just to see if it's better in any way. However, the strong nylon thread seem to be more interesting for EDC.
Any questions or improvement ideas are welcome!
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