The serrations do work faster on a rope but they sure do screw up the ends that have to be repaired later lest your expensive rope starts to unravel. Only use it on lines you don't mind screwing up.

I consider a half serrate better on a survival knife.
The reason?
It's much better for shaving up kindling for a fire. My experiance is that unskilled people find fire building easier with a serrated edge.
I love a plain shaving sharp edge as much as the next man, but not in a TSHTF situation.

Feel free to go into meltdown

I agree with nearly everyone and even more so with Roarmeister. The shorter the blade, the less I want serrations. On a 5-1/2 blade and longer, serrations don;t much get in the way and are there if you need them. Even then, though, a longer, plain-edge blade is what I always opt for.

Earlier in January, we were digging up and moving a tree from the horse stables and had dug most of it up and cut most of the roots. We tied a 1-1/2" nylon braided rope around the hitch ball and the other end went to a huge strap around the tree at the base. Using a slipknot (against my friend's wife's advice - she knew what was going to happen), as soon as we started pulling on the tree the knot tightened up around the ball. We could not, against all efforts, get that knot loose, so the only alternative was to cut the rope. I used my BM-Nimravus, which is razor-sharp, but it wasn't making much headway on this old, dirt-embedded rope. Luckily, it has a partially serrated blade which sliced right through whith little effort. I was thankful that day that I had a serrated edge but it's the only time I can remember serrations being anything more than a pain in the butt.

Anytime I'm in doubt, I do without...... serrations of course

Thank you all for your response.

Regards,

Al

Okay, I have to wade into this.

The purist in me quests for the perfect edge on the perfect uncluttered blade. I want an edge you can *hear* if you listen carefully. I love the hanging newspaper test. I especially love it with the Cold Steel Carbon V folder, Opinel style, that I keep in the sacred vault. An edge to make angels weep, more or less.

But alas, down here on Earth, in the field, or even the yard, there are situations where the perfect straight edge just isn't the best tool for the job.

That's why I find, in field use, partially serrated blades have some value. Though art ain't one of them, and the choirs of angels stay away.

Situations where serrations may be worthwhile:

First is the situation where someone other than you needs to do the cutting. (We naturally assume that we, the well-prepared, will not be incapacitated -- not necessarily so.) They will abuse the blade. And they will not be able to sharpen it. In that situation, a partial serration will keep the blade usable (in the crudest "saw" sense) a lot longer than a straight edge. The "points" of the serration may be obscenely dull; but they do protect the "internal" scalloped cutting edges.

Second is a desperate, total-abuse-of-blade situation, where you are sawing away at something barely cuttable, to save your own or someone else's butt. What you have in your hand is all you get. A serrated blade will be able to chew through more "garbage" than a fine edge, including wire and cable.

(My situations have never been so desperate, thank heaven. They're more mundane. Like sawing weeds and twine and dirt out of the big rototiller before all that junk chews the seals out of the bearings. Or, boning out a deer -- the "toward the tip" serrations I added to my Moras with a chainsaw file keep me cutting when everybody else is whining for me to put their knives on the stone.)

The other big thing: not all serrations are created equal.

Some, in fact, are garbage. They grab and bind and hang up when they should enhance cutting. I suspect anyone who has experienced this would write off serrations entirely.

However, some aren't bad. It's as much design and execution as anything. Spydercos are pretty good, right from the factory.

For others, there's a definite wear-in, break-in period. I often accelerate this, being impatient, with a diamond file or chain saw file. I wear down the points and polish the edges where they would otherwise bind. With TLC and time, they cut amazingly well, but they weren't anything like that out of the box.

I must confess that my hard-working knives, including those with serrations, often get sharpened on a flat stone. This grinds down the points of the serrations. In time, surprisingly, they work better. With more sharpenings, though, the serrations are mostly worn to nothing.

I prefer base-model (400x steel) Gerbers to have serrations, for example, because it thins out the blade where the work gets done. Once those serrations wear in, often with a little help from me, it will cut better than the equivalent straight blade.

Anyway, that's my nickel's worth.