SwampDonkey: The LMFII is a horrible bushCRAFT knife. It's beefy, heavy and has a very thick blade...most of the straight edge is covered with serrations...it's designed for helicopter egress after all. Because of that I haven't been using it as my main carry knife when I'm out in the bush and therefore I haven't been using it very much at all and really haven't put it through any serious bush. I've just started to use it as a light weight solution to leaving my shovel, machete, axes, etc at home. It's lighter than any of those tools and can do all their jobs even if less efficiently...and I would trust it to stand up to way more 'non-standard' use than any of my other bush equipment. It's short for a big heavy knife so it's easy to lash to a pack (the sheath makes this easy...lots of holes and slots).
I look at it as more of a multi-use tool than a bush knife at the moment.
You know that LMF stands for "Lightweight Multi-Function", right?
FWIW, I currently use mine as my primary carry knife when I'm in the woods or out camping. I agree with many of the issues that Dave raised, although I don't find the serrations on the rear half of the blade to be excessive.
The handle is pretty large for a knife with a blade this length (4.84" / 10.59" OAL) but I find it to better balanced and much more controllable than my KA-BAR 1211 (7.00" / 11.75") even though it weighs more (11.4 oz versus 10.5 oz for the KA-BAR).
I have a Gerber Big Rock camp knife that used to be my primary carry knife, but it now resides in my vehicle GHB kit. It is a similar sized knife (4.5" / 9.4" OAL) buts weighs only about half as much (6.3 oz). I doubt I could use it to egress from a helicopter as quickly as with the LMF, but it does a fine job slicing through paracord.
Given the price, I was pretty disappointed with a couple aspects of this knife. Having two retention straps not only is unnecessary (the sheath uses a very secure integral tang retention flange) but they are 1/4"-1/2" too short. I tried several sheaths looking for one that I could actually close without using both hands, but they were all this way. I finally gave up and removed them altogether.
The black finish on the pommel (buttcap) looks like ass, and the coating on the blade seems to get a new scratch every time it is removed from the sheath. WTF?
I have a Colt AR-15A3 tactical carbine that is the same way. When you spend $1500 for a rifle (especially when you know that a Bushmaster or DPMS is half that price) I expect the finish to be a bit more consistent, if not damn perfect. Colt's position is that their rifles are built for law enforcement and military applications, neither of which gives a rat's ass about appearance. Apparently Gerber followed Colt's lead with regard to finish...
The integral sharpener and Molle attachments are very handy, and overall this knife will do everything a good survival knife should do.
Jim
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