My Favorite Tools #2: SOG Power Assist EOD Multi Tool

See below…

 

Mine is about 10 years old now. Here is the latest incarnation.

SOG builds good stuff, or, they did when I bought this and a couple of other things made by them in the last decade. They have a giant bowie that I still want to get, but that’s another story for another day.

It has everything you would expect from a multi tool. Good lock up and the usual bits. Everything is replaceable as well. And hey, no Leatherman politics…

I have repaired everything from a bike, to a 4 wheeler, various guns, several trucks, and even had it sent to Canada once because when I was there I needed a set of tools and a knife and wanted it all in one package. It’s traveled the world… Or, at least southern Ontario.

It’s a close friend at this point.

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My Favorite Tools: #1 – Buck 110

 

About $35 virtually anywhere. I have several, Mrs. Matson one, and each kid at least two.

Good steel, keeps an edge, and fantastic geometry for anything from cleaning game to (i suppose) sticking in a fellow human. So ubiquitous here in the deep south that any dot gov minion would not even think twice to see that pouch on your belt that says ‘Buck’.

I have cleaned countless whitetail with this one, gutted many a fish, and carved off shavings for a fire while out on the trail. And, while there are better, more tacticool EDC ones out there, you could do much, much worse.

You should stop reading this post now, and go get a couple. One to keep on your person and one to put away somewhere safe.

It’s a tool, and a damn good one.

 

EDC Survival Box

My take on this, the Survival loadout.

A couple of operational constraints:

• I work in a corporate setting in full business dress.
• I commute from ‘burb to ‘burb everyday, no highway route, about 20 miles.
• My objective with regard to any challenge would be to get home, not get into a firefight.
• Interdiction is always a possibility.
• There is a larger kit with more comprehensive gear in my truck.
• There is a list of EDC items on my person that compliment the following kit…

I’ll start with the container. Cheap, simple, rugged, water & air tight. Otterbox.

About $11 shipped from somewhere online. Use your GoogleFu. In all honesty it would be a bit better if it were about one inch deeper. I’m sure they make one of those. When I ordered this, it was an afterthought. I had intended to use it for something completely different. Hindsight being 20/20 and all.

Contents are simple:

• Two CR-123’s as these are the primary batteries for every light I have, including the ones on my weapons. My current EDC light is a 4Sevens, Quarkx123 Tactical. Don’t let the tacticool bit fool you. I could care less about that stuff. The difference with this light is a programming feature that allows for illumination settings to be stored on bezel positions. Very useful.
• One, KCI Glock mag with 124-gr JHPs.
• Twenty odd feet of 550 cord and a ring.
• Light My Fire Ferro Rod with a secondary ferro from an ESEE survival kit.
• Opinel Number 9 carbon steel folder – about $10 and one seriously capable blade.

Below is a shot of the packed kit.

Complete? Nope. Does it work for me? Yep. With my EDC gear and this, I could get home. That’s the goal. Could it stand a revision, say, addition of water purification tabs? Probably. I have some. I will likely shoehorn them in at some point.

Again, this is about complimenting what’s on my person, and giving me assets to help me get home, or get to the bigger kit in my truck.

I hope some of you find this info useful. There will be a series of posts soon that will detail the EDC pack loadout, the truck kit, and to satisfy a request from Mr. Kerodin, a SHTF E&E kit with weapons.

 

 

 

Mechanical Injuries

I’m a knife guy. I love them, and have so many I lost count. It’s a primal thing for me.

Every year around Christmas, I usually place an order for one that I have been drooling over all year. A vanity gift. This year I got a Bravo Necker. Great little knife. I really dig on Mike Stewart’s ability to get the heat treat perfect on that A2. Fantastic company and product.

Upon receiving the necker, within 30 seconds of playing with it, I managed to embed in in my hand. Not a nik or small cut. No, stuck in my left palm, about halfway in. I’ll spare you the pic.

Anyway, as I sat there with my hand under the cold tap, I though, “seriously, i do not want to sit in an urgent care or ER for hours waiting to get stitches…”. During said contemplation, I remembered that Superglue was an alternative to this long and tedious wait. After Googling this, I went downstairs to my workshop and squeezed out a bead onto my hand. The bleeding stopped and so did the pain. Wow!

It’s unbelievable that I have not done this before. The result was as close to magical as it gets.

Twenty four hours later, the bead popped off due to my corrosive sweat, and the cut was completely closed.

Doing this saved a good eight productive hours and about $1000.

Morale of the story: Keep superglue in your kit.

 

Dark Arts for Good Guys

Matthew, I am so very grateful you posted once more.

See The Right to a Knife:

The end game is this. There is a difference between “feeling safe” and having viable options to safely defend oneself.

We don’t talk, train, and fight out of a sense of hatred. We do these things out of love. The love to get home, to see our children raised, our families thriving as a whole. I don’t “hate” anyone who is trying to do me harm. But they sure in hell are my enemy and I intend on seeing them dead first if it comes to that.

Rule #1 – ALWAYS have a knife. ALWAYS.

In my house, I don’t go to the head without a blade – in my own house. Neither does Mrs. Matson. Most of the time, I don’t go without a sidearm, but that is not the point here. NEVER (see NEVER) go without a knife. It is a fundamental tool for operating in daily life and means of enhancing defense of yourself and those around you.

Said sharp object need not be an eight inch combat apparatus with the coolest powder coating you have ever seen. It need only be a sharped piece of reliable metal that can inflict damage. Sometimes, it may not even need to be metal.

Be prepared. If you have any questions, see Rule #1.