Highlighting Serious Swiss Army Knife Tools
16th Jun 2020
Victornox, the company that is responsible for the production of Swiss Army Knife tools, as well as the company that has lent that style of design to become a generic term for other tools like them, has a colorful history of success. Here are White Mountain Knives, we’ve already taken a deep dive into some of the history behind the tools, so today we’re going to highlight some serious tools from their catalog, dive into their functionality, and suggest places where they might make a good fit.
There’s no such thing as the “perfect” tool; rather, there are tools that are well designed for a purpose and others that are not designed as well. With that in mind, don’t pass up a chance to check out some of these Swiss Army Knife tools that you can find here on our site, and don’t be shy about reaching out to us for more information on the products, or on products that you don’t see listed.
Victorinox Classic SD Swiss Army Knife
This is probably the most immediately recognizable piece of gear from a Victorinox lineup. This knife can be found basically anywhere you look for it, from deep at the bottom of a forgotten pocket to somewhere in a drawer full of accessories.
This is no bushcraft knife. Rather, it is a small pocket knife that is good as a backup accessory for when you need to open an envelope, cut up an apple, or pull out a splinter. It comes with a small blade, a nail file, a toothpick, tweezers and scissors. The nail file has a flathead screwdriver point as a part of it’s design, so that much is foreseen as well.
It’s a great little backup tool to keep as a reserve, and it’s pretty affordable too. Plus, it weighs almost nothing and can easily be stashed in a pocket or a pack where you won’t need to worry about added bulk, either. As one of their most basic and affordable options, it’s still a pretty useful little tool. Also, it doesn’t hurt that you can get it in just about any color and with a number of different personalized designs if you so choose.
Victorinox Cadet Alox
This is a fine example of a Victorinox Swiss Army Knife that brings a little bit more functionality to the fold, albeit in a larger and heavier package. It’s just a hair of 3 inches long, so it’s significantly larger than the Classic SD. As a result, it is more comfortable in the hand. It fills the grip comfortably yet without hot spots or sharp edges, so it is much more suitable for slightly heavier tasks.
That being said, it’s still not a good option for heavier bushcraft work. Even so, it is more than suitable for light camp work like food preparation or light carving. This particular tool comes with a large blade along with several other functions. As a part of its design you can find can and bottle openers, a screwdriver, nail files and cleaners and a few other tools as well.
Something you might appreciate over this tool is the fact that it has extremely tough alox scales as a part of its design. Most other Swiss Army Knives are made with polymer scales, which, though tough, are just not as tough as Alox. That makes this knife a little better suited to rough use than some other similar tools.
Victorinox Ranger Grip 55 Autumn Spirit
This is a Swiss Army Knife that is well designed to be a more capable companion tool than the former model, with a slightly divergent design as well. Most Swiss Army Knives can be immediately recognized, regardless of their size, but their large lozenge shaped profiles. This design shakes up the mold a little but.
It is well contoured for an enhanced grip; not that the classic models are uncomfortable to use in any way, but the Ranger Grip 55 was specifically designed to offer enhanced ergonomics. In addition, it features a somewhat unconventional blade for a Swiss Army Knife. The large blade has a drop point design with a larger length of straight edge and will excel wherever cutting tasks are required.
In addition, it boasts of a wood saw, which can come in extremely handy in survival situations where teeth are superior to a straight edge for cutting. As a part of its portfolio of tools, it also contains a bottle and can openers, two screwdrivers, and a corkscrew as well as a reamer with an eye that can double as an awl for punching through leather and fabric. In a final effort to squeeze as much utility as possible into the design, it contains a paracord pendant which can offer a myriad of uses to the savvy, enterprising outdoorsman.
Victorinox Fieldmaster with Large and Small Blades
Getting back into the classic designs of so many Victorinox Swiss Army Knife tools, here is one whose looks can be deceiving. At first sight you might take it for a Camper or even for the Alox explored in this article, but it packs a ton of features that you won’t notice until you get familiar with it.
Aptly named, this tool has more than enough functions for any man’s average day in the field. Right out of the gate it hits hard with two blades. Just as some outdoorsmen keep a double bit axe with differentially sharpened bits for splitting or felling and limbing, the additional blade here can give you that ability. You can keep one razor sharp for carving and then give the other a convex profile for slightly heavier jobs. No splitting here, but you get the picture.
On top of its two blades it comes with a wood saw, whose value has already been belabored on top of a respectable number of other tools. In addition to all of the tools of the immediately former model, the Fieldmaster also has a steel hook and a phillips head screwdriver as a part of its repertoire. There’s not much left to want in this model, and on top of that it has the same comfortable grip and designs of three of the four Victorinox tools explored so far in this article.
Victorinox Hunter Pro Alox Folding Knife
Taking a slightly different approach to Victorinox tools, we have the Victorinox Hunter Pro Alox Folding Knife. Conceivably, this knife was designed to address some of the shortcomings of its other tools. Although it lacks most of the other tools included in many other Swiss Army Knives, this one takes on one of the biggest issues of all - solving some of the weaknesses of most folding knives.
One of the greatest issues faced by most Swiss Army Knives is that their blades, while useful, are extremely limited by the fact that they are not only folding knives, but possess no locking mechanism. Most of their folders are slipjoints, which means they are kept open by friction and can be “pressed” closed. That renders them marginally useful (at best) but any tough camp chores.
The Hunter Pro is a lockback knife, which means that the blade will lock in place when opened. It is also a much more robust blade than you will find on many other Swiss Army Knives, making it significantly more useful for tasks like cleaning game and skinning, as well as carving feather sticks or batoning through small logs. It’s still not a heavy duty camp knife, but a little ingenuity will get the job done. Adding to its utility, this knife comes with a paracord pendant and is made with Alox scales, which, as previously covered, is much tougher than the plastics you may find on other Victorinox models.
Victorinox Hunter XT Swiss Army Pocket Knife Multi Tool
This pocket knife multi tool takes some of the shortcomings of the previous tools and then merges them with the Hunter Pro as a solution. It addresses some of the issues with smaller tools while still providing a great deal of utility in the mix. It’s also designed to offer a specific degree of utility to itinerant hunters.
This tool features a large blade, which, though it does not lock, is still larger and more capable than most of the blades featured in other tools on this list. In addition to the main blade, it comes with a curved locking blade that is well suited to gutting. Interestingly enough, the teeth on this curved blade could be used to great success as a fish scaler for intrepid individuals. It also has a wood saw, which can be very useful for cutting branches to clear shooting lanes, for light camp work, and if necessary, for sawing through bone. In addition, this tool comes with a phillips screwdriver and is optimized to be comfortable in the hand.
Victorinox Huntsman Swiss Army Knife
The Victorinox Huntsman Swiss Army Knife is a fair hybrid of the features of a classic model and some of the more capable blades in their lineup. While its two blades lack the spinal fortitude of some of the other knives here, this thing is packed to the gills with tools. To be precise, it contains 13 functions, and has a tool for just about anything you’ll encounter routinely throughout a day.
It has two blades, as mentioned, along with a wood saw and scissors. In addition, it contains can and bottle openers with screwdrivers, along with tweezers and a toothpick. It also has a hook, reamer and corkscrew along with the ability to carry all of this by means of its key ring. Generally speaking, while there are bigger, tougher tools, this thing is not lacking much by means of functionality.
Victorinox Outdoor Master
Victorinox does not get a lot of press time for its fixed blades, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t deserve credit for them. Overall, they are thoughtfully designed and extremely tough. Most importantly, the role that a fixed blade can play is a role for which there is no substitute.
Unlike the other tools on this list, the only specific tool contained in the Victorinox Outdoor Master is its fixed blade. However, in the hands of a skilled outdoorsman, that’s all you need. After all, they say that “the more skills you have, the less gear you need.”
In the hands of an experienced outdoorsman, a fixed blade can fill the roles of most of the tools covered in this article. Of course, it has a straight edge, but experienced outdoorsmen can make chip cuts to replace a saw blade, safely use a knife to open a bottle and drive screws or as an awl to punch leather. There is a fine line between use and abuse, but a fixed blade is the most useful tool you can have, bar none.
This full tang knife has a sturdy blade with a scandi grind and a tough drop point. It’s micarta scales are extremely abrasion resistant and will not absorb moisture, allowing them to offer an excellent grip in nearly all circumstances. In addition, this knife comes with a Kydex sheath with a Tek-Lok to secure the blade. If you need a fixed blade bearing the Victorinox name to accompany you on your ventures, this very well may be it.
These are only a few of the many Swiss Army Knife tools that we carry here at White Mountain Knives, and though they are some of the best, there are many more excellent picks out there. In fact, we didn’t even cover any of the folding multi tools that include pliers on this list. For that, we welcome you to read our other blog posts highlighting some of these and other Victorinox tools. Otherwise, take some time to look through our page of Victorinox products to find your favorites. If you don’t see what you’re looking for, please reach out to us at whitemountainknives@gmail.com. We’d be more than happy to help you find the perfect Swiss Army Knife to be your constant companion.