The Kephart! Does This Old Bushcraft Knife Design Still Holds?

[@HankSielski]

Kephart and other outdoors folks from 100 years ago 10:19 used their tools differently. Ax was used for wood prep, assisted by pocket knife. Fixed blade was for skinning and butchering game and food prep. Kephart’s fixed blade didn’t have sharp spine. Fire was made with flint and steel. No ferocerium rods.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Thanks for the bushcraft history! Those outdoor folks 100 years ago must have had a treasure of outdoor knowledge. Nowadays bushcrafting is a hobby, back than the way to stay alive. Inspirational 👍

[@8626John]

This gentleman nailed it. Old time woodsmen used axes and knives for their designed tasks. Not to say they couldn't or didn't baton with a knife, but I don't believe it was nearly as common back then as now.

[@Gen_Lee247]

Love the Swedish culture! Would love to take a trip out there knowing full well the heritage of tools holds so much historical significance, especially the axes! You guys are well rounded folks and plenty of funny too! Cheers from a Canadian native🍻

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

That is just awesome to hear! Thanks a lot! Hope you get the chance one day to visit Sweden and I am sure there is a lot to experience regarding historical craftsmanship of tools and products. Just watched the Swedish news and they talked about a huge amount of forest fires in Canada. Hope you are safe and doing well. Thanks for your message! Cheers!🍻

[@GONEOUTSIDE]

Hej! New to your chan. Awesome vids! Got the Brisa kephart for a while now. Like H. Kephart I mostly combine it with a hatchet. Then its a really nice allrounder. Convexed the bevel, now feathersticking and sharpening is much easier! Great knive!

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Great hearing that! Thanks a lot! Sounds like some great modifications you did😁👍

[@charlesgore8428]

Great knife

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

we agree :)

[@OldForestBushcraft]

I love the Brisa Kephart 115. One of my most used knife of last year. Thanx for the review!

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Nice to hear! What kind of tasks did you use the knife the most for? Thanks for your Kephart review as well :)

[@OldForestBushcraft]

@@westcoastbushcrafters I’ve used it as kind of a mushroom/food prep/bushcraft knife. It definitely aint the best bushcrafter, but I’ ve noticed I stil grabed it often with me. Loooove the handle, and general balance of the knife, nice and slicy. Dunno sometimes I just like some knives, though they aren’ t the best performers lol, wierd…

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Excellent food prepper indeed! Haha yeah there are many reasons that involve choosing the knife for the day and quality is not always the most dominating 😁👍. I tend to bring often one of my older knives with me. I have to admit that I bring too many knives with me on a day out in the field though 😂

[@tuerkefechi]

I think next to the Condor Bushlore (and maybe the Condor Puuko), the Brisa Kephart is one of the best classical looking Jack-of-all-trades Knifes for Bushcrafting, Outdoor, woodworking and also for fighting.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Isn’t it awesome to have a knife high up that list that just works for all those situations

[@quinntheeskimooutdoors6234]

Looks good 😊thanks for sharing 😊

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Thanks for watching! Its a nice knife😁

[@afprojektcz]

Nice video guys, I always look forward to your video! It's nice to see Brisa Kephart in hand and at work! Cheers boys and good luck!😉👍👌🔪👈😀

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Awesome that you are following us😁👍! Thanks a lot!🙏

[@afprojektcz]

@@westcoastbushcrafters 🙂👍👌

[@airiksknifereviews9548]

I just received the blank version on my channel. I'm going to build it with thicker scales , its gonna look so COOL GUYS 😎 I can't wait . I was shocked to see just how small this knife is in person . On video, it looks much larger , it's so tiny, but hss the perfect palm width for a bushcrafter . I think this is more of a MINI Kephart than an actual kephart blade. I find it to be a perfect little carving and bushcraft size... but batoning no way . 😮just small kindling for me. The edge is very little and needs to be reprofiled with a convex bevel combo. I can tell even without the scales on that it really bites to deep . I'm gonna have a lot to work on with this project but it will be fun. I plan to make it into a neck knife , this one came with a square sheath. I've seen that Brisa sales them with a regular dangler sheath also. The square sheath really makes a good neck knife style I think. Anyways I will fix the edge and get it to feather better and show the finished knife on my channel. Thanks for sharing all your blades it really helps me choose certain knives . You guys are blessed to have one another as bushcraft buds, never take that for granted 🙏

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Hi! We subscribed to your channel! Will be fun to follow the development:)! Impressive work you have done on the kephart. Yeah this kephart is not so big what you would expect it to be. But it is nice! Thanks a lot for leaving a message! Happy to hear you like our content and good luck with modifiying knives! Great work! Take care!

[@airiksknifereviews9548]

@@westcoastbushcrafters Very cool guys ! Thanks so much.

[@pepejuan2924]

I think modern bushcraft focuses more on wood prepping than food prepping and both are very important concerning bushcraft, what I would like to see is game prepping included in a comparison of popular bushcraft design knives like skinning and meat cutting, after all bushcraft is sustaining ourselves in the wild, if we packed in our preprocessed wood like most do when it comes to food could we still call it bushcraft?👍😁💪🏻

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Virtuovice is showing that very well. Really like how he compares his knives durning those hunting tasks. Give us some more years and we both have our hunting license so we can show our knife collection exactly in that setup as well :)

[@pepejuan2924]

@@westcoastbushcrafters 👍😁💪🏻

[@navigator1372]

That's what a nessmuk knife is for. The Becker bk 19 is a great balance between Bushcraft, skinning, food prep and tactical but strong enough for batoning

[@Dissentient01]

Out of all of your BRK , what is your go to? Mine is the Bravo Tope Recon.

[@thomasw_]

for me a toss up between the bravo 1,25 or the aurora (original model) -- both in 3v

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

One of the bushcrafters, tope recon and bravo 1 (for batoning bravo 1.5)

[@LittlyLary]

What is the Anorak and gloves Tim wore in this video? Edit: I see now it is the fjällräven no. 8

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Indeed the no 8 anorak and hestra workglove nr II or nr. III😁👍

[@e.henrythripshaw4554]

I have this knife and agree completely with your conclusions. It's a really, reall nice knife., but not the best for some bushcraft tasks For a more bushcraft-oriented knife from the same maker, give the Enzo Trapper 115 in Scandi grind a try. I just got one in Elmax steel and it's the sharpest out-of-the-box knife I have ever seen, and I own a couple of LT Wright knives. Maybe I just got a good one, but I can't imagine a sharper knife. It's probably a bit small and thin-of-blade to be a great battoner, but it should excel at everything else. Great video! You should have a million subscribers and are my favorite KZbin channel by far. I'd gladly be a Patreon supporter if you offered it.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Wow thank you very much!😁🙏 awesome to hear! Much appreciated! The trapper and the trooper are knives that we talked about a lot and not fully understand why we don’t have those in our collection yet😅. Great to hear that you have such positive experiences with the trapper. Worth a purchase most likely 😁👍. Thanks again

[@adamchavez4128]

Is the jacket you wear the ANORAK NO. 8 M From fallkniven?

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Hi, yes it is the anorak no. 8 indeed😁👍. It is from the brand Fjällräven.

[@adamchavez4128]

Thank you! It looks warm, I hope lol

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Windproof at least😄. You can put a lot of clothes underneath it👍

[@adamchavez4128]

You guys should go over your clothing and gear you wear. I'm an avid hiker and getting into hunting now. Clothing has always been an issue for me and stationed up here in Alaska and want to get into more bushcrafting. I ended up buying the L.T. Wright Illuminos 5 & the Fallkniven F1 Pro in elmax, thanks to you guys. I love the blades, and they do what there supposed to do.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

That is awesome to hear! 😁 Great to hear you are happy with the knives you bought. Thanks for the advice to focus on clothing we wear. We have it on our list as a “best bushcraft gear” episode and nice to hear there is interest for it. We gone work with that😁👍 Cheers!

[@dovepiranha6543]

Thank you for the review. He is right it is a good second camping knife. If the blade was just 1 centimeter longer i would have bought it.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Thanks for watching and leaving a comment!

[@greekveteran2715]

Old, is Gold!!

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

:-)

[@greekveteran2715]

Brisa may not make the best handle ergos, but their blades come with some of the best heat treatments and bevel geometries I've seen on any knife.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Thats great to hear! What do you think about there Trooper 115? Looks to me like a nice grind

[@greekveteran2715]

@@westcoastbushcrafters The Trooper is designed for general use rather than bushcraft or woodworking task. That's why it's edge bevel is raised more than common bushcraft knives come with. If you're really good at reprofiling a knife, you can make it work for anything though. It won't be as good as a Morakniv Black at bushcrafting but it will be bit better on other tasks. You can't go wrong with a Brisa knife. And always remember, it's not the steel, but everything else that matters the most. Edge and blade geometry, heat treatment, handle and even the sheath, are far more important, than the steel itself. Marketing lies, have made a lot of damage, on knife designs and the knowledge about this tool, I really don't like all that misinformation, Carbon steels, are the way to go for a scandi grind knife. and if you want bushcraft taks, do not go for 4mm and thicker blade with a scandi grind.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Thanks a lot for your detailed answer😄👍. Like and agree regarding the focus on the aspects of a knife. Trooper and trapper are 2 knives that look interesting to me although operating in different fields.

[@cecilm3720]

I would have considered it, but it’s not available to buy/order where I live. I bought the Esee PR4 instead. A modern interpretation of the Kephart.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Looked up the Esee PR4. Looks like a sturdy Kephart. How does the handle feels? You like it? Cheers!

[@cecilm3720]

I really like it. Love the blade shape and length. The handle is good too (I have normal sized hands). As a fun project, maybe order some $7 screws from Esee and put 1/8” liners underneath the scales. But that would be more for fun than out of necessity.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Nice to hear! That is a fun to test out. Making some adjustments on the thickness of the handle. Nice possibility to adjust a knife like that. Could make a big difference for some people. Take care!

[@Airik1111bibles]

Full flat grinds with a convexomg actually can make some of the best feathers. I think the motor memory from using acandi grinds takes time to switch over in our heads. I've found that if I use a full flat kephart like my Ontario SK5 Blackbird exclusively for a month things change . You can get better control with your cuts and actually make very tight awesome curls. That's just me from my experience, some people just hate flat grinds and can't find the apex. As for batoning , I'd only do 3 inch branches for kindling, they are just too thin. You guys would like the Ontario SK5 Blackbird but unfortunately Ontario knife Company "OKC "is shutting their doors. ...IM VERY SAD over this . They have been a brand that I've loved for years. They can be rough and need elbow grease out of box but that's why they were affordable. They make fun project blades a bit like kabar Becker but rougher. They will be missed. I plan to build a Brisa Kephart and make a review on my old knife channel. I was going to do knife reviews at one time but never stuck with it. Thanks for sharing , your channel is excellent 👍

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Thanks for your comment, great to hear that you like our content. We have no experience when it comes to Ontario knives, but we’ve seen that knives and tools have some in stock. We will check it out.

[@glbwoodsbum2567]

Ontario knives is not closing for good. I believe they got bought out.

[@Airik1111bibles]

@glbwoodsbum2567 Yep they did .

[@glbwoodsbum2567]

@@Airik1111bibles They did what??

[@Airik1111bibles]

@@glbwoodsbum2567 Got bought out, just agreeing with you. I bet sales went up big time cause everyone was buying blades they thought would be gone forever . They should go out of buisness every few months like furniture stores . 😁

[@zdenekbart]

I have L.T.Wright Genesis A2 steel, Ironwood scales with black liners and its great bushcraft knife. Kephart style. Brisa its not good example for Kephart style knife. Try Lt's. That is different level.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

We would love to test that one out one day! LT Wright impressed us with the illuminous 5 a lot!😁👍

[@swagmanandy]

Does the design still hold? Well yes it does if you use it for what it's designed for , Horace Kephart and for that matter any of his friends never battened a stick with their knives ever.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Thanks for pointing out. We understand. We just like to test knives👍

[@thegoofinator8522]

Heja heja!

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Tackar tackar!

[@johnroberts6353]

Another copy-cat knife "test" that starts out with batoning. Kephart would have never used his good hunting knife to split wood. That was axe work back then, and still is today..

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Thanks for your insight! You make a valid point-traditionally, an axe would be used for heavy wood splitting. However, our goal with this test was to demonstrate the versatility of the Kephart knife in various scenarios, including tasks it might not typically be used for. While Horace Kephart may not have batoned with his knife, many modern outdoorsmen appreciate knowing how their tools can perform in a pinch. We encourage using the right tool for the job, but it's also interesting to explore the capabilities of these iconic designs

[@buškrafterinabaterije]

I dont like Kephart "lens shape grind" idea, dont like the design in particular.

[@westcoastbushcrafters]

Also good to know what not to like. Luckily there are many different configurations nowadays 👍