Building the Ultimate Survival Knife with Master Bladesmith Charly Mann

Forge It Ultimate Survival Knife Charly Mann lead — The BUC knife was designed from the ground up to handle virtually any task in any environment, hence its “Brush Urban Combat” name.

Forge It Ultimate Survival Knife Charly Mann fire — Master bladesmith Charly Mann gets moving with his block of 5160 steel welded onto a handle.

Forge It Ultimate Survival Knife Charly Mann sharpening — Master bladesmith Charly Mann hard at work sharpening what would become the first-ever BUC Knife.

Forge It Ultimate Survival Knife Charly Mann Ed Earle — Master bladesmith Charly Mann (left) and author Edward Earle with the finished BUC Knife.

Forge It Ultimate Survival Knife Charly Mann field — Testing in Utah’s Logan Canyon showed that the BUC could handle a number of tasks with ease, including sawing and chopping.

Forge It Ultimate Survival Knife Charly Mann tomato — Tomatoes cut like butter with zero effort using the BUC Knife.

Forge It Ultimate Survival Knife Charly Mann forging — Master bladesmith Charly Mann brings his 5160 steel over to the power hammer.

For the spring 2018 issue of Ballistic Magazine, we teamed up with Master Bladesmith Charly Mann to build the ultimate survival knife. A task easier said than done, but we did it.

The knife is called the BUC. It stands for “Bush Urban Combat,” and it might just be the ultimate survival knife.

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As a bonus to you, we filmed the entire process from start to finish. Watch ALL THREE episodes of “Forge it” below.

Let’s just say at the start of this article that my team and I thought that we had bitten off way more than we could chew when it came to the design and creation of this blade concept. There was a huge potential for this knife to come off as a complete gimmick to many serious blade users, more in alignment with a Hollywood prop seen in a movie like “The Expendables” than a legitimately serious hard-use, multi-use survival knife.

But now the knife has been forged into a reality. We’ve spent weeks using it in all the ways we intended it to be used. And I can say that our initial skepticism has turned around. This knife reflects my concepts in a survival knife in almost every facet. Now that it’s finished and in use, I will say that the blade is scary sharp, scary deadly and just plain scary good at everything.

To read the entire “Forge It” piece, pick up a copy of the spring 2018 issue of Ballistic Magazine. The issue is available now at OutdoorGroupStore.com.

For more on Charly Mann, please visit MannMadeKnives.com.