Folks carry knives for a lot of reasons, and self-defense is certainly one of them.
When it comes to what type of knife to carry though there are a lot of personal factors that go into that decision: training, budget, carry method, and legality where you live, just to name a few. At the end of the day though, a self-defense knife needs to be able to stop or dissuade an aggressor and that’s generally done by either slashing them or poking holes in them. In order for that to happen, you need to have the knife on you when you need it most, and that’s where the G10 daggers from VZ Grips come in to play.
Wait, VZ Grips Makes Knives?
If you’re a gun person then you probably know VZ Grips for their excellent grips for revolvers, pistols and AR pattern rifles. They make an amazing array of models in wood, carbon fiber, and G-10. If you aren’t a gun person they might be a new name to you, but just know they’ve always been known for quality design and execution. Knives, though, are not generally the first thing that springs to mind when you hear their name.
I ran into the folks at VZ at the BLADE Show 2019 and noticed right away that they had a number of G-10 knives on display at their booth. In talking with the folks working the booth, I soon unraveled an interesting story about how their knife line came to be. VZ was first approached by an Explosive Ordinance Destruction (EOD) team down in Florida to make a nonmagnetic, nonconductive knife for them for use in explosives probing. It turns out that G-10 is a perfect material to use for that task. And VZ happens to have an abundant supply of it, plus the expertise to shape it into just about any form you might need.
With the success of the specialty EOD model, VZ went on to make a series of more general purpose knives out of G-10.
This story is from the December 2019 edition of Knives Illustrated.
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This story is from the December 2019 edition of Knives Illustrated.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
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I have a confession to make. See if this sounds familiar. I take meticulous care of the knives I use for everyday carry, hunting, and general woods wandering. I wipe them down with an oily cloth after use and I never let them get too dull. Seldom do I have to restore a damaged edge. Most of the time I simply touch up the edges of my pocketknives with a few careful strokes across the rough bottom of a ceramic coffee cup. That’s usually all that’s needed. I don’t use my knives as screwdrivers or pry bars. As a matter of fact, I still have the very first knife I ever owned, an old Boy Scout knife that was handed down from my older brother. The blades have a deep patina that comes with using carbon steel over the years, but the knife is very usable still.
