While you can carry a standalone axe for emergency and planned uses when outdoor camping, hunting, backpacking, or fishing, carrying a folding axe is even better, given the many tools you’ll have at your disposal.
How you use a folding axe survival tool depends on your needs as an outdoor enthusiast and the type of sub-tools or elements it has, which varies from company to company. Here’s how to use your newest folding axe tool.
The axe is the main element in the folding axe survival tool, and you can use it to chop and split wood when camping or fishing.
The axe features a sharp edge that you can use to split and chop wood through repeated hits. It will likely take a lot of hits to complete the task because the tool is light and may not exert much impact on the wood.
When chopping wood, you’ll want to make your work easier by making the kerf about the same size as the diameter of the wood. A larger kerf makes it easier to chip away at the wood.
Since folding axes are lightweight tools, you’ll be better off chopping or splitting wood with successive light hits rather than heavy hits that may cause the axe to spin or your hand to feel massive recoil. You should refrain from cutting hardwoods or large logs of wood.
The tactical axe comes with a hammerhead, which you can use to drive nails into wood or tent pegs/stakes and sticks to the ground.
The best way to do this is to have the whole folding axe connected so you have a long handle to make driving nails or stakes easier since the load will be further away from the effort.
When you unlock the multifunctional axe from the long handle, you can use it for delicate work, such as trimming or carving wood shavings to start a fire.
Keeping a folding axe survival tool is an excellent idea. You might need it to break out of the car in an emergency by smashing the glass windows with the axe’s glass breaker or even the axe itself.
Most multi-tool axes have a glass breaker along the folding handle, which you can access by unlocking the handle parts.
The glass breaker comes in handy in some situations, but it would make more sense to use the axe tool itself to break windows in a dire emergency.
Most multi-tool folding axes feature a bottle opener, which you can use to open bottles. The bottle opener is usually attached to the knife and locked away inside the interlocking parts of the handle.
The knife in this camping gear is ideal for cutting food and game using the smooth sharp edge. You can also use the knife for more delicate work, such as scraping wood shavings for making a fire.
The knife’s serrated edge is suitable for lightweight sawing to make notches in wood, but preferably only if the folding axe doesn’t have a saw.
The serrated knife is also ideal for descaling fish, if the folding axe doesn’t have a fish scaling tool.
Once you have some tinder or wood shavings scraped from wood with the axe or knife, you can use the fire steel hidden inside the long handle to start a campfire.
You can create sparks to ignite the shavings or tinder by striking the fire steel with the serrated edge of the knife.
Some folding axe survival gear comes with a flashlight, which you can use to light your way at night or any place you might need artificial light during the day or night.
Getting stuck in ice or snow can be fatal. If you have your folding axe with you, you can use it to chop ice and break it up to release yourself from the trap.
You could also use this piece of survival gear to chisel or dig through ice and snow.
Some folding axes have a chopping chisel head instead of a hammerhead. You can use this to dig the ground or ice as needed.
The axe head in a folding axe survival tool is ideal for hunting and gathering food in the wild.
Throw the axe at nearby game to paralyze them, especially if it’s small game such as rabbits, which only require a light blow to incapacitate.
The axe tool can also be used to field-dress the game, though you’ll have better success with the knife at this if it’s available.
This outdoor camping gear is also suitable for cutting bones and breaking the hard shells of nuts.
Most folding axe survival tools come with a high-pitched whistle within the handle.
You can use the whistle in desperate situations to alert anyone that might be close that you need their help.
The whistle may also help scare away some predators when you blow it relentlessly. The shrill noise may scare animals away.
Being out in the wild sometimes makes you the target of predators looking for an easy kill for their next meal.
In such dire situations, you can use the axe as a self-defense tool to incapacitate the predator or kill them if necessary.
The compass is usually the last thing at the end of the long folding axe handle, covering the hollow tube.
The detachable compass is ideal for checking your location and the direction to take if you get lost.
Besides the serrated knife for descaling fish, some folding axe tools may have a dedicated fish scaler, which you can use to remove fish scales before cooking.
Some folding axe survival tools may have a shovel that you can use for lightweight shoveling.
If your folding axe features a folding saw, you can use it to saw through the wood to make cuts or notches.
These should preferably be small-sized softwoods. Large-sized wood and hardwoods may damage the saw, not to mention wear you out.
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