Tactical Operations > Magazine Articles > TACTICAL KNIVES Magazine Article November 2003

TACTICAL KNIVES Magazine November 2003


TOPS teams up with one of the hottest custom tactical makers to produce a new heavy-duty jungle blade.
By Steven Dick

Short, heavy knives like the Armageddon are at their best chopping solid wood rather than soft vines and plants.
One of the fastest rising stars of the custom tactical field has been Trace Rinaldi. Of course, along with this fame comes the certainty that the maker's knives will quickly become back ordered for the next decade or two. Given that fact, I was more than a little pleased to hear Trace had entered into an agreement with TOPS Knives to produce one of his more popular models, the "Armageddon." Basically, the Armageddon is a "mini-machete" with a flat ground 10 5/8-inch long by 10 1/4-inch thick recurved edge blade of 1095 carbon steel at a Rc of 58. The handle is 5 1/4-inch long with black Micarta finger grooved handle slabs in the pattern Rinaldi knives are well known for. A Kydex sheath is provided with each knife. Weight, knife alone, 23 ounces, in the sheath, 29 1/2-ounces. Price, $299. So what is the purpose of a knife this size? Many wilderness survival enthusiasts seem to feel a knife of about this length is ideal for their needs. Long enough to serve as a compact machete, short enough to still handle most knife work, and heavy enough to replace a small hatchet. The one point I would make about using a blade under 14 inches as a machete is that it ends up needing to be much heavier to still get the job done. On the plus side, a 10 5/8-inch blade is a lot handier to carry than a full-size machete. It probably goes without saying that the Armageddon has considerable potential as a military weapon, but I personally probably would consider it too heavy to carry in anything but a jungle environment. As a rule, I normally have at least one blade in the Armageddon class under the seat of my 4X4 along with a shovel, axe, multi-tool, and assorted other emergency repair gear. This big chopper would also probably be useful on an all-terrain 4 wheeler, wilderness canoe, snowmobile, or horse pack string. In any of these situations the weight matters little because something else is carrying it.
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