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213 of 221 found the following review helpful:
 A Survival Knife 1/4 The Cost Of Its Peers Mar 27, 2009
By Ed Richardson
"Ed"
I purchased this knife because I wanted an ergonomic survival knife that was both high quality and affordable. I got it delivered to me on a silver platter with this blade. A bolt of excitement will shoot up your spine the moment you grasp the handle and remove the cardboard shipping sheath from it and realize you're holding a tractable survival knife that is thicker than a pry bar. It is a serious hunk of metal at 1/4" thick - as thick as a Tom Brown Tracker or a Busse Ash-1 without costing as much as a Playstation 3.
Ethan Becker, the man who designed this knife, is a mountain climber, chef, and survivalist. He designed these same types of blades for the legendary but now defunct Camillus. Ka-bar was wise to ask him on board and he continues his basic approach - bringing people Busse-style ultra-thick high-quality steel fixed blades to those of us who don't want to shell out $450 for a used Ash-1 on Ebay or $275 for a Tom Brown Tracker. The Ka-Bar Becker BK2 Companion is easily in their league.
The Kydex shealth is excellent too - the knife snaps into it without even using the snap on belt and it's much tougher than leather and will not retain moisture. More lanyard holes than you could possibly need too.
I ordered my Becker Companion through Goliath and it came two days ahead of schedule. I cannot emphasize this knife enough. It is the survivalist's survival knife. It is not a short sword or a silly Rambo knife. You can baton through a piece of steel pipe and then go skin a rabbit or fillet fish or whittle an oak spear with this knife if you so choose. I think that sums it up pretty well. Indestructible yet tractable.
88 of 89 found the following review helpful:
Amazing Knife Sep 16, 2009
By J. Elder
This is an awesome knife by Ethan Becker, available from KA-BAR. Great for handling just about anything you could ask from a solid everyday carry survival knife, including batoning wood. The edge that came on the blade was shaving sharp out of the box, the handle has one of the most comfortable I have come across, and the sheath is versatile yet durable. I can't speak highly enough about this work-horse of a knife that feels incredibly rugged in your hand.
The pricing here on Amazon is about as good as I have been able to find- I think I paid maybe a dollar or two less for mine from another website. Including shipping you should not spend more than $65 on this knife, which sets it even further apart as being an outstanding buy. If you do some research, you will quickly find that comparable knives go for at least $200.
Get the Bk2, you will not be disappointed.
86 of 94 found the following review helpful:
Heavy Duty Jul 11, 2009
By Common Sense
If you are looking for something light. Don't buy it. If you are looking for something that is rust-proof and requiring no blade maintenance, don't buy it. If you are looking for the sturdiest, most durable blade in a survival/camping knife, get this one. You can chop a 4" birch to the ground with this knife. Yet, you can get the thing as sharp as you want. It has no peer when it comes to the amount of abuse it can take. It is well worth the money. Get yourself one.
28 of 29 found the following review helpful:
The Ka-Bar Becker BK2 simply walks into Mordor Jun 27, 2010
By Egei
There is SO much to say about the Ka-Bar BK2, but I'll try to keep this short, sweet and to the point... no promises
First off, I need to say that the pictures that they show of the knife on Amazon.com aren't 100% accurate for this knife. The picture that they show is of the BK2 first edition. The knife that you will receive if you order one is slightly different, but in a good way in my opinion. The bottom of the handle in the picture shows that the handle material and the bottom of the knife are flush together, when in reality the knife you will receive has an extended tang that sticks out of the bottom of the handle by about 1/3 to 1/2 of an inch; This allows for the knife to be used as a chisel.
The BK2 is an absolute BEAST! You can put this knife through just about any torture test and it'll come out ready to kick Chuck Norris' butt. The blade is 1/4 of an inch thick which makes the entire knife feel sturdy and VERY hefty in your hand. The knife isn't a light one, but for camping or any other place you may need to chop wood, this knife will blow the competition out of the water. The BK2 is definitely more for brute jobs like chopping wood, cutting thick plastic or anything you would need a hatchet for. You can also use this knife as a chisel because of the extended handle that I mentioned earlier.
The handle of the BK2 feels just as solid as the blade of the knife. The handle is made of grivory. Grivory is a very hard material which feels a lot like the love child if glass-filled nylon and aluminum had a baby. If you take the two halves of the handle apart, you have a fairly good sized space inside of the handle in which you could store some small survival items like some fishing line and a few hooks. The handle has a very solid feel to the shape of it; while the handle isn't made of a very "grippy" material, the shape of this knife handle will make it pretty hard to slip out of your grip, wet or dry.
What better way to finish up a fantastic knife review than to tell you about the fantastic sheath that comes with the knife. The BK2 comes with an extremely well molded kydex sheath. (for those of you who don't like kydex, just ignore me while I gush over this sheath) It comes with many different customization options and places to wrap molle straps, paracord or other kinds of rope or material. Another plus to getting the newer generation model of this knife is that they improved not only the looks of the sheath, but also the functionality of it as well; The sheath now holds the knife in place extremely firmly, which is an area that they had problems with before with the earlier edition. The only downside to the sheath is the nylon strap that they used in order to attach it to your belt; The nylon strap loop is WAY to big. (this can be easily solved by stitching it together in the middle) There is even a section of the sheath that indents, making it possible to put something like a magnesium fire starter on it without interfering with the way the sheath fits snugly against your leg. The last thing that I love about the sheath is that it has a drain hole on the very bottom of the sheath, where the tip of the blade is, in order for water that may get inside of the sheath to drain out through.
All together, this is one of the finest, most durable and BEST knives that I've ever owned. You will be VERY hard pressed to find a better knife that can do what this knife does, take the abuse that this knife can and still be as affordable as it is. This knife is absolutely the best value if you're looking for a knife that can take a TON of abuse and still work just as well as the day you bought it!
88 of 103 found the following review helpful:
 solid, but with caveats Apr 04, 2010
By M. Swaim
I'm not entirely sure how to do this knife justice within a five star rating system. It's very good for what it is, the question is what is it? As others have mentioned, it's a whopping quarter inch hunk of 1095 steel fashioned into a short brute of a knife shape. As near as I can tell, the knife itself is made in the USA, whereas other online sources indicate that the very well designed and executed sheath is made in Taiwan. The sheath itself deserves some commentary as I feel that it's easily worth maybe half the cost of the $63 knife/sheath system. The blade snaps solidly into the plastic sheath and the retention is good enough for inverted carry even without using the provided nylon grip snap retainer. The heavy duty sheath is also fully ambidextrous.
The plastic handle is retained by allen bolts with nuts and it's a good thing they're user tightenable, since the handle loosened up almost immediately with some batoning through hickory kindling. The blade is certainly robust enough for plenty of batoning through wood, yet at only 5.25" long, it's too short for batoning through much over about 3" wood or so. Yet, it's short length makes it relatively easy to carry on one's belt. When using it to whack and chop, I found it to be particularly bone jarring, and it's short length makes it a very inefficient chopper, even though it's quite heavy for it's size. I've seen comments to the effect that this would be a better knife with thinner micarta handle scales, and I agree, but at that point, it might well become as expensive as an Ontario Rat 5, which in my opinion, is an all around better knife for most purposes.
Some have said that the Campanion works as a kitchen knife. That's true as far as it goes, but nearly any dedicated kitchen knife or cleaver one happens to have is a superior slicer, and dicer due to the extreme thickness of the Campanion and the resulting obtuse bevel. Edge retention on the 1095 blade is only so-so.
The Amazon blurb that describes this as "lightweight" is hysterical. At nearly a pound (14.6 ounces), this knife is actually heavier than some lightweight tomahawks and hatchets. That brings up the question of whether one is better off with a lightweight puuko, or even a Becker Necker, combined with a light hatchet, machete or 'hawk, and in my opinion, the answer is most definitely. I like the Becker Campanion, but honestly can't think of too many scenarios where it would be my first choice in a carry knife. I'll probably use this one as a backup knife left in the vehicle for any situations in which, for whatever reasons I either don't have something more suitable with me, or want a knife that can be used as a beater. It's a good solid tool that should last for several lifetimes. I recommend it with reservations, though.
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