Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!bellcore!att!cbnews!military
From: munnari!csc.anu.oz.au!bxr307@uunet.uu.net
Newsgroups: sci.military
Subject: Sawbacks on knives
Message-ID: <10227@cbnews.ATT.COM>
Date: 14 Oct 89 01:56:12 GMT
Sender: military@cbnews.ATT.COM
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From: munnari!csc.anu.oz.au!bxr307@uunet.uu.net
I was always taught that the sawback on a knife was not designed for cutting.
Rather it is designed for use in stabbing an opponent.  The Sawback is meant to
ensure that air is let into a wound and that the wound is ragged enough to 
prevent "suction" from the difference in air pressure between the insides of a
body and the outside which make it difficult to quickly withdraw the knife 
from a wound.

Many early twentieth century bayonets had this feature and the bayonet was the
 first to introduce the "blood groove" (the small deep grooves that run parallel
to the blade along the length of the knife) which was designed (and actually
 worked bettter than the sawback in preventing suction).  To try and use a 
"sawback" on a knife to cut wood or even metal is ridiculous.  I know of no
 large military knife that actually has had the sawback sharpened in the same
 way that a real saw is.  Thats why they won't be very successful in cutting
 things like wood or metal!  While the saw blade on the Swiss Army knife is so 
small that its utility is questionable.

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I hope thats of interest to my fellow readers of sci.military.