Customer Reviews

Timber Rattler Western Outlaw Bowie Knife

5 star:		(44)
4 star:		(19)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Well, first off, let me say I definitely had a "lol, holy ****?!" moment when I first opened the box. I'm pretty sure if you were to pull this out on your next camping trip, the first words out of people's mouths would be," Are you serious?" If anyone has watched Gladiator, during the opening battle where Maximus decapitated the enemy and his sword became stuck on the tree trunk.... that sword is only slightly bigger than this knife.

Anyways, let's get to the review. Knife came super fast. It is somewhat large, as implied above. The picture posted by Amazon is misleading, because my knife does not look all shiny and glossy and new. In fact, it looks...used? The handle, and I'm quoting," ...classic dark blue accented with brass bolsters..." is not dark blue. It's more like dark brown, with dirty white stains on it. Imagine a dark brown deck, with chalk written on it. Then when it rains, the chalk gets runny and you get weird white stains. The brass is noticeably scratched in multiple places and also with some small nicks and dents, and definitely not smooth and shiny. There are slight gaps between the brass, wood, and metal of the blade, yet nothing rattles or is loose. The blade itself is full tang, and razor, razor sharp. I'm pretty sure someone recently sharpened it.

Overall, the integrity of the knife blade feels solid, despite the cosmetic imperfections elsewhere. I have a strong inclination that this is not a new knife and that's fine with me. I was saved the effort of sharpening it myself, so it's a decent trade-off. For the price I paid, I wasn't planning on mounting this thing or passing it on to my children; i.e. I will put this thing to work. This is probably why I am keeping the knife versus returning it for another one. This will go next to the machete in the garage, or maybe in my suv for the off chance that a grizzly bear will escape from the zoo in downtown Atlanta and I have to dispatch it.

Oh and it came with a leather sheath with a belt loop and a snap on loop to secure the knife. The sheath is unimpressive at best, but has a pleasant diamond design on one side resembling a rattlesnake skin.

Beautiful looking bowie out of the box...The Timber Rattler Outlaw Bowie Knife has a full tang, blood groove, brass gaurd (or bolster) & pommel, and an extra long, razor sharp edge. This knife's blade is another in the "Timber Rattler" line made from the Pakistani Surgical Steel, which seems to be the case with all of the "Timber Rattler" knife line. Timber Rattler Outlaw Bowie Knife has the feel of a heavy & very hardy knife when held in one's hand, and is more than hardy enough to perform general utility camp duties. The hardwood handle seems to be just the proper size, matching the blades immense size, yet easily & comfortably graspable in medium to large sized hands. Cannot attest to the ability of the knife to maintain its edge sharpness as yet. Definitely a large beautiful knife.... Overall a very nice value for a sub-$20 knife, and would be a nice addition to anybody's knife collection.... My only complaints are that the knife's sheath is a little cheaply made and does not match the quality of the knife; and that the blade's knife edge had a couple of moderate defects caused by improper (or hasty) sharpening (e.g., small nicks in the knife's cutting edge).

For the money, this is a great knife. Big and heavy, it may not fit those with small hands. The finish of the blade was a little rough but I cleaned that up with a polishing wheel on a grinder in just a few minutes! Nice handle on this knife with a pretty gray laminate wood and the big brass rivets and pommel. This knife is a great buy!

When I pulled this out of the leather sheath, my jaw dropped! If somebody pulled this knife on me in a parking lot at night, I would be afraid! It's HUGE and yet it's well made. Almost too thick but definitely sturdy. This meets the definition of a Bowie knife: Large enough to use as a sword, Wide enough to use as a paddle... and heavy enough to use as an axe. An excellent deal!

I purchased two of these knives, one for my wife and one for my daughter, partly as a joke. Both are knife fanciers but neither have anything larger than a Buck. When the knives arrived we were amazed at the size and decent balance. And they come out of the box sharp.
They immediately went outside to hack at blackberry vines invading our backyard. The blades easily went through the thick blackberry stems. My wife hunts mushroom, so she took hers into the forest where it helped her crawl up and down slopes while looking for chantrelles. It saw alot of mud, but a quick cleaning and re-oiling of the blade made it look good as new.
My youngest daughter takes knife fighting classes for women. She decided to share her new knife with her Phillipino instructor. He was impressed and plans to get one himself. My kid also plans to use it when she teaches primitive survival skills this year to the Boy Scouts.
She also participates at the annual pirate and plans to wear it in a custom made sheath.
The sheath is the weakest part of the package, but useable until another sheath can be made.
We aren't going to baby these knives. While they do look impressive on display these will definitely do alot of outdoor time.
Now I only have to get one for myself.

The second I picked this thing up, I sure knew it wasn't a toy, unlike a certain knife I've recently reviewed! The overall fit and finish leave something to be desired, and is why I knocked it down a star. But then you have to remember that the price you paid for this knife doesn't entitle you to a high-end Gerber or something along those lines. The blade is a massive hunk of 420 stainless steel that is quite sharp right out of the box. The knife weighs in at nearly two pounds! I found that the blade benefitted from the application of some steel polish. It has a nice shape and design. The handle is solid and attractive with its' ornate brass stud work. On my particular knife, the two sides of the handle do not match up well. One side is dark, while the other side has grain veins that are very bright--pretty much white. This is a risk you take when dealing with wood and not a manmade material (the stock of my Winchester Model 94 suffers from a similar problem -- unmatched grain & density -- but since you can't see both sides at once, it diminishes the issue, not to mention that when I purchased it roughly 37 years ago, I wasn't yet savvy enough to know to look for such things when buying a rifle). The guard is crooked since one of the handle pieces is longer than the other. The brass-colored finish on the guard is a real weak spot -- less than smooth and is already discoloring with time (just several weeks so far, and it hasn't even been outside the house yet). The sheath is leather and smells good, but is nothing to write home about since it lacks a lower leg strap to keep this monster from slapping against your leg while walking. I do enjoy holding this knife. It has such a substantial, powerful feel to it. It can make one feel like he or she is ready for most anything that life might throw at you! After awhile, you tend to overlook and forget about the handle pieces not matching perfectly, or the one piece being a little longer than the other. Overall, the knife is very attractive, and is more than I expected for the money. It feels like it will hold up well to rough and tumble use (hacking small tree limbs off, cutting kindling, etc). The long blade is something to behold. At over 10 inches in length, with an overall knife length of 16.5 inches, this is a knife you will be proud to own, unless you are a perfectionist. In which case you can plan on easily plunking down five to 10 times as much money, if not considerably more!

I bought this massive Outlaw Bowie for camping and such. This big knife takes the place of a hatchet for splitting kindling, making tent stakes, and other chores. I've also used this big bowie to clear out brush for archery shooting lanes. The Pakistan steel is fine for my needs. The sheath is okay but the belt loop and its related cheapy fasteners are "less than ideal". So I made improvements with copper rivets purchased locally at an Amish harness shop. In summary: I like my Outlaw Bowie very much and the price is quite reasonable.

I purchased Four of these knives based on the many positive reviews I read. At first I was dissappointed. Each one had imperfections and knicks in the blade and the handle construction was was not good even for a twenty dollar knife.I got rid of three of them and kept the best of the lot for myself to use for camp wood prep and batoning,after a couple of whacks while batoning the brass guard came loose and rattled,it drove me nuts, but I fixed the problem with some loc-tite.The performance since has been perfect, I have chopped and split literally dozens of trees and logs over the last six months and the factory edge is still intact,the blade still looks as good as it did when I got it and I have beat it to death. The handle is a tad big for my hand because it is square, not round. The performance has far exceeded my expectations and $20 price. The extra weight makes it a fierce chopper also.The 11+ inch blade also helps it excel at batoning.
It is 2 inches longer than the Kabar Heavy Bowie, which also is a great batoning tool.I have to say all in all I love this knife and would not hesitate to endorse it. The sheath is not so good but works for me since I keep it in a pack.

Well worth the small amount of money you'll pay. This thing reminds me of the sword from Aladdin when Jasmine's hand is almost cut off by a merchant. It's heavy and fairly sharp (I'm going to sharpen it) and I'll definitely have it with me next time I go out into the woods!

Came fast, came sharp, feels like a well built knife, full tang, I really like the finger knotch on the base of blade.

For the money you pay it's a nice knife. I plan on experimenting with it on camping trips and what not. I heard stainless blades dull quicker compared to carbon, ect... *the more expensive knifes* but as long as you keep it sharp like any other knife your fine and to be honest i need to experiment with my sharpening more which will be in the future after some use with this thing.

Just by feeling it and looking at it ect. I made a good buy.