SHARP Thought : The name Huginn stands For

SHARP Thought: The name Huginn stands for thought. Do the theoretical thoughts behind the design also work in practice?

 

 The Huginn is named after one of the ravens of the Germanic god Odin

   Odin is the Germanic father of the gods. According to legend he has two ravens, which he sends every day for a flight around the world. When they return, they sit on Odin's shoulders and tell him everything they saw on their flight.

   These ravens are called Thought and Memory - Hugin and Munin, or in the English spelling Huginn and Muninn. It is after Huginn that Ukrainian knifemaker Ivan Braginets named his new design, which is being put into mass production by Real Steel.

   The Huginn is the first Real Steel knife to incorporate a slide lock. The Liner Lock has a big advantage: It is very secure even under high load. It is also very comfortable to use - for both right-handed and left-handed users.  A round pin, a good three millimeters thick, sits transversely in the handle and is pressed into a recess in the blade root by a spring on each side between the liner and the handle shell.  For an Liner Lock to fail, the bolt or liner would have to break. pin or liner break, or both springs springs fail at the same time.

   To unlock, pull the bolt protruding from the out of the handle scales with the thumb and then fold the blade back with the forefinger. Wear is compensated for by placing a pin on both the blade root and in the recess of the handle shell is installed in the recess of the handle.

 

 

The Slide-Lock is very safe and also easy for left-handed people to operate

 The Side-Lock has been established on the market for over 20 years and has proven itself in bestsellers like the Benchmade Griptilian. It is gratifying that other manufacturers are now also bringing great designs with comparable systems to the market.

One can hope that Real Steel will follow up the Huginn with more models featuring the new Slide Lock. The modified Spearpoint shape of the blade is versatile.

   Our test specimen arrived impeccably sharpened and also has a very cutting-friendly blade geometry: at a With a moderate blade thickness of three millimeters, the flat grind tapers out finely.

   Cutting with the Huginn is really fun. For the steel, Real Steel chose the high-quality VG-10 steel, which is known for its high rust resistance and edge retention and can also be hardened to a fairly high level. However, VG-10 is quite demanding when sharpening: Patience and time, and high-quality sharpening materials are required to achieve a really smooth cutting edge. The best way to bear down the steel is a combination of diamond and ceramic.

 

    From the factory, the Huginn is a classic one-handed knife with a thumb pin on both sides. In our test sample, the thumb studs were really firmly glued with screw locking and could not be unscrewed at first. The trick: After we had heated the threadlocker with a hairdryer for a few minutes and thus liquefied it again, we were able to remove the pins with pliers and a screwdriver.

   For its quite decent size, the Huginn is very light: the steel liners are skeletonized and the backspacer is made of lightweight G-10. Due to the very slim and also flat construction results in good carrying properties. The Deep-Carry-Clip is mounted at the tail - with it the knife disappears almost invisibly in the trouser pocket.

   Due to the rear mounting, the clip can be easily moved from the right to the leftwithout leaving ugly holes in the handle. In combination with the slide lock, this is one of the rare knives that can really be used 100% comfortable with one hand, even by left-handers.

   Despite the really slim design, the handle of the Huginn lies well and slip-proof in the hand. On the one hand, this is due to the rough structure of the G-10 handle scales. On the other hand, the handle is also ergonomically shaped, although visually very discreet, but haptic well noticeable.

   The thumb ripple on the back of the blade is positioned exactly right and also supports powerful work. The ribbing at the end of the handle serves as a thumb rest in the tactical Reverse grip, but is not really necessary and sometimes also somewhat annoying.

  Despite minimal shortcomings, the Huginn is an almost perfect EDC overall. It really lives up to its namesake: it is very well thought out, cleanly finished and, at a prize of around 95 Euro, in no way overpriced.

 Text & Photos: Tactical Gear  - Thomas Laible (Original text from German, extract from RSK)