The tried and true Swiss Army Knife

I’ll take a break from discussing unitaskers and follow Erin’s lead by talking about multi-taskers. The classic Victorinox Swiss Army Ranger Pocket Knife measures in at 3.5 inches and weighs a miniscule 4.8 ounces as it packs a whopping 20 different tools including:

  • Large and small knife blade
  • Corkscrew
  • Can opener
  • Bottle opener
  • Cap lifter
  • Screwdriver
  • Wire stripper
  • Reamer, punch
  • Multi-purpose hook
  • Nail file
  • Nail cleaner
  • Scissors
  • Metal file
  • Fine screwdriver
  • Wood saw
  • Toothpick
  • Tweezers
  • Key ring (ok, so this isn’t really a tool)

You can’t take it on an airplane, but around your house it has endless possibilities. This is the gold standard of multi-taskers. A Leatherman Multitool is the only multi-tasker that plays in the same league. Go get your MacGyver on!

Popularity: 3% [?]

Posted by Matt on Jul 12, 2007 | Comments | Tweet This

13 comments posted

  1. Posted by Brian - 07/12/2007

    For my money, the Victorinox SwissTool is a better option than the Leatherman.

  2. Posted by BigNerd - 07/12/2007

    BigNerd never goes anywhere without his Gerber multi-tool. Retracting pliers that can be opened and closed with one hand. All blades and tools have safety locks. It one bad mamby-jamby. Not as lightweight and pocket-friendly as the knife, but it’s always in my MacGyver backpack… and I inevitably need pliers for something.
    Have a look-see here: http://tinyurl.com/32cy53

  3. Posted by Raisin - 07/12/2007

    Agreed on the Gerber. I got mine as a gift in the mid-90s. I got it when it first came out, and at the time they didn’t offer locking blades, or the needle nose. In fact mine has the leather punch instead of the file, and the I have not found a newer locking style gerber with the leather punch.

    I carry a gerber multi-tool and a gerber mini-ridge on the d-ring knife holder on my victorinox laptop bag. Both the ridge and the gerber multi-tool feature single handed-operation, and that combined with a dedicated knife holder on my laptop bag make it easily accessable, and easy to consistently put it away in its home.

    Not to go to far off topic, but using several multi-taskers like a multi-tool along with a backpack designed to have dedicated outer pockets for keys, wallets, knives, cellphones, sunglasses, nintendo ds, thumb-drives, headphones, etc along with a backpack station and/or landing strip has reduced my clutter considerably. I have a backpack station at both work and home, and a victorinox messenger bag. I flip over the top flap, set the bag on the backpack station next to my desk and have all my little gadgets in their more or less permanent home. When I leave, I throw whatever gadgets are missing in their dedicated pocket, flip over the flap, and I’m ready to go.

  4. Posted by Monica Ricci - 07/12/2007

    I don’t know about the one you profiled here, but I LOOOOVE my Leatherman! :) Let’s hear it for multi-taskers!
    ~Monica

  5. Posted by Melinda - 07/13/2007

    The toothpick always makes me laugh. My dad had one when I was growing up.
    Melinda

  6. Posted by tom - 07/13/2007

    I have the Cybertool. Screwdriver with bits, lightweight plyers, eyeglass screwdriver plus all the other swiss army bits. It’s good enough that I don’t need my screwdriver when I’m repairing computers (I’m a system administrator).

    It’s a medium pocket knife that I can carry in a pocket. No holster needed.

    Raisin – I’d love to see a pic of that backpack

  7. Posted by Arjun Muralidharan - 07/13/2007

    It makes me feel so patriotic…

  8. Posted by Cyrano - 07/13/2007

    I love my Leatherman Crunch, and never leave anywhere without it (it has locking pliers – absolutely fantastic)!

    I even where it at work, where the attire is western business.

  9. Posted by Adam Snider - 07/13/2007

    That Gerber is pretty sweet looking.

    As for the good ol’ Swiss Army Knife, I lost mine back when I was a Boy Scout. It would be nice to find it again, though. It really is a great thing to have.

  10. Posted by Jordan - 07/16/2007

    I had this knife several years ago and it also came with a pen. The pen was slotted in like the tweezers and toothpick are.

  11. Posted by Deb - 07/16/2007

    I loved MacGyver!! And yes, I still love my Swiss Army knife, too.

  12. Posted by Raisin - 07/16/2007

    Tom, it is the Victorinox Charles.

    http://www.ebags.com/products/.....elid=94164

    If I had to do it over again, I would have got the Booq Folee XM. Two reasons, my laptop is 15 inches, and the victorinox is a 17 inch compartment, and the booq has a removable sleeve for the laptop.

    I used to use an eastpak chaos messenger bag with a laptop sleeve, but it got old and worn, and they had stopped making it when I went to buy another.

  13. Posted by Cliff - 07/19/2007

    The real trick is to have a home that doesn’t require its occupant to own tools merely to have the right to occupy it. Outsource! Get an apartment and call the Super!

Subscribe to this entry's comments

Comments are closed for this entry.