I continue to be pleased with the Leatherman Wave multitool that I got for my birthday. It does nothing supremely well, but it does everything well enough. No multitool is going to be perfect, since therell always be a need or function that is either unaddressed or not handled perfectly by the tool inquestion, but 9 times out of ten it’ll do the job well enough for the immediate need at hand. In fact, I like tis little thing so much that Im going to have to pick up a couple spares. It certainly beats the snot out ofp rety much any Swiss Army knife. McGyver coulda used one of these (and a set of balls).
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I was re-reading some of my older entries from about two years ago and recall bitching that gasoline was $1.86 per gallon. Good times.
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Im still deeply in love with the Nalgene water bottles. I’ve been tryng like hell to break one with various impacts and it just aint gonna happen. Im sure some folks will chime in and say ‘I can get an empty one-liter pop bottle for free that will do the same thing!’. True. Tell you what, you fill up that pop bottle and:
1) hurl it as high and as far as you can across a parking lot so it impacts on the ground and skids thirty feet
2) drop it from shoulder height, repeatedly, onto various uneven surfaces, including sharp rocks
3) Freeze, thaw, freeze, thaw, repeatedly
4) Clean with simple soap and water and remove all traces of previous flavorings
5) Find an aftermarket water filter that screws directly to the top of your pop bottle to make filling from a filter at streamside a breeze
Now, an empty designed-as-disposable pop bottle that does none of that for free, or something that will do all that and last pretty much the rest of my life for, oh, eight bucks.
Im all about saving money but not at the expense of utilitarianism, ergonomics and durability.
Love my Wave. It beats the hell out of my Gerbers any day.
Speaking of gas, I just ordered four more Swiss nato gas cans from SG today. I’m not particularly looking forward to filling them up…
BTW, $6.99 Nalgenes at Campmor.com.
I have the Leatherman Juice XE6. Like it so much that I carry it all the time.. Nalgene bottles are great I have even fallen on mine while backpacking with no effect..
damn it would be nice to find a good source of Nato cans in Canada, I can’t seem to find any…
A reasonable thick-walled PET (polyethylene terephthalate) bottle would likely handle 1-4, though polycarbonate is tougher. I think you probably just don’t want to admit that you like the pretty colors that the nalgene bottles come in.
I like my wave as well, though it’s old and beat to hell. It’s probably time for a replacement. The only downside it has is that it’s bulky to put in one’s pocket and it’s also marginally useful for defense purposes.
It’s probably time for a replacement.
What has worn out and why?
Did you ever receive the book I sent you for your birthday? There was no way for me track the deliver through Amazon because of the carrier they used.
‘I can get an empty one-liter pop bottle for free that will do the same thing!’
Well, I was more thinking if you really wanted to *break* it, then the pop bottle would work more than adequately.
I suppose I forget that you want to know all about the failure modes of a given tool that you’ve chosen to put into service.
My Wave is quite old, so the wear isn’t unexpected. The hinge-pin in the pliers gets some slop in it eventually which causes the cutter not to work very well and/or dull itself. It really depends on how it’s used. Using it as a screwdriver and applying a good amount of torque to the handles can cause this to happen. It’s probably best to have it opened up when using it as a screwdriver to prevent this wear. Note that I’m refering to the hinge-pin that holds the plier jaws together and not the part where each plier jaw is attached to a handle. That part seems to wear very well and has absolutely no slop in it at all.
Other than that, just about everything else is fine. One of the flathead tips was broken and had to be reground and the blade has been sharpened so much that it’s worn away to the point of being less useful. Newer waves are a bit wider from the edge to the spine and could be resharpened more through the life of the tool. The diamond file is also a bit worn as I’ve used it a fair amount sharpening other tools. It works quite well as a rough hone.
At one point I had a new Wave and just had this one as a backup. I gave that one away as a gift and just haven’t gotten another one yet. Mine still works fine, it’s just a little sloppy.