Hultafors Craftmans Heavy-Duty GK Knife Review

On the heels of writing about the Mora Classic I will be checking out the Hultafors GK: the beast of Mora-style knives!

The Hultafors GK is essentially a traditional Mora knife on steroids. The steel is a mystery carbon steel from Japan. The knife is made somewhere in Asia (I would personally guess China), and is marketed in Scandinavia. The Hultafors GK is a true product of the global age, and in this particular case, I would say it benefits for it. Tough, relatively lightweight, cheap and dependable, it’s a solid hiking knife if you think you might need something a little more heavy duty than a traditional Mora, but if weight is also a concern.

Hultafors Craftmans Knife Heavy-Duty GK – Amazon / eBay

As you can tell, the handle on this knife is much thicker than the handles on most Moras. The Hultafors GK has a lot of heft and yet it fits the hand really well. The balance point is not quite at the hilt, which leads me to assume that the tang must be reasonably long.

In terms of shape, the Hultafors GK is chunky. The spine is not very well finished, but at its low price point, it’s definitively safe to say that it’s intended to be a beater knife rather than a show piece.

The sheath has great fit even if it is a bit boring and utilitarian. The same is true of the knife, however, so the sheath goes well with the overall look of the knife.

I cut off the belt loop as it just didn’t function the way I wanted it to.

Instead I decided to use the flashlight holster from my Fenix LD20.

As you can see, the flashlight holster has a generous clip for belt attachment.

Surprisingly, it actually fits the Hultafors GK sheath perfectly. Such a great combination!

And it looks pretty damn good, I think.

The advantage to using the flashlight holster is that it can swivel relatively freely, so even when sitting down the sheath is never uncomfortable.

The sheath retention is nice. I wouldn’t carry the knife upside down, but it shouldn’t magically fall out either.

The drainage hole on the sheath is very generous, and being right at the bottom, is in the ideal spot (unlike the Mora Classic sheath’s drain hole).

The tip of the blade is super heavy duty. Not a huge fan of it, though, as it creates a limit on any detail work.

Ergonomics, however, are fantastic. The injection moulded handles mean all the design and tech has gone straight to comfort. Function before form is personified here.

The handle length makes this knife a good fit for nearly any sized hands (possibly with the exception of some insanely large basketball players’ hands!). Those with XL hand sizes will find this knife very comfortable.

Although the blade is a bit thick behind the edge, you can still pinch the blade when skinning. A bit uncomfortable, but if you really need to you definitely can.

Cutting performance is adequate taking into account its thickness. Don’t expect a laser thin cut, but for how chunky it is, it’s pretty damn good.

The tip is barely acceptable for detailed work. I’m pretty sure Hultafors expects people to pry with this tool because it’s really obviously overbuilt.

Making a notch with this knife required much more effort than making one with the Mora Classic, though I can’t say I am surprised about that.

However, the Hultafors GK does beat the Mora Classic effortlessly in the batoning department. The Hultafors GK does extremely well at batoning for its weight class, mostly because of its thick scandi grind, which helps to push material apart smoothly.

All in all the Hultafors GK is an amazing knife, especially at it’s price point.

It’s lightweight, comfortable, extremely heavy-duty, and batons exceptionally well. The only thing it doesn’t do well is detail work, but it’s not made for detail work anyway, and being realistic, you can’t have an overbuilt blade and expect it to cut like a laser (nor can you have a laser and expect it to take a pounding). All things considered, the Hultafors GK is an amazing buy if you ever need an extra beater knife around.