Which knives and makers of knives, have y'all found to work best for cleaning, gutting and quartering wild pigs? I've got a set but it just doesn't seem to get the job done too well so I figured I would ask for y'alls input. Thanks for any information in advance!!

Bubba Blade 7" fillet knife and a saw.

Hook blade, round blade - remove of hide, 4"-6" bone knife - cut off meat, keep knives sharp, good cleaver .

brand does not matter

quality of steel does

D2 is a good steel, get something with a rounded tip, not pointed tip

Last one we tried the gutless method. After doing it that way I don't think I'll ever gut another hog.

A while back I posted in the Knives forum that I came across a knife on ebay that seemed too good to be true basically. Company is CFK - Custom Forged Knives. I bought a D2 skinner with camel bone scales.. sounded fancy and looked good, and for $39.99 I was too curious to pass it up. Knife came in, not super sharp but I spent a few minutes on it with the Work Sharp and finished with my smith's ceramic sticks and got it hair-popping sharp. First real test was the 240lb boar I killed 2 weeks ago. I skinned and quartered the whole thing and the knife held a pretty good edge which really surprised me! Knife has the look and weight of a much more expensive blade, but was ebay cheap. Cant beat that for $40!

^This, and use a razor knife, brand name doesn't matter. Throw the blade away after a hog or two. I can quarter a pig without removing the guts in under 30 mins by myself doing it this way.

A client of my turned me onto these, been working great,since he processes about 2000 animals
A year, I listened as I had been filtering Thru different set ups ,this ended my search

F. Dick brand knife in the UltraSource ErgoGrip Curved Boning Knife, 5" Flex Blade 20 dollar ish
Semi flex
http://www.amazon.com/UltraSource-ErgoGr...s=f.dick+knives
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I too avoid gutting hogs these days. For basic skinning, I use a gut hook with a disposable blade, like THIS ONE

I tried using a box cutter, and it worked okay except that it pushed hair onto the meat. The gut hook cuts outward, driving the hair away from the meat. I hang the hog with the head hanging downward (direction is optional). I skin the legs, then I cut the skin on the body into strips about 3 to 4 inches wide. I grab these strips with a pair of vice-grip pliers and pull them off. It's not quite like peeling a banana, but similar. The result is that I can get the skin removed from the body pretty quickly.

As for a knife, I actually use several. I avoid anything serrated. I much prefer a smooth blade rather than something that 'saws'. The main requirement is that it take a sharp edge. I have one that I inherited from my father that was made in Pakistan (not an expensive knife, but they do know how to work steel over there). The blade is maybe five inches long so it's easy to handle. I have a few others, but my primary message here is that I like the gut hook method, and the hooks with disposable blades make it easy to always have them sharp. Replacement blades are very inexpensive.

Where this method falls short is on a large boar with a thick shield. In these cases one is forced to do it the old-fashioned way, cutting the shield away with a knife.

yep

Whatever knife is laying around the cleaning station will work.

Yall don't like ribs?

I don't have any one particular knife that I favor, I keep an ammo box full of different knives in my truck. They serve different purposes.

I use a variety of blades for skinning (mostlyr my Stic knife)and a flexible blade boning knife to quarter, as well as remove the back strap.

Where I hunt I my friend is a rancher who cleans a lot of hogs and deer. I gave him a Havalon knife and he loved it.
Super sharp and if it gets lost no artistic or intrinsic value.

Mark

There's no reason to open the cavity of a pig. Take the quarters and backstraps and leave the rest for the cleanup crew.

I love my Havalon Piranta. Absolutely the best cleaning utensil I've ever purchased.

Reach in and grab the tenderloins too.

7" Ka-Bar with partial serrations for me.

I don't even like ribs with meat on them

really for as many pigs as I kill the most I usually take are the straps... im not using good freezer space for hams lol.. now if someone tells me they want a pig ill do the whole process even before I give it to them... four quarters, straps and tenders

hard to beat these pork steaks!

I like ribs, but not enough to gut a hog

Plus, my limited experience has been that the small hogs are tender, but don't have much rib meat.
The large hogs have more meat, but it's tougher and overall just not worth the effort.

I quit skinning them when I learned to do them this way....torch the hair, gut, and cook....


Smoking whole pics thread

The curved blades are nothing more than utility knife carpet cutters I believe. Has anybody confirmed that the carpet knifes will skin a pig?