Trainer Knives

I'm a firm believer in practicing with your equipment, and this should most definitely include EDC items like knives. However it's not feasible to practice knife fighting with live steel, so trainer knives are a must. My question to the experts is, do you know of any good trainer resources out there? From what I've seen, Spyderco offers trainers for two of their folders but I'm not going to spend over a hundred dollars on an inert blade, so those are out. I'm specifically looking for a folding tanto style trainer, but I'm sure others out there would be interested in other knife styles as well. From Cold Steel I've only seen trainer swords, not their folding knives. A Voyager trainer would be awesome.

I suppose one could always severely blunt the edge of the real thing but that still seems a little iffy for contact training, and then you are again spending as much on the trainer as on the real thing. Rubber seems the way to go when available.

Iv seen some bad scars frome home made trainer swords and knives made from PVC and Duct tape . Get one of the Tanto or Bowie trainers made by Coldsteel the extra 3" of blade shouldnt make a differance in training . Rub charcoal on the point and eadge so you can prove "hits" when training .

The colds steel trainers are good. Another way to make a trainer similar to what you use is to take a cheap plastic cutting board and trace you preferred knife out on it then cut it out.

I think 3" is a huge difference... When you're talking about a 3-4 inch blade folder then an extra 3" is like doubling the reach of your weapon.

I like the idea of the expensive trainers because you can practice dynamic deployments. If you know what you're doing you can utilize the knife in the closed position as an impact weapon and then deploy if the violence needs to escalate. Can't practice that with a plastic cutout but it looks like that's still going to be my best option as far as cost goes. Thanks for the input fellas.

The trainer knives are not expensive you can pick them up on Ebay for a few $'s and they will last you a life time , if you are that worried about the longer blade buy two and cut one down keep one long incase you get a good field knife . I use folders alot and have several types of full size combat knives and the length of the blade of the traineing knife does'nt affect anything when you consider the violence of action .

I almost always buy 2 cold steel folders. One for use and one for training. I know it seems wasteful but if you wanna train for real you gotta make the sacrifice....