Check your safety knife and other gear.

I was gathering and checking all of my gear for ORC weekend (early I know), but I got to my life jacket and checked out all the straps. When I got to my safety knife that is strapped to the left shoulder, I pulled it out and noticed a little rust. I went about cleaning the rust off, then put corrosionX on. Then I tried to cut a rope. The dang thing was super dull. I had to saw through the rope. There was no rust on the blade and I have never used the knife before. I went to my kitchen and got my sharpener and gave it a few swipes. Now my knife goes through that rope like butter.  So just remember that even if you don't use a piece of safety gear, please check its functionality before an outing!

You're right!  I never thought about that.  Good advice.

This is good advice, to check the safety gear.

As a tip for people not great at sharpening knives, a lot of the serrated knives have a flat bevel on the off side. You can often get sharpness back by flattening the bevel back out on a stone.

This is good advice, to check the safety gear.

As a tip for people not great at sharpening knives, a lot of the serrated knives have a flat bevel on the off side. You can often get sharpness back by flattening the bevel back out on a stone.

Yup exactly what I did. Thanks for explaining

I checked my knife when I got home and it too had a bad edge and couldn't get through rope without sawing (chewing) its way through.

I hit the edge real quick with a steel as the flat side of the serrated edge had a small curl.  This helped, but not to my satisfaction. Later thiis week I plan to get a good edge on it so it will work as I expect it too.

Guilty, thanks for the reminder John!