Hand Saw Portable Pocket Chain Saw Paracord Handle Emergency Survival

A saw small enough that you actually carry it.

The bow saw is in the shed and the folding pruner is in the other bag. You are three hours up a track with a limb across it, or back at camp at dusk with nothing to burn but green sticks. The saw you own is no use to you — only the saw you carried is.

This is a length of chain saw chain with a braided paracord handle at each end and a steel plate joining the two. It rolls into a pouch about the size of your palm, and you cut by dragging it back and forth across the timber. Eleven teeth, no motor, no fuel, nothing to service and nothing to go flat.

It is not a replacement for a bow saw or a petrol saw, and we are not going to pretend it is. It is slow, it wants a clear working angle, and it will blunt. What it does is fit in a lid pocket, which is the only reason it ever ends up being the saw you have on you when a track is blocked.

What It Does

• Cuts small timber: branches, deadfall and limbs you can get a full stroke across, dragging the chain through on the pull.
• Rolls into a pouch: the supplied pouch is 135 x 150 x 20 mm, so it lives on a belt, in a lid pocket or in the glovebox instead of in the shed.
• Runs on you: no fuel, no battery, no charger, nothing to spill, and nothing that stops working because it spent a week wet.
• Clears a blocked track: a limb down across a fire trail or a two-track is the job it is genuinely good at.
• Doubles as cord: unpick the handles and there is roughly 7 m of paracord in them, which matters on the day you need cord more than you need a saw.

Key Features

• Eleven cutting teeth: numbered one to eleven on the supplier's own diagram and countable in the product photo.
• Teeth face both ways: the cutters are set in both directions along the chain, so it bites whichever way you are pulling.
• 610 mm of chain: 1.03 m end to end once the handles are counted, which is enough length to keep a rhythm going.
• Braided paracord handles: 180 mm of braid at each end, thick enough to hold in a work glove without cutting into your hand.
• Steel end plates: a triangular steel plate at each end joins cord to chain and gives you something solid to pull against.
• Carry pouch included: 135 x 150 x 20 mm, side-release buckle, belt loop on the back.
• Steel chain: the supplier's artwork calls it high-carbon steel. No grade, hardness or heat-treatment figure is published, so we are not quoting one.
• Army green only: that is the single colourway stocked, whatever the black version in the supplier's photos suggests.

Limits

This is the part worth reading before you buy. A pocket chain saw earns its place by being small, not by being good, and the gap between those two is where people end up disappointed.

• It is arm power: there is no motor and no mechanical advantage. Everything the chain does, your shoulders do first, and it takes as long as it takes.
• No cutting capacity published: the supplier states no maximum diameter and we are not going to invent one. Treat it as a saw for small limbs and deadfall, not for felling.
• It needs room both sides: you have to swing a full stroke through, so it is no good flush to the ground, jammed in a tight fork, or buried deep in a big trunk where the handles foul the timber.
• Not climbing or rigging gear: the artwork prints a load-bearing figure of roughly 100 kg beside the cord, with no test standard and no certificate. Nothing here is made or marked to AS/NZS 1891 or EN 566, so do not stand in it, hang off it, or use it to lower anything you care about.
• Not a medical device: the supplier's artwork also shows the cord used as an emergency tourniquet. We are not repeating that. Paracord is narrow enough to do real damage to a limb, and none of this is designed, tested or supplied for first aid.
• Green and wet wood binds: sappy or soaked timber packs the gullets with wet sawdust and the chain starts dragging instead of cutting. Ease the stroke off and clear it out.
• It blunts: teeth this small dull quickly, especially in dirty bark or near the ground. No file is supplied and the supplier publishes no sharpening guidance, so treat it as a consumable.
• Overhead limbs need a line: to use it above head height you have to throw a rope over the branch first. No throw line is included.

Q & A

How thick a branch will it actually cut?

The supplier publishes no maximum diameter, so we will not put a number on it. The chain is 610 mm long and your working stroke is shorter than that, so the honest limit is whatever you can keep a full, clean stroke across without the handles hitting the timber.

Can one person use it, or does it take two?

One person can, with a handle in each hand. The harder part is the timber, not the saw — it has to be held still. A standing trunk or a limb pinned under its own weight is straightforward; a loose branch rolling on the ground is not, and that is where a second pair of hands or a boot on the log makes the difference.

Is the paracord strong enough to stand in or hang off?

No, and please do not. The load figure on the supplier's artwork is a marketing number with nothing behind it, the braid is a handle rather than a rated sling, and no part of this is made or marked to a fall-arrest or climbing standard. Use rated gear for anything that holds a person.

Will it cut green or wet wood?

It will, just slower. Wet sawdust packs into the teeth and the chain starts to drag. Shorten the stroke, clear the gullets, and expect to work harder than you would on dry deadfall.

Can I sharpen it once it goes blunt?

Not specified by supplier. No file or sharpening instructions come with it and the supplier publishes none, so plan on the chain being a consumable rather than something you maintain.

What comes in the pack, and how long is delivery?

One chain saw with a braided paracord handle at each end, plus the carry pouch, in army green. Delivery is 10 to 14 days from the day you order, and we ask you to allow up to three weeks. Delivery is free to Australia and New Zealand.

Specs