Recently I obtained a Tool Logic Credit Card Companion from Base Camp Echo, one of the sponsors of this site and a business behind which The Martialist gladly puts its support and recommendation. For those of you who don’t know — it wasn’t clear to me until I looked at the address on the package — Tool Logic and SOG are the same business, with the same corporate office and customer service e-mail. SOG, of course, is known for its knives. Tool Logic offers a variety of pocket gadgets, some of which I have owned over the years, including a knife-and-flashlight combination that I keep in one of my survival kits.
The Credit Card Companion is the width and length of a credit card, but as thick as three or four of them stacked together (depending on how tightly you compress them). This means that it can be tucked into the sleeve of a wallet that is intended for a bank card, but will perhaps be more comfortably if placed inside one of the billfold areas of the wallet (which is where I keep mine). The housing is black ABS plastic. According to Tool Logic, the whole thing weighs just 1.4 ounces.
The concept of such a card is clear. The most successful preppers, the most flexible individuals devoted to carrying the gear they may need in a given day, practice a layered approach. You keep gear in your car, you keep gear in your desk, and you keep gear in a bag that you carry with you. But at any given moment you could be caught without your carry-on accessories. Depending on circumstances, you might find yourself forced to contend with adversity with just the contents of what’s in your pockets. It is for that reason that I always carry the basics — a multitool, a bandanna, a knife, a flashlight, etc. — right on my body in my pants pockets or on my belt.
The Credit Card Companion makes it easier to do this by making the tools easier and more discreet to carry. Within its slim profile, the card offers a chisel-ground, 2-inch serrated knife blade of stainless steel (probably 420), a combination can/bottle opener, an awl, an 8x magnification lens (plastic), a toothpick, and metric/English ruler markings. (There is also a button compass, but this is too small to be particularly accurate, which is a limitation of such items.)
The toothpick and tweezers are as useful as the ones on my Swiss Army Knife, for the same reasons. These are great, in particular, for cleaning my glasses, but you’ll find various other fine jobs for them. The tweezers are excellent for removing splinters, for example, and springy enough that the card will retain them securely.
The bottle-lifter/can opener bears a couple of protrusions that can be used as small flat-head screwdrivers. It’s fine for opening bottles, but its small size means that you won’t really get the leverage you need to open cans with it unless you have a grip of iron (or leverage from a pair of pliers). I don’t count this against the little tool; there is only so much something of this size can do.
The 8X magnifier will start a fire on a bright day. The unit in which the magnifier and compass sit can be removed (it is retained by a pair of screws) for replacement (or to facilitate modularity at the factory). The card housing has an opening in one corner for the attachment of a split ring or a lanyard.
The real stand-out in this little tool is the knife blade. It has a cut-out for the index finger that makes the knife easy to hold despite the almost total lack of a “handle.” You could use this blade as a last-ditch self-defense knife — the grip it provides is that positive — or you could use it for day to day utility.
There is no worry that the blade will close in use, because it isn’t a folder. The serrated edge is easy to resharpen and the blade shape is great for utility chores. The hole in the blade serves no purpose that I can define, except perhaps to reduce weight. It could, I suppose, be used to lash the blade to a stick or other handle.
The Credit Card Companion found a permanent home in my wallet the day I took it out of the box. This is a very slim multitool that allows you to accomplish multiple tasks with ease, convenience, and discretion. It’s worth adding to your EDC kit, light enough to go everywhere you do, and versatile enough to justify its negligible weight.
Pick up your Credit Card Companion through Base Camp Echo and tell them we sent you.
