Alaskan Ulu

Brian Andrews

Brian Andrews

Joined
Dec 11, 2006
Messages
1,659
I always get super fascinated with tools used in different areas of the world. Something that I have been wanting to make for a long time is an Alaskan Ulu. When I thought about making on before, I didn't want to do it unless I could make a matching cutting board/bowl for it. I finally figured out that detail and one of my friends just got back from Alaska, giving me a kick in the butt to take on this project again.

It seems that there is a "tourist" type Ulu that almost anyone sells. Looks kind of like this.

ulu1.jpg


You see this everywhere, and if you look hard enough, you can find the exact same looking blanks to make your own. I feel these ones have a lot of short comings. Even so, they can be useful. Even though this is an infomercial, and I still think the knife is cheesy, the guy is pretty good with it.

[youtube]iVG0WgvVjp4[/youtube]

I have one of those "styles" plus a couple other handmade ones (from other people).

It seems the more authentic ones are "handmade" my locals up there. Old Jimbo (one of my favorite resources) tells about his experience with a local maker (with 3 of his Ulu's) as well as some history on the knife. Good article.

Between my research and my own use of the Ulu's. I decided to incorporate some features into mine that I think are important. First, the knife.

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One of the features I wanted to include in mine is to not have the "hole" in the middle. Without it, I wanted to taper the handle back under to give your fingers a place to "tuck."

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Another features is how I did a radius around the handle area. When you require a lot of push force, you put you hand on the top of the handle. If you are doing fine chopping, only a quick rocking is required. Instead of rotating your whole wrist (if it were on top) you grip it more like this:

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In order to grip it like that, I included a radius on each side.

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That is all. I am just stoked about my new toy and wanted to share. I personally love using O1, so that is what this is. 1/16" O1. Since it will see a lot of kitchen use, I forced the patina on it, and matched it with reindeer antler. The thing is a screaming slicer and all I have used it for so far is in the kitchen. I am going salmon fishing next weekend, so maybe I will have some field use there : )

I would love to hear about other's experience with an Ulu, whether a factory made, local made, or your own. Any good stories about this intersting style of tool?

B
 
Brian, that looks super classy! Love the patina and antler handle on it. I've never used an Ulu before and wouldn't even know where to start with a tool like that. Closest thing we have in a kitchen is a mesa luna for cutting up herbs and I admit to preferring a big old chef knife for that task. What are some of the specific uses you see for an Ulu like this and where it would outpace a chef knife and perhaps a standard 6" boning knife?
 
Oh yeah, I meant to post this too. Here is another video of a woman using them on salmon. Looks like she is pretty efficient with hers :)

[youtube]0tU5nmzqfbw[/youtube]

B
 
Your mods make it much better for control I'll wager

I've held them-but never used one
 
I've been intrigued with the design in the past, but I've yet to use one. Your's looks great. They look like they'd make great tools in the kitchen.
 
That is way cool Brian. I like the patina and the antler as well. I find it interesting that the Ulu and the knife that Cuban cigar rollers use are very similar.
But the Cuban blade does not have a handle. Yours looks great.

Jeff
 
Knice work, Brian. Ulus are great tools. I have made a couple of knives with a similar belly to an ulu but with a typical knife handle. I'll see if I can get some pics.
 
That is perhaps the best looking Ulu I've seen. Very nice.
SWMBO has often said she'd like to have one for the kitchen. She likes them for cutting veggies and such.
 
Brian,
I saw plenty of those when I was in Alaska last year. They were used in the fashion of the woman in that last video you posted. I even found a balcksmith in Ketchikan who was making them and some other knives set up in a booth. I always find it interesting how people prefer to use one type of cutting tool than the other.
Good job on yours.


-RB
 
bearthedog said:
I always find it interesting how people prefer to use one type of cutting tool than the other.


-RB
Click to expand...

Hey Reuben,

Me too. On the simpler stuff like this, that is why I try to make it. Even though it may not match all the criteria of the originals (especially when there are regional differences) it gives me a chance to learn something new.

But, I am also smart enough to know when I am out of my element. When it comes to the long chopping tools that you enjoy, like a parang or a Duku Chandong, I just buy those :) It will take me a long time, if ever to feel I know what needs to go into one of those

kgd said:
What are some of the specific uses you see for an Ulu like this and where it would outpace a chef knife and perhaps a standard 6" boning knife?
Click to expand...

Hey Ken,

I meant to get back to you on this.

There are definitely some benefits that I can see, but also some drawbacks (depending on how you look at it). To be honest, I think being fluent and efficient with a tool is just a matter of how comfortable you are with it. For example, I can not chop with a Chef’s knife like the professional chefs do : ) Still, I like to learn new stuff and who knows, maybe one of those new things will fit me well.

With that in mind though, here are some of the immediate benefits that I see. BTW, some of this is shown in the “infomercial” video pretty well. I am just now explaining it in words.

1) Pressure. The force you apply is directly over the cutting edge. In a traditional knife, it is a lever-arm scenario.

2) Curved cutting edge. For some reason, with a traditonal knife, I don’t like too much curve in the blade (for a kitchen type knife). Because you have to rock it to get all the way through what you are cutting, and your hand being way back on a handle exaggerates the amount of movement you need. But, when your hand is on top of the cutting edge, the rocking motion is really quite fun. So, mincing can be done really fast. But the curve does another thing for you. Much like an axe face has a continuous curve, so does your cutting edge. What this does (for both) is makes a small amount of blade to be in contact with what you are cutting at any given point in time. A fraction of a second later, a different portion of the blade is being used. If you compare that to a realitvely non-curved blade a larger portion of the blade is being used at any given time and therefore requires more force.

Pairing it up with the “curved” cutting board or cutting bowl is quite neat. Before using it, I didn’t get it. My thought was “Here you with a knife whose advantage is supposed to be a curved cutting edge, and then you purposely take that curve away by making a cutting board to match it.” Well, that is only half true, and all good : ) You still hav ethe curved blade advantage of cutting power when cutting into something, because the bowl does not come into play a that point. So, you slice nice and easy through something, But, as you get ALL the way through, your bowl and cutting edge line up together and do not require you to do any (or minimal) rocking motion to cut completely through what you are cutting. Pretty neat.

3) Compactness. These are made in all different sizes. I made mine 7” from tip to tip. In that 7” package, I have just over 8” of cutting edge. A traditional knife with 8” of cutting edge is probably going to just over a foot long.

When I was younger, and group of friends and I used to venture really, really far north into Canada in the spring for walleye fishing. The places we went were generally “fly-in” lakes, although use poor saps used to spend hours in our boats getting there. On trips like that, we could carry more weight with us in the boats than say backpacking or canoeing, but you don’t want to go crazy with too much stuff. We used to bring a lot of good food. I wouldn’t usually use my belt knife on food, and something like this would have been great to take. Both for the fish and for the food.

4) Efficiency of movement. In the infomercial video, the guy shows butteflying a porkchop. I also mentioned having 8” of cutting edge on my knife. I can use every bit of that cutting edge without my forearm moving at all. One wrist movement. If you compare that to a traditional knife, the hand, the wrist the forearm and upper arm all the way up to the shoulder would have to move to use 8” of blade. That move that sliced through the pork chop can definitely be used in skinning animals and filleting larger fish.

Anyway, those are the advantages I see. I don’t mean to talk about it like it is the perfect tool for everything. But you asked for “advantages.” : ) I could probably make a very similar lists for disadvantages too. Still, I really like the tool, and it is definitely work exploring, even if you try out a $17 cheapie, or go to Jantz supply and try a $6 blank to handle yourself.


Thanks for the comments guys.

If anyone else has an experience with one good or bad, I would love to hear it.

B
 
I grew up in Alaska, and saw some ulu use, the sizes range from barely more than a wide round chisel to bigger "rockers".

I've seen experienced people skin very efficiently with them, wrist rocking motion while the arm moves in a line, very little chance of the tip puncturing anything. The design wasn't really for vegetation of any sort, it's a skinner, scraper and slicer.

Like any knife it has draw backs, it's not much use for chopping, to me it's a purpose built tool made for game processing.
 
Great work as always Brian !

I've always admired the Ulu's that G L Drew makes~

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pitdog said:
I've always admired the Ulu's that G L Drew makes~

QUOTE]

Hey Pit,

I have been eyeing those for quite some time. They are incredible!

I have used a few different styles, including the one with the opening, and one with the T style handle. For this particular one, I wanted to do without the hole and the T, if that makes any sense :)

B
Click to expand...
 
If I remember correctly some caveman looking Canadian made one I really liked a while back. Perhaps Rick will tell us about it.
I'm interested in the size differences. The one in the video looks somewhat larger than I expected.
 
I wish i had seen this post, before i made mine....Big job for me...It was a present for my daughter.......Will not make another..........carl
 
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