Beckerhead's Other Choppers

Bladite said:
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Nice collection! :thumbsup:
 
Bladite said:
oh yeah, that Benchmade one :D i'm not sure where i put mine now :D lol...
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You turned me on to that one and the Skrama. That’s what I mean about you being a bad influence. What’s next? :D
 
Beastchopper said:
Aranyik Enep VS BK-21???
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Aranyik would tend to win in terms of overall use due to mass; it chop chop chops with out having to power through

i would easily guess there's someone with a BK21 that could be me at equal chopping with the e-nep, in a race, but in all day use? less energy used is more work done.

that said, they have different uses. one is a heavy blade more akin to a hatchet/light-axe, the other is more speedy and light for things like vines and small stuff. i use mind to limb green trees a lot. it's just fun too.
 
Bladite said:
Aranyik would tend to win in terms of overall use due to mass; it chop chop chops with out having to power through

i would easily guess there's someone with a BK21 that could be me at equal chopping with the e-nep, in a race, but in all day use? less energy used is more work done.

that said, they have different uses. one is a heavy blade more akin to a hatchet/light-axe, the other is more speedy and light for things like vines and small stuff. i use mind to limb green trees a lot. it's just fun too.
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Nice. I limb a lot of trees, baton and chop up logs. My largest blade is my parang, and I tend to go that direction a lot when chosing my tool for the job. That's one reason I like the Aranyik E-nep, It's huge. Plus it's cheap and so am I. I'll have to keep my eye out. I'm sure the big convexed belly on that powers through with the weight like you say. My SP-53 is similar in that way, yet a few inches shy of the E-nep. I think the BK-21 would be cool, but I recently got a condor bushcraft machete. I just refinished the handle today as it was too big and round to best control it's power with. It looks like 3/8 inches thick with a distinct distal taper. The edge is scandi ground with the same thickness of bevel, so that means as the kukri gets thinner towards the tip, the same length of bevel that gives a sturdy obtuse edge near he handle, comes to a finer slicier edge towards the tip. I was touching up the edge today, but I'm not an expert sharpener and I want to be careful to maintain the bevel as is.
 
The Ka-Bar Grass Machete is a great blade, but hard on the hands if you arent wearing gloves. Lightly sanding those rubber handles helps make them a little less sticky and tear your hands up less, but I wish that bladehad grivory handles...lol Steven and I talked at length about the handles on the KaBar versions of his knives, and he has similar feelings as were stated here. Also his original Pot Belly wasnt 1/4 inch thick. It was 3/16ths and to my understanding was better at that thickness. The Parangatang is one of the best pound for pound cutter/choppers I have had the pleasure to handle. A better handle design and it would be one of the best all round big blades I can think of, for my 2 cents.

Hes a good guy and a lot of fun to talk to. I hope to catch him at a Blade show again and get another chance to hang out.
 
Ptac157 said:
Here’s my top 4. Each one has been to hell and back more than once. The 2 on the left are my trusty old Condor Warlock and my modified Busse BB13.
The 2 on the right are just beaters that I made back when I had spare time View attachment 1101039
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Did you use a dremel with sandpaper or stone bits on it for the micarta warlock handle mod? Do you have any regrets, advice, or details on that? I want to make my warlock handle more grippy.
Ptac157 said:
Here’s my top 4. Each one has been to hell and back more than once. The 2 on the left are my trusty old Condor Warlock and my modified Busse BB13.
The 2 on the right are just beaters that I made back when I had spare time View attachment 1101039
Click to expand...
I want to mod my micarta warlock handle to make it more grippy. Are you happy with the grip and feel on yours? It definitely looks cool. Did u use a file, a dremel (stone or sandpaper bit?) Any specific finishing work? This will be new territory for me, so any details, advice, or techniques you can hit me with would be appreciated!
 
Beastchopper said:
Did you use a dremel with sandpaper or stone bits on it for the micarta warlock handle mod? Do you have any regrets, advice, or details on that? I want to make my warlock handle more grippy.

I want to mod my micarta warlock handle to make it more grippy. Are you happy with the grip and feel on yours? It definitely looks cool. Did u use a file, a dremel (stone or sandpaper bit?) Any specific finishing work? This will be new territory for me, so any details, advice, or techniques you can hit me with would be appreciated!
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I use a dremel and 60 grit sandpaper bits, much quicker than using a file. There’s some detailed tutorials on YouTube if you search “how to texture knife handle” I do this on quite a few blades and I like how it feels. If it ends up being too harsh on your hand, you can just sand it down to whatever point you’re happy with. Just make sure to wear a mask while you’re sanding, micarta dust in your lungs is bad news
 
Crag the Brewer said:
any particular reasons why?
That golok always seems to speak to me (I don't own one)
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Yeah I actually was going to write some of those reasons in the above post, but decided not to in the end. Didn’t want to seem like I was being unfairly critical of the BRKT Golok, or too fanboyish about the BK9.

Since you ask though, here goes.

I’ve had the BRKT Golok for about 5 years now. I have different backpacks prepacked with gear for different purposes. One for dayhikes, one for day hunts, one for overnighters, and one for 3 days and up. When I want to head out, I basically just add fresh food and drink and pick up a bag and go.

The Golok generally lives in my overnight pack, and while I haven’t used it constantly over the time I’ve had it, I’ve used it enough I think, to be able to get to know it.

It’s well made, and has a nice convex grind with a relieved spine, like the Colclesser Kephart knife, so the thickest part of the blade is about 2/3 of the way up the height of the blade.

I have the A2 version with cocobolo handles. I’ve thinned out and sharpened the edge so it’s like a big straight razor.

I’ve used it for clearing brush on bush tracks to get 4WDs around fallen trees, light chopping like a machete, cleaning up bamboo in the yard and a lot of firewood batoning.

It excels at batoning, being a tough steel with a full width spine all the way out to the tip.

However from the moment I got it, it felt like the handle was a bit ‘off’.

Holding the handle loosely for the ‘Golok wrist flick’ at the end of the swing to increase velocity, just doesn’t feel safe or inspire confidence in me. The handle feels a bit small in cross section. As you can see I’ve put a lanyard and sports tape on it, and that helps a little bit.

Cutting through light brush has a kind of jarring feel after the blade passes through the material, and it feels like you have to fight it a little to pull it up at the end of the stroke.

Chopping into material like heavy timber, the blade doesn’t bite that deeply because of the convex ‘cheeks’, and again, feels slightly jarring to me on impact.

The blade doesn’t work that well with your hand in a forward grip on the handle for finer work. With your hand toward the back of the handle, it feels like the whole blade may fly out of my hand. Now this has never happened, but a knife of this size should have a secure feel to it IMO.

This is a traditional forged Golok which the caretaker of an island in the Kelantan River delta used to open a coconut to offer me a drink - up near the border of Malaysia and Thailand:

cPe2qlp.jpg


OgLzGRd.jpg


See that flared out, ‘hooked’ end to the handle?

You can hold it quite loosely between thumb and forefinger, and do the ‘wrist snap’ at the end of the swing, and have a feeling of full security, that the blade is under complete control.

The BRKT Golok doesn’t have that.

By contrast, the BK9 just feels like a much more refined, well thought out design.

It works well using a forward grip, doing detail work with the edge just in front of the handle.

With your hand further back, you can make powerful, accurate chops that bite in deep and release easily, without binding.

It just blasts through light brush with minimal effort, and always feels poised and ‘lively’ in the hand.

I’ve never felt the need to put a lanyard on it - it feels secure, comfortable and balanced in all holds.

I haven’t tried using it to do food prep for a camp meal yet (except for breaking down pumpkins - no mean feat in itself - most knives function like a crude splitting wedge or bind up in the cut), but have no doubt that it would acquit itself well in that task. It’s no surprise to hear that Ethan is well versed with using chef knives in the kitchen. Using knives for all the varied techniques of food prep, I find, gives a good understanding of what makes a useful blade.

I’m quite familiar with Cro Van 1095, yet this steel has constantly exceeded expectations in the BK9, and as far as production heat treats go, I think Ka-bar’s martempering is probably benchmark quality for this kind of large knife.

I’m not sure that BRKT place the same importance on a precision heat treat.

To be fair, the BRKT Golok is not a bad blade, and someone else may have a completely different experience with it to me, but the BK9 is just a more versatile and compact knife, and a pleasure to use - while still being capable of dealing with all the same tasks the Bark River Golok was designed to handle.

You’ve prompted me to start doing some further side by side comparisons between the two knives, to gain a better understanding of them.
 
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Cambertree said:
Yeah I actually was going to write some of those reasons in the above post, but decided not to in the end. Didn’t want to seem like I was being unfairly critical of the BRKT Golok, or too fanboyish about the BK9.

Since you ask though, here goes.

I’ve had the BRKT Golok for about 5 years now. I have different backpacks prepacked with gear for different purposes. One for dayhikes, one for day hunts, one for overnighters, and one for 3 days and up. When I want to head out, I basically just add fresh food and drink and pick up a bag and go.

The Golok generally lives in my overnight pack, and while I haven’t used it constantly over the time I’ve had it, I’ve used it enough I think, to be able to get to know it.

It’s well made, and has a nice convex grind with a relieved spine, like the Colclesser Kephart knife, so the thickest part of the blade is about 2/3 of the way up the height of the blade.

I have the A2 version with cocobolo handles. I’ve thinned out and sharpened the edge so it’s like a big straight razor.

I’ve used it for clearing brush on bush tracks to get 4WDs around fallen trees, light chopping like a machete, cleaning up bamboo in the yard and a lot of firewood batoning.

It excels at batoning, being a tough steel with a full width spine all the way out to the tip.

However from the moment I got it, it felt like the handle was a bit ‘off’.

Holding the handle loosely for the ‘Golok wrist flick’ at the end of the swing to increase velocity, just doesn’t feel safe or inspire confidence in me. The handle feels a bit small in cross section. As you can see I’ve put a lanyard and sports tape on it, and that helps a little bit.

Cutting through light brush has a kind of jarring feel after the blade passes through the material, and it feels like you have to fight it a little to pull it up at the end of the stroke.

Chopping into material like heavy timber, the blade doesn’t bite that deeply because of the convex ‘cheeks’, and again, feels slightly jarring to me on impact.

The blade doesn’t work that well with your hand in a forward grip on the handle for finer work. With your hand toward the back of the handle, it feels like the whole blade may fly out of my hand. Now this has never happened, but a knife of this size should have a secure feel to it IMO.

This is a traditional forged Golok which the caretaker of an island in the Kelantan River delta used to open a coconut to offer me a drink - up near the border of Malaysia and Thailand:

cPe2qlp.jpg


OgLzGRd.jpg


See that flared out, ‘hooked’ end to the handle?

You can hold it quite loosely between thumb and forefinger, and do the ‘wrist snap’ at the end of the swing, and have a feeling of full security, that the blade is under complete control.

The BRKT Golok doesn’t have that.

By contrast, the BK9 just feels like a much more refined, well thought out design.

It works well using a forward grip, doing detail work with the edge just in front of the handle.

With your hand further back, you can make powerful, accurate chops that bite in deep and release easily, without binding.

It just blasts through light brush with minimal effort, and always feels poised and ‘lively’ in the hand.

I’ve never felt the need to put a lanyard on it - it feels secure, comfortable and balanced in all holds.

I haven’t tried using it to do food prep for a camp meal yet (except for breaking down pumpkins), but have no doubt that it would acquit itself well in that task. It’s no surprise to hear that Ethan is well versed with using chef knives in the kitchen.

I’m quite familiar with Cro Van 1095, yet this steel has constantly exceeded expectations in the BK9, and as far as production heat treats go, I think it’s probably benchmark quality.

I’m not sure that BRKT place the same importance on a precision heat treat.

To be fair, the Golok is not a bad blade, and someone else may have a completely different experience with it to me, but the BK9 is just a more versatile and compact knife, and a pleasure to use.

You’ve prompted me to do start doing some further side by side comparisons between the two knives, to gain a better understanding of them.
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Very, Very thorough post! Thank you.
I was wondering if the scales were too narrow (I did notice the tape)

I too enjoy My BK9, but I'm always on the hunt for something better, I don't know why???
 
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