Broken Khukri

[Daniel Koster]

The cho is not a weak spot.....any more than a tip is a weak spot.

For a kukri to be a kukri, it needs a cho.


999 out of 1000 times....that will not be a problem.

Dan

 

[cybrok]

I don't think the cho need to bo completely removed, I was suggesting to round the angle between the half-circle and the peak Would solve the problem.

 

[Karda]

I don't think the cho need to bo completely removed, I was suggesting to round the angle between the half-circle and the peak Would solve the problem.

I know i read something to this effect in the archives somewhere.
I was said that rounding/smoothing the sharp angles of the cho could relieve any stress risers in that area.

To me though, It hardly seems to be a prevalent enough problem to warrant such action.

 

[Daniel Koster]

agreed :thumbup:

 

[jnphares]

... Also, if you have used the BFC e-mail links to email her they sometimes get eaten. ...

I sent an email to one of the ROS Arms Mods via BladeForums' email, eBay's email, and a direct email from my Yahoo account this weekend. When he replied, he said that he'd only received one of the emails (I'm not sure which one, but I only mentioned sending other emails in the ones after BladeForums, so that wasn't it).

 

[jnphares]

Already been said -- removed.

 

[37up]

Sorry guys. I apologize for my comment. I was under alcohol influence when I typed it. Just a drunk stupid fool crazy about Busse INFI steel which I still believe will be the most suitable blade material for Khukuri.
I have no intention to hurt anyone's feeling, especially HI's. But I do want to see more and more knife makers to make strong, tough, and sharp knives. Probably everyone will agree that, at the end of the day, if HI or whichever knife maker can produce better knives than BCK does, we will buy its knives. Customers' are only loyal to the quality they believe their money deserves.

It's all good.

on a side note, I am an avid collector of both (though I wouldn't call my collection HOG worthy) and greatly look forward to the Busse version of the khukuri.

as far as I can tell, HOG's and Sharks have lived *very* peacefully together and represent somewhat 2 different markets in terms of offerings.

-D

 

[spiraltwista]

I sent Yangdu e-mail two days ago and have not received any reply yet. I think it is only natural for people to ignore inquiry which they think is silly. But when you punch a semi-finished blade to produce choil, structural integrity of the punched blade definitely will suffer, more or less.

If Yangdu says she will sort it she will. Getting on your high horse doest look good to me.

If you think kukri are inherently weak because of the kaudi your very inexpierienced with kukri , fair enough we all start somewhere, but I have 150 old kukri with lots of battoning marks that Ive cut dead standing hardwood wych elm with without problem. Many times.

99.9% of kukri have such kaudi.

All kukri need to be soundly battered on arrival as per. the late Bill Martinos instructions.in case of natural steel flaws etc. Cold weather adds another dimension as the Japanese found with there katanas in manchuriua.

Spiral

 

[Yangdu]

I did not ignore anyone specially my customer they are very important to HI, I and Kamis. I have already shipped the replacement CAK on 2nd of Jan 2009 via USPS insured priority mail. Priority insured #1307 1300 002 8010 9357

 

[spiraltwista]

There you go Paua,

It was already sorted better than any other kukri seller will ever do.

You just didnt realise , when you posted, the real quality of the people you were doing buisness with...

Enjoy!

Spiral

 

[Acinonyx]

From a structural point of view, the sharp angles and location of the cho naturally creates a stress point. The question, as I see it, is rather "is the cho a design flaw?". The answer to that question is a timeworn and obvious "no", and a khukuri shouldn't break at the cho unless the blade is defect in other ways. Should the blade be defect, or subjected to too much stress, then I'd assume the cho to be the spot most likely to break. And who knows, perhaps this was one of the cho's original intentions? Dependable breaks? All speculation, of course. I really have no idea what's it's for.

 

[greenwoods]

I sent Yangdu e-mail two days ago and have not received any reply yet. I think it is only natural for people to ignore inquiry which they think is silly. But when you punch a semi-finished blade to produce choil, structural integrity of the punched blade definitely will suffer, more or less.

Gosh, I imagine You will be answered with a fine communication

Punched is to be understood as WHAT?
Hot punched, cold punched, forge punched, Hawaiian Punched?:thumbup:

Any explanatory help to understand you is greatly appreciated.:0

Mark

 

[Andrew Taylor]

although Daniel has touched on it, I feel that the way in that this kukri was used is abuse. When you have a blade and handle weighing 2lbs and you embed it into a piece of wood weighing two or three pounds, you now have 4 to 5 lbs of weight on a blade that was not designed for it. Slam that down on a hard surface and you will shear the weakest part of the blade at the cho. When you chop a piece of wood down the grain your strike the wood and cleave through it as the wood parts and the blade continues downwards. If the blade embeds in the wood, the smartest thing to do is to either remove the blade upwards and chop again, or use a piece of wood to strike the blade at the tip of the blade whilst holding the handle loosely. This doesn't put stress on the weakest part of the blade, the cho, but powers the edge through the wood.

Just my 2 cents CDN.

 

[Karda]

although Daniel has touched on it, I feel that the way in that this kukri was used is abuse. When you have a blade and handle weighing 2lbs and you embed it into a piece of wood weighing two or three pounds, you now have 4 to 5 lbs of weight on a blade that was not designed for it. Slam that down on a hard surface and you will shear the weakest part of the blade at the cho. When you chop a piece of wood down the grain your strike the wood and cleave through it as the wood parts and the blade continues downwards. If the blade embeds in the wood, the smartest thing to do is to either remove the blade upwards and chop again, or use a piece of wood to strike the blade at the tip of the blade whilst holding the handle loosely. This doesn't put stress on the weakest part of the blade, the cho, but powers the edge through the wood.

Just my 2 cents CDN.

Agreed and well stated Andrew!!!

 

[starboard]

I wonder if anyone would care to guess at the shape/area of the cross-section at the typical break location, presumably the blade/tang interface.

We could perhaps then make a gross adjustment for stress raisers and estimate the PSI at the handle the user's hand must sustain to flex the break location beyond its elastic range.

On the face of it, I find it difficult to accept that the hand, holding on to a rather short lever, can deliver sufficient rigidity to subject nearby metal to inelastic deformation. But breaks do happen, and it would be a neat bit of geekery to try to put some numbers to it.

 

[Cpl Punishment]

I'm going to disagree with you on this Andrew.
The method of picking up the embedded blade int he wood and bringing both down has been a time-tested method of splitting. If anything, you'll generate less stress on the knife because you won't have the same speed or impact force as if you were doing a full-on shop with the blade, plus the wood is going to take and dampen the impact force, versus the edge taking the initial impact.

It's certainly not abuse as HI defines it because it doesn't even put as much stress on the blade as Uncle Bill's testing procedure does.

 

[Steely_Gunz]

I think when we get down to it, breaks happen. Uncle Bill knew this. Yangdu knows this. The people of Nepal using khuks day in and day out have known this for centuries.

It's not that the khuk broke that is the real issue. A gross failure at this juncture is pretty uncommon. Way more uncommon than purchasing a random mid-range priced folder and experiencing blade play where there should be none. The real key to this is HI standing behind their product. Even though technically the original poster was not entitled to a warranty replacement, Yangdu still treated the customer to class action service:thumbup:

I think we can talk till we're blue in the face about how and why it broke

 

[seaice]

Reckon to weed-out almost all potential breakages would require the measured testing setup (as was described in one of the historical kukri forums) used by Wilkinson Sword in England after WW2, when for a short time they manufactured kukris for the army.... a standard so stringent that most perfectly good and safe blades -- either present or historical -- might not pass.

 

[GregS]

I'm going to disagree with you on this Andrew.
The method of picking up the embedded blade int he wood and bringing both down has been a time-tested method of splitting. If anything, you'll generate less stress on the knife because you won't have the same speed or impact force as if you were doing a full-on shop with the blade, plus the wood is going to take and dampen the impact force, versus the edge taking the initial impact.

It's certainly not abuse as HI defines it because it doesn't even put as much stress on the blade as Uncle Bill's testing procedure does.

Agreed! 100% took the words out of my mouth. Stating that batoning or picking up the wood with the embedded blade and slamming it is abuse is a disservice to HI. If I have a blade that breaks during that kind of "abuse" (I call it use) than good! Great! It wasn't worthy anyhow apparently, better to find out now than later, when a catastrophic failure may be more of a problem. HI's khukri's are tough, period, for god sake, some are over .50" thick, what would be the use for this sort of blade if you can't use it? I say... Beat them, beat them again, then beat them some more, rinse and repeat as necessary.

 

[GregS]

This is why we try very hard to get Busse Combat Knife to make Khukuri.

As for this comment... I'm a hog and I still have too cringe....

As far as I'm concerned it was an attempt at...

That's A LOT of spaghetti O's, I'm jealous.