Cracks at the cho: PICTURES ON Pg 3

Thank you Mr Bensinger....got a kick out of the Dobe supplied facebook page and the gelfling and scones and gelfling sword of much love.....with scones and gelflings and whatnot it brings SCA faires to mind....down here if you mentioned a scone, folks would think you were talking what fell out of pahn treez...

PS....on further thought, can think one way such a cho crack could happen would be if hot blade and cho area dowsed with cold water inducing rough cuts to craze with surface cracks, but also would lead to brittle ricassos and almost guaranteed failure if blade used......the former is not supposed to come even close to happening during quench of sweet spot out front, and failure rates are quite low as to be remarkable by being known of at all by posters, so still think something else accounts for marks or lines.....but only as much conjecture this way as any other at this point, barring a sample and sample owner willing to find out....
 
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It is an interesting video but of a totally different place and frankly seemed a real sweatshop, folk looked worked to death and underfed.....and differences in how tangs formed as well compared to HI including skinnier and sharp cornered and etc., so kinda unsure how much, if any, translates to HI khukuri make, if you get my drift....watching an HI kami in the blessed Howard Wallace video forging out a heavy tapered tang from a goodly chunk of rear steel versus these video guys crunching back the rear to make a true "rat tail" is like night and day in quality forging....and where is zone hardening coming in? Did i miss it, or do they not bother?

Back to chos, the Wallace video seems to show the cho when tang worked, at least partially there, while blade seems about finished aside from minor grinding and edge, but am still wondering how any crack would then grow from a filed to finish shape cho later on down the road, and only on corners....almost as weird as it growing a beard....especially if never used....
 
When all else fails....look in own backyard....from our own HI site of an expert village kami...preforged cho started hot, not filed out or rough at quench, and quench nowhere near cho, in any case....so we are left with mystery "cracks" growing after filing and blade not used for anything.....man, i want a sample!

If the metal were stressed i could even perhaps see a crack forming as stress relieved by filing, but a) this is a tough spring steel not known for cracking, and b) this steel is worked in an annealed condition and left there and no stresses there as no quench anyhow......a true mystery unless there are no cracks in the first place....



 
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Ask him to send you a blade. I'll chip in for shipping and insurance. As with you, and the OP, I don't think it is likely to produce a failure. I believe he simply had a question, nothing more.
 
His questions are contagious but answers easier to come by from those who know...and that ain't here....i personally think ANY real crack an incredible danger, for what it is worth....there is rarely a "self limiting crack" as there are rare self limiting teen drivers....and a flying piece of sharp 2lb of steel is nothing to even chance...ever...it is why i would never leave alone if i owned one....i would have to file out and polish area just on principle if not curiosity....and i would need buy the knife for that...and would...
 
The following photos include an extreme closeup of a cho that has a "mark" -- it's not a crack -- that looks something like SS40s' photos, but a lot clearer.

This khukuri is one of my finest blades, from the Uncle Bill era. It's an M43-AK hybrid by Sher kami. The cho is extremely well made and even the inside is finished. I'm including a full length picture of the entire knife for scale (18" OAL), so you can see how tiny the mark is.

View attachment 563579 View attachment 563580 View attachment 563581

I believe that what we're seeing here is a combination of file marks and scratches, very superficial. As for "wrapping around" the edge of the cho, one would expect that to happen with the extensive use of a file in a very confined space, especially at an inside corner.

It's also possible that the kamis are using better files in recent years, or just not doing quite as much cleanup of the inside of the cho. Less filework would lead to fewer of those tiny marks.
 
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SkagSig40 said:
Just curious if anyone has seen first hand of read about cracks forming in the cho and causing problems?.... I just sometime worry for no good reason(OCD) they they may fail one day and want to know if anyone has ever seen this or a failure caused by this
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I have purchased dozens of Shop 1, Shop 2 and BirGorkha Himalayan Imports khukuris, and followed the forum daily since 1999. For me, the answer is "No".
I agree with David, the pictures show what I would call marks, not cracks, and very tiny ones at that.
"OCD"? - well, we are all subject to that diagnosis, to greater or lesser degrees. Sometimes I think we can get to the point where we overthink that which is really not complicated.
I prefer to enjoy my HI khuks, beat the hell out of the users and admire the safe queens. I know that if any performance issues should develop, Yangdu will make it right.
Otherwise, I try to remember something I learned years ago in an old country bait stand, down a dirt road that lead to a good fishing stream. City slicker that I am, I asked the old fellow who ran the stand how many worms I would get for a dollar. He looked at me with surprise, and said "Don't worry, son, I'll treat ya right. Life's too short fer countin' worms."
 
Would cracks in the original leaf springs caught earlier? I know they are inspected, and I am sure the visual acuity / assessment of someone doing this for living would be nearly always accurate. But, even if I throw this into discussion, it would still not account for a huge number of issues. I mean, repeatedly missing cracks. Or maybe through forging. If tiny, these would go away...I am just thinking out loud. I suspect hammering hot iron would "pack" them, unless air is trapped, which would be bad?

I am still relieved, seeing that the original poster has good intentions, and I agree that such marks would make me look twice and thrice at a knife. But they are most likely not cracks.
 
I have seen cracks in the cho of one khukuri, but it was NOT AN HI KHUK!

I purchased it the summer of 2000 from a Marine Officer who, for whatever reason, had a hundred or so various khukuries for sale. He'd had them all stamped on the blade "Warrior Diplomat '00". I don't know what company or organization made any of these, but he said this one was a "British Army Model". A few months ago I saw a picture somewhere that looked exactly like it labeled "Nepali Police Issue". I don't know if it is or not.

Anyway, a couple years ago I pulled it out of a drawer, unsheathed and looked at it and noticed two cracks. Both were in the cho, one on each side of the "post thingie", down in the cho notch. They were as Mtngunr described a crack, going from one side to the other through the cho notch, and extending about 2mm toward the spine from the cho on each side of the blade.

I had possessed it for over 13 years and had never noticed them. However, since I had never used it for anything serious, and I'm pretty sure steel doesn't "dry out" like wood, it's safe to assume they were always there.

They looked similar to the pictures in this thread, except as I stated they went from one side to the other, not just one corner. I do know they were cracks because when I ground on them with a diamond tip on my dremel tool, they were visible until I had removed enough metal to get past them, which was about 2-3 mm of steel. It now has a cho that is slightly disproportionate to the blade, but oh well. After I smoothed the edges, and polished the cho, no one I've shown it to noticed I had worked on it until I pointed it out. Was this necessary? Probably not, as this khuk is too small for me to generate any chopping force with, and I rarely use it for anything anyway.

I can't post pics as 1. I don't have the equipment for that kind of detail, 2. I still haven't figured out how to upload to this thread, and 3. As I stated, I ground them out a couple years ago and they're not there anymore.

Because of this thread, I did examine all my HI khuks with a lens I salvaged from a broken riflescope several years ago, and a flashlight. I have 14 HI khuks and I did find one with a mark like the ones in SS40's pictures, and only on one corner/edge like his, but this one is actually about a third of the way up the "post thingie" in the cho, . One leg appears to travel about 2mm on one side/face of the "post", and the other about 1mm. If it is a crack (and Mr. Bensinger's explanation about cold shuts indicates it probably isn't), short of trying to drive nails with the "post thingie", I don't see it causing a problem, due to its location.

Do I consider it an issue? No.

Am I going to grind on this one? Again, No.

Am I willing to part with it so someone else can experiment on it? Sorry Mtngunr, but no. No one plays with my babies but me.
 
I wished to apologize to SS40 as his post seems done in such unbelievable naivete as for even the possibility of damage to a company he honors, that i frankly just did not believe that was possible.

So i apologize in all sincerity for jumping all over the post with both feet, and it turning out both were in my mouth.

The marks are curious but putting them on the net answers nothing....answers can only be had by trying to clean them up and see if they go away or keep going....even doing one will answer nothing as it might be the 1 in 100 giving results either way, and would not be valid alone past being a talking point.

I hope to end up with one with a mark such as that and will report honestly even if with misgivings over what a sample of one really means, which is nothing except to admit the possibility of which we already know of anything being possible.

Will welcome any further experience with such from others but with OVER 2000! hits on a thread proving nothing, still very few responses indicating anything to it....and i hope of some of those hits, the viewers also walk away with that impression rather than otherwise.
 
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Photo of edge of quite new Tarwar spine, rear quarter of blade and still 3/8ths" thick....

Dead center of photo to left of obvious small scratches....small black line wrapping around corner.

Very difficult to photograph as camera attempts to focus on distant blade reflections but the line truly wraps around edge and extends 4 times what is visible onto spine and down blade, and is black.

An identical line nearby polished right off.....does this prove anything? No, not even for the line still visible...

But i surely am not going to trumpet to the world my new sword is covered with cracks.

If i were that curious, i would attempt to clean up every one....which i am not....

 
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Does the phrase "quit while you're ahead" mean anything? Done deal. Let 'er rest. Put this puppy to bed.

Edit. atrocious spelling
 
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Sorry...just got back to my computer. Wow! Lots of thoughts and input! Appreciate everyone giving me the benefit of the doubt. I started this thread with no ill intentions and just wanted to try to find out what I noticed in my blades. I forgot I had already asked this over 10 years ago. My brain is filled up and I cant seem to remember a lot of things these days LOL! No need to apologize at all.
One thought I have on this topic is maybe when the kami is making the cho, the pressure of pounding/cutting the cho kind of "tears" the soft steel and "micro cracks/marks/deformities/tears etc form. I would think that the soft steel would possibly "tear" while it is being forged? I don't know. I only have a few favorites left or I would donate a khuk to have it properly analyzed to find out exactly what I'm seeing on a lot of these khukuries. I plan to buy more and will watch this. I'd send my Sanu made khuk if it was not going to be destroyed and I'd get it back. Just a thought....
 
SkagSig40 said:
I'd send my Sanu made khuk if it was not going to be destroyed and I'd get it back. Just a thought....
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What do you mean?

From the pic you posted it looks like there is a tiny crack that seems to sink in (visible inside the Cho) hard to tell as hard fact. But lets take your word for it.
Cracked Cho.jpg

What would be the reason for sending it?
 
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