I was just told a skeletonized tang has more strength. Is that true?

[shawn 7.5]

T

Pretty much. I wouldn’t worry about a full tang sandwiched between micarta slabs snapping, even if skeletonized.

Thanks for the help. This is my first winkler knife, (I guess, as he built it, different brand) I’m pretty impressed with it so far. The skeletonized tang was something I learned after. The grip is my new favorite.

 

[DocJD]

this particular knife.

You shouldn't expect ANY one knife to do everything the best .

Your tanto looks to be intended primarily as a fighting / SD stabbing knife and NOT a hard use survival type knife .

I'd be lots more concerned about the blade failing than the tang , if subjected to hard use / abuse .

I'd suggest buying a knife intended for baton use and prying , etc . if you are concerned with ultimate toughness .

Something like this :

 

[Danke42]

To be clear, does Winkler do a "skeletonized tang or a tapered tang?

I have a Belt knife and it's for sure tapered but the sales are pinned on so I don't know if it's also milled out further.

 

[GIRLYmann]

I talked to a reputable knife dealer today and they said that skeletonizing a tang actually increases the strength. Is that true? ...

to which i would further ask
would the thickness of the blade stock
make a difference in structural strength
in such a tang?

 

[Alberta Ed]

Benchmade's Puukko 200 has several holes in the tang, which lightens it but I doubt it significantly weakens the tang. There's still plenty of steel there. Even rat-tailed tangs as on Moras have served perfectly well for centuries. It would be great to hear from knife designers on this topic.

 

[shawn 7.5]

Benchmade's Puukko 200 has several holes in the tang, which lightens it but I doubt it significantly weakens the tang. There's still plenty of steel there. Even rat-tailed tangs as on Moras have served perfectly well for centuries. It would be great to hear from knife designers on this topic.

This is from an email chain with winkler knives. It eventually went up to the man himself.

When skeletonizing a knife or axe tang you do technically change the strength of the steel. Just like an “I” beam in a building the more steel that is there the stronger the structure is. However, you wouldn’t use a 12” beam to support a standard home floor. That would be more strength than is necessary. The same is true for a knife tang. To make a knife comfortable to hold, the tang especially full tangs are more than is necessary to hold up to the strength needed to perform whatever the knife is used for. By either tapering a tang or skeletonizing we can reduce the weight without compromising the knife function. Axe tangs are similar but when designing an axe that will be used for chopping you must be careful to not remove too much material and what you do remove needs to be designed to not cause a place for a stress fracture. This knowledge comes from a lot of testing.



Thanks for your interest,



Daniel Winkler

 

[Dan of Bazz Clazz]

I know I’m reviving a dead thread here, but I just need to quiet my own paranoia. I purchased an HZT 004 from Williams blade design and I believe they also have a skeletonized tang. Daniel Winkler makes the knives for them from 80crv2 steel. Would I be right in assuming that removing steel from a knife’s tang doesn’t improve strength, but it isn’t enough to matter? I don’t plan on doing anything crazy with this knife, it will probably get strapped to my war belt and that will be it, but I like knowing my tools can take terrible abuse if need be, even though said abuse would probably break my heart if I had to do it.

Simple physics is against the argument of skeletonizing alone adding strength. Additional steel would need to be added elsewhere Much like an "I" beam being so much stronger than a square steel bar of the same weight. Skeletonizing reduces weight and strength, but in a well made knife. At least not enough to matter unless such things as vises, power tools or hydraulics get involved. None of which provide anything other than scientific confirmation of theory, not real life use parameters.

 

[Steely_Gunz]

If done correctly, I look at a skeletalized tang as the diffence between a 700lb gorilla and an 800lb one...you're going to lose the arm wrestling match either way.

 

[DocJD]

I'm not an engineer or structural expert , but the idea of holes ADDING strength is pure BS , IMO .

Here's a real life failure under very extreme usage ( my doing ) , but note that the fracture goes right through where a hole has been drilled .

 

[killgar]

Although the shape of a piece of metal can affect how strong it is, or more accurately, how much weight/stress it can bear in a particular direction, I cannot see a knife blade ever being made stronger by having holes cut or drilled into it.

When I hear someone say "A knife dealer told me a skeletonized tang is stronger than a solid tang", my first thought is - "Is that dealer trying to SELL you a knife with a skeletonized tang?".

 

[Blues]

I think the quoted reply from Daniel Winkler himself makes the most sense in regard to knives and axes. His work speaks for itself.

The only thing I might wonder about, hypothetically, is whether the skeletonization could add more "flex" which might allow the tang to bend more before breakage.

But, since I'm not an engineer and don't work in metallurgy and material sciences, I'll leave it to those who actually know what they're talking about, and not worry about it one way or another.

I do tend to be a little more gentle on knives with "stick tangs".

 

[3fifty7]

I'm not an engineer or structural expert , but the idea of holes ADDING strength is pure BS , IMO .

Here's a real life failure under very extreme usage ( my doing ) , but note that the fracture goes right through where a hole has been drilled .

I can’t see any markings what’s the origin and maker ?
What were you doing at the time of failure, also appears the scale is fractured?

 

[shawn 7.5]

I think the quoted reply from Daniel Winkler himself makes the most sense in regard to knives and axes. His work speaks for itself.

The only thing I might wonder about, hypothetically, is whether the skeletonization could add more "flex" which might allow the tang to bend more before breakage.

But, since I'm not an engineer and don't work in metallurgy and material sciences, I'll leave it to those who actually know what they're talking about, and not worry about it one way or another.

I do tend to be a little more gentle on knives with "stick tangs".

It is probably one of the better answers I have received. It did confuse me a bit, if I’m being completely honest. From what I could understand, he essentially said that skeletonizing the tang does reduce strength, but so little it doesn’t matter. And, if I recall correctly, bark river knives skeletonizes a lot of their knives, and those are often used as survival knives.

 

[irsh]

How are we breaking knives at the scale pin? I've seen knives hammered into a tree trunk and used as a step without breaking. Seems to be more to it, like heat-treat or steel type...

 

[Londinium Armoury]

Putting holes in a bar of metal will never make it stronger than a solid bar. You are creating future fracture points.
Get a bar of hardened steel with holes drilled into it towards one end, and put it in an engineers vice and crank on it with a hollow pole. It will break where you have drilled those holes before the solid part breaks.

 

[DocJD]

I can’t see any markings what’s the origin and maker ?
What were you doing at the time of failure, also appears the scale is fractured?

I've already been accused of derailing threads , so I'm not gonna detail this . It's been covered previously in my old posts .

This failure was due to abusive and essentially destruct testing , far beyond normal , proper use for this type knife .

I only showed the pic to demonstrate how a hole weakens the structural integrity and can become an area of failure under stress .

 

[cbach8tw]

I was wondering about a skeletonized full tang compared to a rat tail tang.

 

[herisson]

I wonder about what strength you need in a knife that makes you wonder "will it hold up ?". Swords (which imply a whole lot of more load on the entire build) were produced in a rat tail tang build for centuries... Users were pleased. Similar patterns were produced in full tang but it was for a "same quality but lesser price, for you my lord". Usually, I find full tang knives to be way more heavy than needed.

 

[Danke42]

I'm not an engineer or structural expert , but the idea of holes ADDING strength is pure BS , IMO .

Here's a real life failure under very extreme usage ( my doing ) , but note that the fracture goes right through where a hole has been drilled .

So this was a CFK knife? And you're surprised it was junk?

CFK Knife update and company history

I had purchased a CFK knife (1095HC) last week, and was patiently waiting for it's arrival. I did a search here to see if there was any info on the company. I was shocked to say the least. My heart sank after reading most of the info. The knife arrived yesterday. After spending a few...

www.bladeforums.com

 

[DocJD]

So this was a CFK knife? And you're surprised it was junk?

CFK Knife update and company history

I had purchased a CFK knife (1095HC) last week, and was patiently waiting for it's arrival. I did a search here to see if there was any info on the company. I was shocked to say the least. My heart sank after reading most of the info. The knife arrived yesterday. After spending a few...

www.bladeforums.com

No actually it was not at all "junk" .

Many good knives would have broken under my destruct testing . Please send me some of yours , if you doubt me !

You can break anything . It's all relative .

I set out to break the knife and pushed it far beyond any reasonable use for the type .

The surprise for me was NOT that it broke , but how hard it was to do so .