New to the forum and just ordered a CAK!

[stickfred]

misthv,

In the past, some people that were going to carry a great deal pulled that brass chape(?) off the end and set it aside. Others carried theirs on a belted system over their shoulder which seemed to keep them from getting jabbed.

The question regarding the spine centering can only be responded to by saying that it is a handmade, one-of-a-kind item. Though the kamis may make hundreds of any/many style, each one is unique in its own way. The only problem I could envision would be that the spine would be so cock-eyed that the blade may land slightly off your mark in a swing. If it was really bad, I'm sure Yangdu would have set it aside and noted it in the sale.

I'm sure you are going to enjoy your CAK, just as I am sure it will be reproducing like a rabbit soon. Happy and safe khuking to you. And, of course, Welcome to the Forum.

 

[Moonw]

I have one that is not perfectly centered. A few grams out of a few hundred...make no difference. It's just an aesthetic thig, really, that today, for me, for a beater knife, is nothing. Repeated sharpenings will also take away metal, it won't matter at all, again. I'm assuming you have around 1 mm of "driftage" on some segment of the blade...

 

[Bawanna]

Precisely what Stickfred and Moonw said. I doubt it's worthy of worry.

Auntie has a very desriminating eye, very little that really matters gets past her. I've bought several blems advertised as such and gosh durned if I could find the blems.

I bought one special, not a blem, right after she sent it before I even got it she sent me a large refund, said when she looked to check stock for me it looked great but she didn't have her glasses on, when she went to package it, she found a flaw.


I'm still looking for the flaw, never did find it.

If it's a genuine concern to you, you need not worry Auntie will work it out with you. She wants everybody happy, very happy.

 

[mtngunr]

The triangle point of spine is cosmetic and you should be able to look over blade and see any truly meaningful flaw such as blade corkscrewing...
Which i doubt you'll on any knife shipped unless mentioned beforehand....as mentioned, handmade by eyeball and hammer and no fixtures or jigs for shaping....my Randalls are not perfect either and Gary Randall will freely admit Randall Made Knives has never made a perfect knife....handmade takes a serious mental gearshift as we are so accustomed to factory things jigged and fixtured to near perfect symmetry...as with Randalls the question is "does it work for job intended?...is something weakened or preventing normal operation?"......if you have doubts, hold off on use until you talk to someone at purveyor....basic rules for all hand forged knives...
it sounds as a niggle to me but it is your knife and money...as an fyi the one on my End of World thread recently is not perfect and angle not same especially past "elbow".....i LOVE it....great for handmade under what we would call quite primitive conditions...

As for the chape tip, i think under the safety faq on main page, it recommends blunting tip....i do so to mine but less drastic than file....2000 grit paper and then polish with rouge....hang depends on belt, waistline height etc.....it works great with LBE (pistol belt with suspenders) on deployments but i DID end up now with the slightly less massive WWII model of late....both are great multipurpose chop and clear and hack and split tools....but not something for casual wear at Walmart when an urge to stand in a line of 50 people comes upon you.

Just as a PS, was reading some of the comments/possibles.....near every one assumes somewhere the blade is dead perfect in the main and one thing off is what led to what you see...but in a handmade knife there is not one single fixed point of reference in the entire thing...it is an accretion of various facets of the blade and tang which lead to any one thing about the blade which catches the viewer's eye for good or ill. In no case is it as simple as "this was dead flat, these bevels were added and then this was ground off center"....there is not one surface on the handmade knife which is perfectly flat, convex or concave...not one line that is perfectly straight nor any matching angle truly matching...nor are thicknesses perfectly symmetrical either side of a centerline nor is there even a straight centerline....how an accomplished smith makes one thing not going so well flow into something which all comes together into a working blade is the art of the thing....where a lesser man might throw it on the scrap heap, a good smith makes anything work and work well to where only the closest look shows that it is indeed handmade....and that it works DESPITE these things which if carried to conclusion on a piece of flat stock by a machine would produce only an absurd piece of junk..

This is what i love about my handmade knives....they are far from perfect but they are PERFECT.

 

[ndoghouse]

.......they are far from perfect but they are PERFECT.

Thats it brother! If it feels good do it! If it dont... email Aunti for something that will. Each knife is a fingerprint. When I buy a new knife I photograph it for two reasons. One is to log it in to my database in case I have to identify it at a pawn shop or something and two is it wont stay shiny and pretty long so I can show it off on the forum as new but in reality if you asked for a recent pic it will likely be scratched up pretty nicely.
As far as the chape I believe it it hot glued on so heating it will easily release it and if you ever want to put it back on it is no problem to heat it and stick it back on. Really that simple. You can round it or sand it smooth as well or even put little Christmas jingle bells on the end like one big bad dude with dire wolves and mote monster does.

 

[mtngunr]

Most chapes need top tips bent in to clinch enough or they fall off anyhow....my new WWII was already done so....i just dull point but just keep in mind it is a sheet cone and the more removed the larger the hole at actual tip....

 

[misthv]

Here's the sheath - I took away the metal thingy to reduce scuffing! Looks good imho!

The knife in whole.

I guess this is Kumar's work?

So this is me trying to get a picture of the uncentered line. Its about 50% wider to the "left".

BAM!

Links to larger images;

 

[stickfred]

Yep, that looks like a Kumar. Don't see much of his work lately. He did great work with HI. The Kobra was his design IIRC. That uncentered line one a Kumar blade won't mean squat. Congratulations on a fine acquisition. Now, let the plants beware.

 

[ndoghouse]

Very nice looking Kumar CAK! Looks just fine without the chape.

 

[mtngunr]

Your knife is as well made as mine....doubt many here could do better with twice the tools.....i buy handmade knives for that exact reason....they are not machine cold machined barstock things spit out by thousands daily.....Randall is the most practiced US handmade shop with much better equipment and modern supply flow support and cranks out 180 or so a month...and some knives are better than others....i hate to say this as a true Randall admirer/user/investor of the most famous handmade knife in world, but imagine the numbers of blades delivered which do not work is even higher for them than with the Khukuris from dear Yangdu....the Khukuri smiths average maybe two per day if lucky, and with long hours...lot of blood, sweat, tears and blessings in that blade...

Once you start using other's totally handmade knives of highest renown, and then get a knife from dear Yangdu, you realize what a fine knife it is which she supplies...anything made stateside of this quality would easily sell for two or three times as much.....actually far more if the shop prided itself as doing things exactly as in a traditional manner.......as an fyi, this is exactly what Randall does and why they cost as they do....made exactly the same way in every detail as they were in, say, 1953.....and Yangdu's shop even more "old school" than that.....normally you pay more for such, and not less....these knives are fantastic....