whats the deal with the marbles DB?

im not gonna be able to get one for a while. i was trying to scope it out before i buy it. with my current situation, that's a "major expense"
 
Better days lie ahead, my friend. There we days I wish I had much much less than that in my pocket.

They are gone now, but boy did it build character. Or so I like to believe.

(As I used to say, living under communism is an experience that changes people. Be thankful if you experienced it only from reading books.)
 
phantomknives said:
So smoky mountain knifeworks sells the marbles full size double bit, with as far as i can tell, a skinny handle and decent steel. I'm skeptical because its $29.
its from their forge in el salvador. looks to be a swamper, i dont know about the profile.

https://www.smkw.com/marbles-full-s...d-forged-1049-carbon-steel-head-model-mr782db

whats your thoughts
Click to expand...

Suppose this listed for $99 then what? All of a sudden it might be great stuff for great value? For the life of me I don't know how a manufacturer can make and ship a finished product to a distributor who doubles the price when he moves it along to a retailer who then also doubles the price: all for $29. On the other hand I don't know how it's done for $99 either! Someone has to cut corners on materials, production, labour, wages and western style safety, and for sure ain't the transporters, middlemen or retailers.
 
i have a bias againt cheap stuff even though im an advocate of cheap. my pocket knife cost 20 bucks. if it was 99, i wouldnt even consider it because i can get a very nice axe head and a velvicut handle for that price.

i think how they're cutting corners is, if you look, it doesnt have a palm swell. they can use more parts of the tree, it's also not finished. only sharpened. lastly labor is cheap in latin america. if harbor freight can make 6 pound fire axes with baseball ash handles, which by the way is a good axe under all the excess, im sure they can make a double bit for 29
 
Steve Tall said:
Plus, they have "American Hickory" handles. (The Chinese hickory handles in a recent thread are just "Genuine Hickory").
Click to expand...
Something else we're going to have to keep an eye out for. There are about a dozen different 'American' Hickories of which only a few are deemed tool worthy.
 
Steve Tall said:
Plus, they have "American Hickory" handles. (The Chinese hickory handles in a recent thread are just "Genuine Hickory").
Click to expand...

Steve, are those Chinese “Genuine Hickory” handles made of Chinese hickory species or some American hickory sp. (pecan?) imported to China (from the US or Mexico)?
 
littleknife said:
Steve, are those Chinese “Genuine Hickory” handles made of Chinese hickory species or some American hickory sp. (pecan?) imported to China (from the US or Mexico)?
Click to expand...

Unrelated to the Marbles products, the picture of the axe handle from a Chinese manufacturer (shown below, from another thread) is marked "Genuine Hickory", and the caption from that photo is
"China hickory wood handle for felling axe, hickory wood handle for camping axe supplier".

Written this way, it can be taken several ways. I don't know but I'm guessing they mean the felling axe handle is from Chinese hickory wood (from China and/or made of some "Chinese hickory" species).

"Chinese hickory is cultivated in Zhejiang Province, with much of the production coming from Linan County..."
http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu//carya/species/cathayensis/cathayensis.htm

Steve Tall said:
Sad but true, it seems:

JINGANG INDUSTRY CO.,LIMITED
Tools Handles Manufacturer

pl11788732-hickory_wood_handle_for_felling_axe_hickory_wood_handle_for_camping_axe.jpg

caption: "China hickory wood handle for felling axe, hickory wood handle for camping axe supplier"


Product Details:
Place of Origin: Shandong
Brand Name: Jingang
Certification: GS
Model Number: A613, A601 All types handles
Payment & Shipping Terms:
Minimum Order Quantity: 1000pcs
Packaging Details: Export Carton or Pallet
Delivery Time: 30days
Payment Terms: T/T, LC
Supply Ability: 10000pcs/day

Note the last line: 10,000 pieces per day.
Click to expand...
 
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FortyTwoBlades said:
Condor/Imacasa use very good quality hickory for their handles. :)
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Provenance (ie physical properties of) of the material is one thing but choice of grain orientation and whether it goes straight through is a whole other. Anyway I think I know what you meant.
littleknife said:
Steve, are those Chinese “Genuine Hickory” handles made of Chinese hickory species or some American hickory sp. (pecan?) imported to China (from the US or Mexico)?
Click to expand...
Knowing now that genus Carya (true Hickory species) is also found all throughout Asia I don't think you have to contemplate for too long as to where Chinese handles marked "genuine Hickory" are coming from. Even a machine-felled/automated-milling-processed tree in USA is going to cost a lot more to transport overland and across the Pacific (recall in another thread what weighty blanks and billets are worth when it comes to shipping) than is a 'peanuts' human labour-processed tree nearby the Asian factory. In fact it may become a future miracle if "genuine Hickory" continues to be what it is instead of becoming whatever-'lookalike'-hardwood-grows-nearby.
To be a large-scale wood tool handle manufacturer in a First World country today is increasingly fraught with problems not least of which are investors whose only loyalty is the bottom line (above average financial returns) and not stable local employment, advancement or growth.
 
Steve Tall and 300Six, thank you both for your insights.:thumbsup::thumbsup:

I know that shipping adds cost, but that does not prevent Food Companies to ship frozen US chicken to China, getting it “processed” there (whatever that means; mixing soy protein, sea algae extracts?) to “chicken nuggets” and shipping it back to the US to be sold with profit to boot.
The amount of “Genuine Hickory” on made in China axes and striking tools is so great, that I wondered on the availability of local Asian hickory sources large enough to sustain the demand. Hence my question.
Presuming for example a source from let say Mexico, where labor is still cheap and environmental protection is not really enforced (illegal logging?), one might easily imagine a situation of hickory wood (not necessarily pignut, mocker nut or shagbark) being shipped to China & still being profitable, because the true costs a legal logging operation employing legal workers simply do not apply.
 
300Six said:
Provenance (ie physical properties of) of the material is one thing but choice of grain orientation and whether it goes straight through is a whole other. Anyway I think I know what you meant.
Click to expand...

They also do a surprisingly good job of orienting the grain and avoiding runout. Whoever they're sourcing handle stock from (or completed unfinished handles--I'm not sure what they do in that regard) does a great job. They're just usually in need of slimming out, but that's par for the course for most axes/handles.
 
littleknife said:
. . .
I know that shipping adds cost, but that does not prevent Food Companies to ship frozen US chicken to China, getting it “processed” there (whatever that means; mixing soy protein, sea algae extracts?) to “chicken nuggets” and shipping it back to the US to be sold with profit to boot.
The amount of “Genuine Hickory” on made in China axes and striking tools is so great, that I wondered on the availability of local Asian hickory sources large enough to sustain the demand. . .
Click to expand...

Maybe "American Hickory" is going to China and coming back as handles. IDK, but I think that is what this this guy is saying:


Posted by Mark Stansbury at 4:41 PM​


Bob
 
Could be there was an commercial incentive in China to plant groves of American Hickory after Nixon's historic visit but I doubt it. I do have knowledge of an enthusiastic gov't official commemorating that visit in 1972 by planting 40 n. American Ash trees in a public park. USDA scientists accidentally re-discovered these, still thriving, about 10 years ago thanks to biological control by two or three species of parasitic wasp of the otherwise ruinous native Emerald Ash Borer.
 
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