baby Ganga vs. greasewood

F

fearn

Joined
Apr 12, 2005
Messages
124
Hi All,

Awhile back, I got a baby Ganga Ram as a DOTD, and tested it out on a log. It passed with flying colors. Today I took it out to cut a few stems of chamise (greasewood, to the uninitiated). These stems burned about a year ago in a fire, and I was clearing them for a fence. None were more than 1-2" thick. I got them cleared, but at some cost:

GangaRamedge.jpg


GangaRamside.jpg


Chamise is a wood that's hard but brittle. It's fairly easy to snap small branches with your hands, and the splinters will dig in nicely too. The Indians around here used to use the chamise wood for skewers and arrow points, and I think I see why. The baby ganga also chopped through a small stem of mountain mahogany with little difficulty, even with all those dings.

Here's the question: given what I now know about chamise, should I be grumpy about a bad heat treatment, or just wiser about what to cut with it? Perhaps in chamise we have the wood equivalent of bone, so far as cutting goes? What do you think? What would you suggest cutting it with?

F

In case you're wondering, about 30 minutes of work with hammer, file and various diamond hones have fixed up the edge, although some scalloping remains. It's good to go.
 
It could be a problem with heat tretment, but looking at the photos you're chopping outside of the sweet spot and to much twords the tip where it is left softer. I have never cut any of the wood you discribe though.
 
fearn, I can't figure out from the pictures where you were chopping. Was it inside the recurve or on the belly of the blade?

I've got a baby Ganga that I intend to use, but not chopping hardwood. Still, the chips are interesting. I would think if you used a soft section of the edge, it should roll rather than chip.

I'm not familiar with chamise but we have a tough thornbush around here that's hard on even a good edge. The only tool that took it down cleanly without damage was a John Greco hand axe. :)
 
Skyler R. said:
It could be a problem with heat tretment, but looking at the photos you're chopping outside of the sweet spot and to much twords the tip where it is left softer. I have never cut any of the wood you discribe though.
Click to expand...

No, he is fine cutting there. You should be able to cut any hardwood allong the entire edge without damage like this. I have done it with maost of my khuks.

Smells of bad heat treat.
 
SkagSig40 said:
No, he is fine cutting there. You should be able to cut any hardwood allong the entire edge without damage like this. I have done it with maost of my khuks.

Smells of bad heat treat.
Click to expand...

Or just too thin an edge. If you want to send it to me, I'll convex the edge on the belt sander. email me if you're interested. sferguson2 at triad.rr.com

Steve
 
Man, that looks bad. Either send it to Steve, or to Yangdu for replacement.

I've never had any damage such as that cutting any hardwood with any of my khuks.
 
Wow those dings are deep, it could be a bad HT I have cut really hard wood and havent had half as bad damage as that.
 
I agree with steve, the edge looks a bit thin. It does look like you're hitting closer to the tip too. What Kami made it, some kamis temper zones vary slightly.
 
ferguson said:
Or just too thin an edge. If you want to send it to me, I'll convex the edge on the belt sander. email me if you're interested. sferguson2 at triad.rr.com

Steve
Click to expand...

I'd send it to Steve. :thumbup:

I have obtained a couple khuks he has sharpened and a seax also. He puts a great edge on them.

If it still is a problem Yangdu will take care of you...but I wouldn't pass up a good edge from Mr. Ferguson.
 
I'd be really interested to know which kami made that knife. I've never seen that kind of damage to an edge from wood. Sure, the edge is intended to be somewhat softer at the tip--but one really does end up using the tip for some cutting, and that edge looks like you've hit a block wall with it a few times.

I had a (beautiful) tin chirra, made by Vim, that Yangdu kindly arranged to replace because the heat treatment was off and the edge was soft enough that it was developing waves even in the "sweet spot" through wood chopping. (The chiruwa ang khola by another kami which she sent as a replacement has held up perfectly.) Since then, I've seen pictures of another khukuri by Vim that was apparently getting a little wavy in the sweet spot after chopping. So, I'm curious: who made yours?
 
Fearn,

As a possible answer to your last question, I use a cordless Makita recip saw on bamboo and its underground rhizomes. For larger jobs, I run an extension cord out and use a full-size Sawzall, although its weight gets a bit tiresome after awhile.

For removing branches from dead culms once they are cut and for trimming back escalonia hedges when they just need a quick touch-up, I use 18" machetes from Harbor Freight that I've sharpened on one of their $40 belt sanders. The machetes are normally $4.79 each (including a cordura-type sheathe), but they were on sale for $2.99 in April, so I picked up five of them for $14.95.

The real value of the cheap machetes for me has been the practice they've given me in using the inexpensive belt sander, so I have more confidence when sharpening more expensive blades with it.
 
Last edited:
Hi All,

Thanks for your input, and keep it coming. To answer some of the questions:

Most of the strikes were in the sweet spot in the belly of the blade. I'm determining the sweet spot by tapping down the blade. I can hear a noticeable difference in tapping tone (ting ting, tick, tick, ting) as I go down the blade, and I think the tick is where the hardening is supposed to be.

It dented, rather than chipping. If it had chipped, it would be on its way back to Yangdu for a replacement.

As Berkley noted, this chamise was a fire-hardened wood, and also the wood is hard but brittle fresh or burned. Even burned and dead, any chamise stem up to 3/4"-1" can be broken by hand. I've cut a 5" log (toyon) with little damage to the edge. (http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=547639). It's possible that this isn't the blade for chamise.

As for who made it, It was listed as by "Bural" (Bura) on the DOTD, but it has a backward Nepalese flag that made me think Vim had made it. So, I'm not sure on the kami.

Ferguson, I'll talk with you via email. That's a good point about the edge thickness. I've got close it to a swedish flat grind right now, and that might be thin for the wood chopping I'm doing.

Cheers,

F
 
Before every one blames heat tempering and kami's you need to go back and read the safty thread. scroll down and read controlled safe cutting principals by Ferrous Wheels.
All of the dammage on this blade appears to be on the front edge and tip. These areas are not usually tempered like the sweet spot and are not to be used as the primary cutting edge. Also remember that primitave tribes use fire harden wood tips on their weapons (Arrows, spears, pungi stakes ectra.) Fire hardened points are as hard as metal points.
Its possible that the fire hardened pieces that were being cut were as hard as mild steel or rebar not real good on the kukri.
Jim
 
I'm one of those 'uninitiated' post up the photos of the wood or chopped wood
 
Esav Benyamin said:
I've got a baby Ganga that I intend to use, but not chopping hardwood. Still, the chips are interesting. I would think if you used a soft section of the edge, it should roll rather than chip.
Click to expand...

from the images posted, none of those are chips. theres metal moved over to the side at every damaged location, indicating a roll or mash. their just very heavy rolls :(

yangdu may be able to find something similar in stock that has a heat treat that runs to the tip, and if not you could aways take steve up on his offer to convex it. a slightly heavier edge near the tip may help, though I would expect it to suffer some heavy blunting regardless of the edge angle and thickness used, based on the results shown here. truly soft metal will mash down and blunt even if theres a lot of metal backing the edge.

of the 30-40 HI blades I've had, about 10% of them had heat treats that ran to the tip or near it, though those area's were obviously not as hard as the sweet spot. only about 20% of them had really limited sweet sport hardening, most of the branced out into the main curve a little.
 
ajwatson said:
Also remember that primitave tribes use fire harden wood tips on their weapons (Arrows, spears, pungi stakes ectra.) Fire hardened points are as hard as metal points.
Its possible that the fire hardened pieces that were being cut were as hard as mild steel or rebar not real good on the kukri.
Jim
Click to expand...

I've never heard that fire hardened wood is as hard as steel. And I highly doubt it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top