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Chopping with a machete

moonwilson

moonwilson

Joined
Aug 10, 2006
Messages
7,250
I had a chance to do some chopping this morning. One of my neighbors decided to throw away their old, nasty dining room table, and left it on the curb. "That thing's taking up entirely too much space!"- says I. My wife rolled her eyes. And I'm out the door, lickety split, before the garbage man can rob me of my prize, machete in hand. You see, I live in the city, and an opportunity to terrorize hardwood early in the AM before work rarely presents itself. So I set to that table, with the intention of doing it grievous injury, before I headed into the office.

You see, I've never tried hard chopping with a machete before. I've always thought machetes were for the light stuff, and big "choppers" were for chopping. Well, I learned something this morning- that's true. However! You CAN chop with a machete, there is just a heck of a lot more technique and finesse involved to do so efficiently. With a chopper like a Battle Mistress, you grab the handle in a hammer grip, and pound away like a caveman. The weight of the blade and your muscles power through whatever you're trying to chop. A machete is different. With a machete, you accelerate the blade up to speed, and sort of fling it into whatever you're trying to chop. You have to be accurate- a little bit of angle off one way or another, and the blade will "mush" or deflect off of what you're chopping. If you get your swing, your angle, and the sweet spot of the blade just right, you'll get a nice, deep bite. It's fun! But hard, in that you really have to concentrate on what you're doing.

Another thing to take into consideration when you're using a machete to chop- is that there is a much longer blade swinging through the air than there is with a "chopper". You have to pay attention where ALL of that blade is going, not just the "sweet spot". In a chopper, you have maybe an inch or two of blade that extends past the sweet spot. With a machete, you could have 6", 8" or more going past where you are trying to hit. Which means that yes, I did ding my edge into the pavement a couple of times. BAD NEWS with a chopper. Not so much with a machete. Turns out, I did very little damage. After steeling, I have a little ding about .5mm across, that you can only see if the light hits the edge just right, and you're really looking for it. Not too bad! I was using my 18", stainless Condor El Salvador, and I continue to be impressed with Condor's edges, and their stainless machetes.

So, yes, you can chop hard wood with a machete. (This was oak, probably 1950s or '60's vintage). It just takes a little longer, and requires more technique than a dedicated chopper does. :thumbup::cool:
 
moonwilson said:
So, yes, you can chop hard wood with a machete. (This was oak, probably 1950s or '60's vintage). It just takes a little longer, and requires more technique than a dedicated chopper does. :thumbup::cool:
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Glad you got to have fun with that table! Seasoned hardwood definitely poses a challenge for any chopping tool, but once you really get your angle of approach and that nice hard "SNAP" of the point right it's kind of scary!!! :eek: If you need some more practice just drop me a line if next time you're up this way again. No shortage of stuff to chop here! :D

It took me a while at first for my machete handling (really more like awareness of how to use the tool) skills to become second nature, but once you spend a few summers with them it starts becoming second nature. I hardly think about it anymore, except about where a glancing blow might deflect to, of course!:p
 
WILLIAM.M said:
any damage to the edge??
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Only where I dinged it into the concrete several times. Even after that, there was only one teeny roll that steeled out almost completely. The edge was completely unphased by the hard oak. :thumbup: Still shaving sharp! Convex is definitely the way to go on machetes.

Here's the edge. I've circled the little ding in red. The rest of the edge is still pristine. The dark spots near the tip are spots of paint that need to be cleaned off, though I may not bother. This is a machete, after all. :)
zzzz-1.jpg
 
Wow. I have to say that you're more confident than I am of what a machete will do to a table. Being a dedicated Machete Man, I wouldn't worry so much about whether a machete could chop up an oak table, but rather what all the steel fittings in the table would do to my lovely machete's edge. I know my bolo will chop... but not through steel.

I think I would have used a sledge hammer for that one. Almost as much fun, and no chance of damaging my Precious.
 
dawsonbob said:
Wow. I have to say that you're more confident than I am of what a machete will do to a table. Being a dedicated Machete Man, I wouldn't worry so much about whether a machete could chop up an oak table, but rather what all the steel fittings in the table would do to my lovely machete's edge. I know my bolo will chop... but not through steel.

I think I would have used a sledge hammer for that one. Almost as much fun, and no chance of damaging my Precious.
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Well going into this, I wasn't exactly sure how the machete would hold up. It was my plan to push it a bit- not outright abuse, but to see what the thing could do. I looked the table over before I started wailing on it, to see where the metal bits were. The only metal on it was the nails holding the legs on, everything else was pegged and glued. The top was formica, with a '50's "googie" boomerang pattern on it. The edging was hard rubber. It was in sorry shape. The legs were solid oak, about 5" thick. I got through those very easily, once I figured out the technique. There was no way I was going to chop all the way through the top, I didn't have the time, so I just chopped away the supports around the edges, and used my "gorilla school of bushcraft" skills to smash it into pieces- by putting the edges on the curb and jumping on the damned thing. I weigh 220lbs, so a little table isn't much of a match. :D Then I threw the whole thing into the dumpster.

It was so much fun. I love tearing stuff apart. :thumbup: The machete did its job, better than I expected actually, but a Battle Mistress would have done it much faster. However, my favorite mistress is worth at least 20X what that machete cost me, FWIW. For the money, a good machete makes a pretty decent chopping tool!
 
moonwilson said:
Well going into this, I wasn't exactly sure how the machete would hold up. It was my plan to push it a bit- not outright abuse, but to see what the thing could do. I looked the table over before I started wailing on it, to see where the metal bits were. The only metal on it was the nails holding the legs on, everything else was pegged and glued. The top was formica, with a '50's "googie" boomerang pattern on it. The edging was hard rubber. It was in sorry shape. The legs were solid oak, about 5" thick. I got through those very easily, once I figured out the technique. There was no way I was going to chop all the way through the top, I didn't have the time, so I just chopped away the supports around the edges, and used my "gorilla school of bushcraft" skills to smash it into pieces- by putting the edges on the curb and jumping on the damned thing. I weigh 220lbs, so a little table isn't much of a match. :D Then I threw the whole thing into the dumpster.

It was so much fun. I love tearing stuff apart. :thumbup: The machete did its job, better than I expected actually, but a Battle Mistress would have done it much faster. However, my favorite mistress is worth at least 20X what that machete cost me, FWIW. For the money, a good machete makes a pretty decent chopping tool!
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Ahhh... that table isn't at all as bad as the last one I dismantled for a neighbor. That one had threaded steel rods running up the inside of the legs, and metal bits all over the place. I ended up using wrenches to dismantle it, then smashing the remainder with a sledge. You're right: smashing things is a ton of fun. Without the steel in the table, it would be a lot of fun to cut one up with a machete. Don't know if a Battle Mistress would do better or not, since I don't have one. My philosophy is, if I can't do it with a Silky saw and a bolo, then it's time for an application of high explosives.
 
dawsonbob said:
My philosophy is, if I can't do it with a Silky saw and a bolo, then it's time for an application of high explosives.
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If you have a Battle Mistress, you don't need the Silky saw, or the high explosives. :D A FBMLE or a NMFBM hits like a JDAM! They're not much for clearing brambles and vines, but a Battle Mistress is THE tool for heavy chopping. They're scary how well they chop. 4" thick branches in one whack are nothing. :cool::thumbup:

I need to give my Combat Machete a shakedown sometime soon. It looks like it might make an even better chopper than the El Salvador. Shorter, thicker, heavier blade= chopping POWAH!
 
moonwilson said:
If you have a Battle Mistress, you don't need the Silky saw, or the high explosives. :D A FBMLE or a NMFBM hits like a JDAM! They're not much for clearing brambles and vines, but a Battle Mistress is THE tool for heavy chopping. They're scary how well they chop. 4" thick branches in one whack are nothing. :cool::thumbup:

I need to give my Combat Machete a shakedown sometime soon. It looks like it might make an even better chopper than the El Salvador. Shorter, thicker, heavier blade= chopping POWAH!
Click to expand...

I'd be happy to loan you my 14 inch bolo to try: it's short, thick, and it's my best chopper. It's a cheapy that I got for about $5 years ago. Although the handle exemplifies the word suck, the steel's fairly good. I spent a fair amount of time re-profiling and convexing it and now hitting branches — at least the ones around here — with it is like wrapping them with det cord. Bang: branch-be-gone.
 
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