james terrio
Sharpest Knife in the Light Socket
- Joined
- Apr 15, 2010
- Messages
- 22,618
Just about 1/4" ( a tad over on mine) at the ricasso, but it tapers in both directions from there. Most winning comp cutters these days are at least 5/16" at the plunge with very little distal taper towards the tip, and tapered to almost nothing at the butt... those cats want a lot of weight out front for the chopping exercises.
Keep in mind, despite "basically" being camp knives, modern comp cutters are specifically designed and only used for a brief flurry of activity; hence the term "race knife" like a dragster.... they would not work nearly as well if you had to use them all afternoon to actually clear a campsite and build a shelter. The balance would wear out your arm/shoulder and piss you off pretty quick, unless you're a serious athlete. The Crowell/Barker is an outstanding true camp knife with very nice tapers both ways, and it won a couple comps early on... but I notice no one in actual competition is using that design nowadays.
I'm not sure how relevant any of that is to your project, though. A 10" comp cutter is an entirely different animal from a 13-15" machete-like object. My guess is, .200" will be plenty thick, and it better be ground all the way up if you plan on swinging it around very much... both to cut better and moreso, to reduce weight.
It's not so much making the cut that wears a person out... that's the easy part! Recall/pull-back gets real funky once you get up to/past that 8-10" mark with thick stock... you're basically doing a lot of curls really fast. I know, it's only like a pound, but,,, try it yourself. It's not nearly as much fun as it looks with a heavy blade when the clock is ticking.
In any case, I would have no problem trusting 3V at 60Rc for pretty much anything, small or large, thick or thin.
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