CS Recon Tanto vs Birch log. Winner: Birch log

[matt]

A few years sgo I bought my brother three of cold steel's throwing knives,the exact name of the model escapes me.He took them out of the box walked outside and broke two of the three on the first throw.Cold steel replaced the two that were broken,but while waiting for them to arrive the other one broke.So he just gave up.They all broke at the blade-handle junction.I have the recon tanto and trailmaster and have had no problems with them so far.

 

[inspira]

Lol.. I always wondered how knives broke when thrown, and so I learnt the technique a little and well yes... One of the blades I threw broke clean in half straight perpendicular line right down the middle. I stood there staring at it for a few minutes wondering wtf had happened.

Anyway, I don't throw things anymore and lucky it was only a few dollar letter opener :3

-- Vince.

 

[Dmitry_Platonov]

I used to throw 200mm nails - they are cheap, do no break and good to develop technique.
Antiofftopic: maybe, there was crack for a long time, and batonning just exposed it? There is almost no stress for blade-tang junctiong while batonning.

 

[Thomas Linton]

If proper technique is used, there should be no stress on the blade/tang junction. BUT:

1) if the blow is struck between the handle and the fulcrum, there is stress on the bottom of the blade/tang junction; and

2) if the fulcrum is between the point and the handle and the tip is struck there is stress on the top of the junction.

Imagine rocking (pulling) up on the handle as one strikes just above the tang/blade junction. That combination usually creates a fulcrum towards the front of the blade and the blow puts the bottom of the tang/blade junction in tension. If there is a sharp corner there, as pointed out by TT, one might get a failure.

Or imagine rocking the blade up and down. That can create a fulcrum towards the center of the log/blade. If you then push down on the handle while striking the tip of the knife, you put the top of the tang/blade junction in tension.

 

[ratstuph]

FA,
I encourage you to go ahead and contact CS anyway; point them to this thread. They don’t want people thinking their knives are carp, so they may do the right thing and replace it. It can’t hurt to ask.
adbd,
rats…

 

[Cliff Stamp]

I think it is hard to avoid it completely, when you start you can hammer on the blade in the middle and just drive it into the wood with no such stress, but at some point the blade will be in the wood and you will have to hit the tip. Now you also have to press down hard on the handle or else the knife will just angle up and out of the wood.

Placement of the knife is key, you can make a split a hundred times harder by going across a knot compared to a natural grain break. I have seen even small pieces of wood (3-5") take dozens of impacts to split with a heavy baton with full shoulder strength impacts, because the wood was so badly twisted and knotted the blade essentially had to chisel cut the round, there was no actually splitting involved.

Last winter I cracked some rounds which were so difficult the vibration mangled my off hand, I could not use it the next day. In a survivial situation you would of course not do this, and argueably it isn't overly sensible in most situations.

-Cliff

 

[Triton]

Am I the only one that thinks that this is a bad idea? I would never use ANY knife this way.... I've got this axe...

 

[Cliff Stamp]

Am I the only one that thinks that this is a bad idea?

No, lots of people view it as extremely abusive, it is kind of hard to argue this though when considering the experience of individuals like Jim Aston :


http://www.oldjimbo.com/survival/leuko.html

Check out the pictures at the bottom of the page.

I would find it hard to imagine Cold Steel would admit their knives are not as durable as the ones Jim has used for batoning.

-Cliff

 

[Way-O]

I've split through knotty birch/pine/spruce (could have been any or all, probably mostly the last two) with a thin kitchen knife, cheap but not totally crappy. Eventually the knife was missing chunks out of the edge and small bends were to be found as well. It had a straight angle at the tang junction, no radius. Force was not spared, common sense was ignored. I bent and broke off the tip (a large part of the knife actually) just for the heck of it after it was clear that the knife had no future (though it could have been reground with much labour). Did not take crazy amounts of force, snapped cleanly.
Still it did not actually "fail" during the abuse. I went through quite a few half-logs too. Or about that size, not as thick as they might come.


It's very disappointing to hear of this kind of failure on a supposedly hard use knife.
.

 

[Gryffin]

Am I the only one that thinks that this is a bad idea? I would never use ANY knife this way.... I've got this axe...

When I go camping, I take a hatchet for that sort of work, too. You won't see me beating my knife with a stick like a $2 mule!!

But, the hatchet stays in camp; it's kinda heavy to lug around, and I don't really have a need for it on a trail.

Unless something goes wrong...

If, while out on the trail, I should find myself in a survival situation (admittedly difficult to manage here in New Jersey!), I won't have that hatchet. So it's reassuring to know my knife could handle wood splitting and other firemaking work, if needed.

 

[Cliff Stamp]

You won't see me beating my knife with a stick like a $2 mule!!

If the wood is clear a hatchet is usually far more efficient, however if the wood is twisted or knotty it can be more efficient to baton a knife through it. I have actually batoned a knife through a stick which could not be split with a GB maul, a wedge would have better better though, I was just curious.

Way-o, interesting post. It is comparisons which make the work meaningful, Cold Steel used to promote their knives as being very tough as they could pop them into car doors. Lots of people thought this was impressive until other people starting doing it with other knives and found it didn't take much at all.

-Cliff

 

[Gryffin]

If the wood is clear a hatchet is usually far more efficient, however if the wood is twisted or knotty it can be more efficient to baton a knife through it. I have actually batoned a knife through a stick which could not be split with a GB maul, a wedge would have better better though, I was just curious.

Well, when I run up against that sort of "pathological" wood; I just yank the hatchet free and grab another piece of wood.

Interesting info, though.

 

[Cliff Stamp]

I just yank the hatchet free and grab another piece of wood.

Last year I gave a friend a hand splitting wood he bought, more than half the wood was extremely difficult, none of it was easy, and some of it took the full GB maul head and two wedges. That was the worst I have seen, most spruce around here though won't split well but isn't that bad, pine, birch and oak tends to crack fairly well. In general yeah, cut easier wood. If I am building a shelter I look for pine first and will go a long way to cut it.

-Cliff

 

[FoxholeAtheist]

Storm... I think she's got a guy, but thanks for the offer.

Gryffin, the blade-tang junction wasn't a true right angle as in the "Bad" pic, but the radii weren't much (if any) bigger than the "good" pic. I was unfortunately unable to get pics of the knife this weekend, but I did cut the kraton away from half the handle, so if I get access to a camera soon, the pics should at least be nice and clear.

Triton, if I had known that I was going to need to do this, I would have had my splitting axe along. As it was, I grabbed my RT because I knew I would be buying a small amount of wood prior to visiting a provincial park, and wanted to try out batoning in a non-emergency situation.

The birch log appeared to be knot-free, for what it's worth.

The knife hadn't been used very much prior to this, so I don't think a pre-existing crack was very likely. Mostly I had used it to split apart frozen chicken pieces in the kitchen. Me mighty hunter.

 

[fixer27]

Chicken parts? I broke my Cs Tanto trying baton cut a large pork roast!

I would not trust a CS product with batoning period.

 

[Way-O]

Way-o, interesting post. It is comparisons which make the work meaningful, Cold Steel used to promote their knives as being very tough as they could pop them into car doors. Lots of people thought this was impressive until other people starting doing it with other knives and found it didn't take much at all.

-Cliff

yeah, I should probably mention that the knots in the wood weren't that big or multiple. Biggest were mayde as wide as a finger and there were max. 2-3 per piece of wood.

In any case, I'm pretty confident that the knife would have had very little damage if there hadn't been any knots. I really had to pound through some of them.

 

[steve4765630]

This sounds like abuse to me, but I guess I've never tried it myself, so I don't know how much force it actually takes. I'm an axe guy though. I love splitting, felling, limbing, kindling, looking like a barbarian, etc. I always thought a knife was made for cutting and general light/medium use and an axe was for the aforementioned chores.

 

[t1mpani]

This sounds like abuse to me, but I guess I've never tried it myself, so I don't know how much force it actually takes. I'm an axe guy though. I love splitting, felling, limbing, kindling, looking like a barbarian, etc. I always thought a knife was made for cutting and general light/medium use and an axe was for the aforementioned chores.

It's not nearly as hard on the knife a heavy chopping would be. Clearly an axe or hatchet will outclip a big knife for much of this type of work, but unless I'm expecting to move a LOT of wood I won't lug an axe or hatchet around with me. Small to medium knives with thin to medium blades are certainly best left to cutting. Larger knives with thicker blades don't slice and cut as well as their thinner counterparts, so why do you have them? To serve well enough for normal knife cutting chores and also give you some ability to do heavier work. If they can't do that, then there's no use lugging around the extra weight and size. Some are of the opinion, therefore, that there's NO good reason for larger, thicker knives, and they're certainly entitled to that opinion. Whatever your preference, though, the reality is that these knives do exist, and should be able to handle heavier use. There is no excuse for this knife breaking under these conditions. It would be abusive of a SAK, but not of a fixed blade with a 3/16" splne.

 

[steve4765630]

I'm not dissing you at all. Heck, I have a CS Oyabun and would use it in a similar way if needed, but I almost always have one of my tomahawks on me for wood chores. I guess by abuse I meant that the manufacturer probably would frown upon this type of use. The CS Recon Tanto is tough blade and would guess yours had a flaw. I would try to get it replaced under warranty. True, the knife should not have broken, but it did and unless one of us has a time machine, I guess we have to chalk one up for the birch log. I wonder if you could sharpen up a 1" wide metal file for this type of splitting technique. Hmm, maybe I'll try that. Good luck.

 

[Rat Finkenstein]

You could sharpen a metal file, but it might be too hard, and could break easily with heavy impact. Wear some goggles or a face shield for your protection.