Edge grind on the Vietnam hawk

Joined
Sep 25, 2000
Messages
535
I love the Vietnam hawk, buts what your take on the edge grind now that you have them in hand? I am sure I could go out and punch through a 55 gallon drum with the blade end and not damage it. Probably cut steel cased wiring too. Smash crates open as well. But I am also sure I could not cut a hunk of rope with it either, unless it was on a wood block and I let a chop fly on it good and hard. That grind is more like an acute wedge than a blade. I wonder if this was used as a weapon if the lack of bite would have it just skimming off a winter jacket on someone's arm etc. How about a leather jacket sleeve. Again I got hunch it would not bite, bruise maybe, maybe even break bone, but not get inside. That kind of has me wondering. I wonder if they over did the thickness of the edge. I mean first and foremost it is a CQB weapon. Not a metal cutting tool. It doesn't cut brush or wood too great either. My thickest edged and bladed knife the Livesay HKR cuts branches and brush much better. Still they must have their reasons to grind the original vietnam hawk that way. I hate to send it back to Andy to regrind. But It's thick enough though that I don't want to tackle the job. Guess I will try and fabricate a variety of targets and test it out. The spike on the other hand is great. Gets through everything. Awesome spike end. I wonder how many folks will be disappointed and sending theirs back for a regrind. The average joe on the street is likely to be more impressed with a shaving sharp edge than one that penetrates a steel drum with no damage. I don't care if it shaves or not, but again question if it can get inside heavier clothing. Hate to chop holes in mine to find out. That leads to the problem also of what to put in said test jacket or clothing as filler that simulates anything worth simulating. Don't suggest hacking up road killed deer as a test medium either. I ruled that out as just too weird.

Anybody test theirs out on anything yet. By the way the bead blasted ones do not have the thick edge grind. How do they preform as well?
 
...this is acutally a good post. I am going to table a specific response until I see some reports from others here, but I look forward to folks sounding off on their experiences. Mike....thanks for sharing this and rest assured, we want you pleased with your Hawk.

As for me, my Vietnam Tomahawk discouraged a fast moving dog tonight that thought it would be fun to charge me in the dark.
Made me think of my friend ole StraightBlastPFS, who had the same thing happen to him!!!

No blood, but when the owner saw me ready with what could end his dear pets life in about a millisecond, he was a whistlin' fool!!!!

I carry the Hawk with the head clutched in my hand.....handle along the back of my forarm.......a la Caracci! When I want length, I just let my hand slide to the bottom.
 
Yep Andy, its a should I eat steak of lobster post. Just cant decide that's all. No way am I disappointed with this great hawk. Just wondering in the long run which grind is most effective for ME. You are not getting it back to regrind yet. No sir. Waiting for my Ranger Spike this week to compare with.

Also I thought of something else that had not occurred to me when I made the first post. The armor penetrating grind is also less likely to hang up in a target. I have heard of blades binding in wood and other targets and I am sure it could happen in your basic daily CQB incident :-) Don't want your blade binding in any target and losing it or your grip on it. The more obtuse angle on the head should prevent this.

Sooner or later I am going to try some more tests and will let you know. Just don't want to scar my new hawk up right now, so will stick to just testing the edge. No chopping up parked cars or anything.

Also the by flipping over the case of the sharpmaker 204 and using the gray stones in bench stone mode, the hawk sharpens very easy. Its the first thing I ever sharpened freehand and it was easy to touch up and or sharpen.
 
The road kill deer idea is a good one. You could go the a thrift store, buy some baggy ass oversize pants, a sweatshirt and a great big parka to put on it. Maybe a stocking cap.

That would make the test more realistic :)
 
I had already said something about this to Mike990 off the forum, but I'll put my thoughts up here, for the sake of discussion.

I like the armor-piercing grind. I think the LaGana tomahawk excels at penetration, judging by my quick & dirty tests. I don't think it's very good at, say, a draw-cut, although I think you could make a pretty wicked slashing wound through soft material with the edge.

The armor-piercing grind is fine for penetration, and the slight forward angle to the edge and the SPEED of the little devil allow it to cut its way into a target better than any tomahawk I've had, bar none.

That's INTO a target. Could it cut a piece OFF OF a target? I'm less sure about that. One thing in its favor is that it's really fast, and unlike a heavier hawk it doesn't blunder into a light target at low speed and just knock it away. It comes in very fast, and the top point bites and lets the rest of the blade cut in behind it. However, for a narrow target that can bend out of the way, if you can't get the top point to lead into the cut and have to rely on that thick edge to push-cut through (including through a leather sleeve), I'm not sure it could do it.

Trouble is, I haven't tried it, and also can't think of a very realistic test. Was wondering if any martial artists amongst us might have some bamboo target poles or tatami rolls to test all these theories against.

I think the armor-piercing edge maximizes what this hawk is good at, and subtracts from its ability to do something it's not really good at to begin with.

'Course, you could always make the argument that most of us are unlikely to need it for a helmeted, body-armor clad mugger. Or for any mugger for that matter (thank heaven).

At any rate, I think I'm going to stick with the grind as-is for a while, try to find a way to test it out, and consider whether the loss of capability is worth the gain of something that might be useful in a limited situation, but for which the weapon isn't designed.

My $0.02.
 
Day by day the armor penetrating grind is growing on me too. I think it probably is best for this hawk. I also keeps it from binding in the target and getting stuck like a knife blade can do. It is sharp and fast enough that it will snip off the tips of weeds when you take a swing at them. One thing that helps any blade work more effectively is to hit things at like a 45 degree angle. This keeps the target whatever it may be from being pushed out of the way. The spike end is really nice. Its not sharpened but boy does it penetrate stuff leaving nice holes. For now I keeping with the orginal intent and grind.
 
I like the way this thread is going and I hope more folks contribute.

A note on the Spike and bevels........for the first time since 1970, we are applying all 5 bevels to the Hawk by hand.......

1) The primary cutting edge on the face of the Hawk
2) The heel of the face....(this is the underside of the cutting face, where the hooking is done......while the coating coats it, it is quite sharp and not a place where the user should keep his/her hand while holding the Hawk
3) Underside of the Spike
4) Lower shank of the spike point
5) Upper shank of the spike point

We are not aware of a reproduction, (and Bobby, correct me if I am wrong on this) that has all five cutting edges ground by hand. There was an unauthorized second generation done in the early 70's that might have, but most of the reproductions tried to get the cutting shape on the heel and spike bevels by sinking the drop forging dies enough to skip a step in hand grinding and sharpening....OR, they would just stop and not actually grind each bevel after the head was forged.

Our Blade Show, Shot Blasted Finish reveals this stark hand work, as the coating hides it some......but its THERE!!! :)
 
I have a shot blasted model and, as Andy said in another thread, its edges are a bit thinner than on the coated ones. Since I don't have both, I can't say just how much thinner. Nevertheless, the edge on mine is still fairly thick. Anyway, I did a few test cuts on some 1/4" nylon cord. It push cut the cord very, very well. Its performance on draw cuts was a bit less impressive but, IMO, not due to the edge geometry as much as the smoothness of the edge grind. For the heck of it, I ran the edge against my leg & was rewarded with a nice bald patch for my trouble. ;) This puppy shaves but the edge was so smooth that it didn't bite all the way through the cord on the draw cut.

I'm going to leave the angle of the edge just as it is. The slightly rougher edge that I will no doubt get after eventually sharpening it myself should have it draw cutting like the champ it is. Great job guys! :D
 
Back
Top