"K.O." Khukuri in hand

[Mash-ete]

I have just received, in good order and timely fashion, one Ken Onion Pork Piercer style Khukuri from the inimitable Gurkha House.

Cool.

Bullet-point assessments:

Visual- Handle slabs are of superb selection and finish. I had to look very closely to find any hint of grain. They almost look like bakelite or ebonite. Fit to tang is also excellent. There are no gaps, laps or other readily apparent "blister-makers" on the hilt.

Tactile- I generally eschew finger grooves on my cutlery. The shape of this handle, however, affords my gimped grip remarkable comfort with the promise of incredible control. This sucker also came sharper than your average khukuri. Ow.

Olfactory- It smells like a gangrenous yak zit.

Practical- It swings a little weird, but I have so far only cut air with it. The shorter length and unusual curve blur the well-defined "sweet spot" on the more traditional blades. This will be no heavy chopper, but it should perform well for close-in and detail work. I will not be the one to break this baby in. Believe it or not, my mother, who will be sixty later this year, liked the heft if it. She intends to subdue some recalcitrant flora in her yard. I'll let you know what she thinks.

 

[Deathblow]

I received my Ken Onion today. The blade seems very nice, although the sharpened false edge would have been welcome, I doubt I'd actually use it. The only thing I could have a possible complaint about was that the gold inlay around the hole in the end of the handle is incomplete. Other than that it's a very nice Knife. Feels good in the hand, and I can't wait to go chop something with it. BTW, I got #3.


Now if only my WWIII would show up.

 

[Marcus]

Whoa man, you finally got a khukuri! We`ll have to have a "chop off" between your KO and my trusty Bhojpure! Marcus

 

[Mash-ete]

Just got my KO back from mom. While I value her opinion, it took diligent questionning from me to extract detailed performance analysis from her.

She doesn't speak in the vernacular of knifedom so I had her compare the KO to machetes and the WWII that she's borrowed before. (note to MARCUS- You haven't been keeping count, man! The KO makes THREE GH Khuks in my humble collection. There's the above-mentioned WWII and an SN-1 with a stabilized birdseye maple handle. I'm still missing a WWIII, though...)

She was reducing some displaced elm branches to curbside trash pickup size and putting the vestiges of an olive tree out of its misery. Nothing she tackled was above kindling size.

She loved the grip! She has some arthritis trouble in her wrist and thumb and she found the KO easier to control with less fatigue than my WWII. She also felt the grip was more secure than any of my machetes with bakelite or molded nylon handles.

Her assesment of cutting power was a little harder to define. There was a time when she preferred a pruning saw. She has only recently discovered the joys of chopping and still finds the power a bit intimidating. She liked the way that she could denude a branch of twigs in two passes of the blade- one down each side- without having to swing with any effort. I consider this to be testament to the sharpness of the concave edge. She also said that she was able to trim smaller branches in bundles of three or four at a time with one stroke- indicating that the convex edge is no slouch either.

Mom has always been good about tool care and returned my Khuk clean. She also returned it dry, so I reminded her about the benefits of lightly oiling iron tools. I could find not even the tinyest ding anywhere on the blade, and the edge was still sharp enough to slice cardboard without dragging or catching.

In summary- this baby works at least as well as expected for it's anticipated purpose. I look forward to verifying these results in a more strenuous field test myself next month. I'm taking my nieces and nephew on their very first camping trip.