Karda Review...

SamuraiDave

SamuraiDave

Joined
Apr 6, 2001
Messages
2,632
I have been lurking for quite some time now. School, work, and other things that somehow find me to get themselves fixed, have taken away all but enough time to maintain my sanity.

Well, last night I sat down and started cutting up a cardboard box so that it would fit into my small trash can in my kitchen, and realized "hey, this is fun!". So I started cutting the cardboard into 1" strips. The box was about 3' Cube that my parents TV came in. (Did I mention that I now have a TV?) I soon realised that cutting cardboard was a good measure of edge retention and went and got the Karda to my GRS and my JKM out.

The large karda to my GRS is the only one that I own that is functional, and being sharpened by YVSA it cannot be compared to anything but a tiny light sabre. After cutting 1/2 the material I have into 1" strips, both with and across the coruagated grain, after a light stropping the thing still shaves!:eek:

Getting kinda bored with that blade I moved on to my JKM. It showed similar performance as far as the edge goes, but due to it being really thick it didnt like sliceing as well. Verdict: a slighly larger and thicker light sabre.

At this point I busted out my Benchmade folder (ATS 34) , I dont know the model, and finished off the cardboard. Due to the flat grind it had excellent performance on the leftover cardboard, but I didnt have enough cardboard to give it a sufficient test.

Talk to yall later...Back to the salt mines.
 
I haven't checked out the kardas that I have very well. Just to make sure that they will cut. I better do a little research with them pretty soon. They made most of them to use I'm sure.:)
 
IIRC the karda and chakma are usually farmed out to the kami's apprentices. Chakma's have been noted to be insufficiently hardened to stike sparks from flints. ( The bic lighter has hit Nepal also ). I'd hope the kardas would be properly tempered, but would not be surprised if the pine on them ( pine = temper in Nepali ) was lower than it should be.
 
My Karda's seem OK. there does seem to be variance in the hardness of the chakma, though. I'd thought it might be related to the temper of the parent blade but I'm not sure this is true. Haven't really tested this out. But the Karda's I've used for any task a pocket knife would do, and intend to dress out game with one come hunting season. Do they have a partial tang? How far into the handle does the metal go?

munk
 
The 18" AK i have came with a full size karda, partial tang, glued into the horn handle. The YCS I have has 2 full tang kardas, with wooden scales slapped on either side (like the Chiruwa AK).

The Chakma on my 21" GS is the hardest chakma I have, but it is a bit smaller than the chakma(K) that came w. 18" AK. Probably why it tempered up harder than the thicker one.

Keith
 
Kardas and chakmas will vary in quality much more than the big blades. This is due to what Rusty pointed out -- the master kami does not always make them.
 
Okay by me. I use the chakmas that i have, and almost wish that the YCS had one too! I bet in a pinch I could just use one of the flats or spines of the kardas as a chakma...

I also use the chakmas on kitchen knives, scissors, etc, and I rarely take a sharpening stone to a knife anymore. Chakmas rule!

Keith
 
Originally posted by Ferrous Wheel
Okay by me. I use the chakmas that i have, and almost wish that the YCS had one too!

I bet in a pinch I could just use one of the flats or spines of the kardas as a chakma...

Keith
Click to expand...

That was the general idea. Two small knives are better than a small knife and a chakma.:rolleyes: :p
 
Interesting, Yvsa!

The rig just sorta whispered that to me. Goes to show what Richard Burton says in his Book of the Sword(heavily paraphrased) is true --that is that the weapon (or tool) tells you its use.

And the two small knives are nice. I edge profiled them sightly differently, so one's a razor, the other, the workhorse. I also reprofiled the awl tip which was broken.

YCS is my new fave! Wait til you see the scabbard I'm designing to match the yin/yang and diamond motifs!

Keith
 
Originally posted by Ferrous Wheel
Interesting, Yvsa!

The rig just sorta whispered that to me. Goes to show what Richard Burton says in his Book of the Sword(heavily paraphrased) is true --that is that the weapon (or tool) tells you its use.

And the two small knives are nice. I edge profiled them sightly differently, so one's a razor, the other, the workhorse. I also reprofiled the awl tip which was broken.

YCS is my new fave! Wait til you see the scabbard I'm designing to match the yin/yang and diamond motifs!

Keith
Click to expand...

The very first YCS was a bit thinner as was the little knives, awl was same size, but we had the kamis thicken the YCS's edge up a bit as I felt it was too thin.
The damn kamis can't always leave well enough alone and so opted to thicken both kardas as well, makes 'em easy to rework though to put a proper convex edge on them, wish I could say the same for the khukuri itself as I hate the flat and concave edges coming out now That is unless they've changed and from the appearance of the pix they haven't or not much if any.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top