Khukuri evolution???

B

bobwill

Joined
Feb 10, 2001
Messages
147
Hello again everyone,
Something I've been noticing, the more I look into khukuris, most of the antiques seem to have no real "shoulder." (I think that's what you refer to them as) In fact, it isn't until this century that shouldered khukuris seem to become popular. Any ideas as to what might have caused this.
I have two theories so far. The first being that the shouldered or angled khukuris have always been around, but for some reason the museum curators decided not to display them. My second theory is that the shouldered khukuri is relatively new development in the life of the khukuri.
What are your thoughts?

Bob
 
IMO... I think that the shouldered blades are easier to make. Having made a few simple knifes, I always thought that a straight line is easier than a greaceful curve.

Granted that is just my opinion.
 
Hmm, I've never done any forging, but to me it kinda seemed the opposite. I mean, the steel's going to flare out, right? Of course I have no experience with forging, and you do so you just became the expert, atleast compared to me.
smile.gif
Of course you could just grind the spine to get it perfectly straight, but I do not think that's a technique that HI would employ, for one thing it doesn't look like they would have the necessary tools.

Bob

[This message has been edited by bobwill (edited 02-26-2001).]
 
Shouldered khukuris are one of the results of modern war I think because knives in general have become less important in combat. Shouldered khukuris are better tools whereas curved khukuris are better weapons.
 
The 'Shoulder' on a kukhri is where the blade bends. On the modern kukhris there is a distinct point at witch the blade bends. On the older models there is no real point at which the blade changes, but it does happen.

Let me take a look... see if I can find JP's pics.
 
Matt Matheny wrote -

"IMO... I think that the shouldered blades are easier to make. Having made a few simple knifes, I always thought that a straight line is easier than a greaceful curve."

With respect, I'd tend to disagree; a curved khuk should IMHO be far easier to make than one with a shoulder. Simple curving, whether concave or convex, requires a few heats and some gentle tapping over the anvil bick or a stake (or you can use the jaws of the vise); an angled shoulder would require some jumping up and shaping after forming the curve by one of the above methods.

When you're forging, the metal will usually seek to curve of its own accord, for example when you're laying in the edge bevel. Straight lines are much harder to achieve; generally you have to take a heat and take out the curve that's crept in of its own accord, by tapping the blade first over the bick and then on the face.

Put it another way; I can do curves quite easily. I've tried to do shoulders, but never successfully.

[This message has been edited by Tom Holt (edited 02-26-2001).]
 
Originally posted by Tom Holt:
Matt Matheny wrote -

With respect, I'd tend to disagree; a curved khuk should IMHO be far easier to make than one with a shoulder. Simple curving, whether concave or convex, requires a few heats and some gentle tapping over the anvil bick or a stake (or you can use the jaws of the vise); an angled shoulder would require some jumping up and shaping after forming the curve by one of the above methods.


Well Tom, you might be right. Most of the stuff that I have done was small tools for carving. The bigger pieces that I have done were reductive process. I does however seem to make sense that if the piece that you start with is straight, it would make sense (at least to me
smile.gif
) that you would have to heat and beat it less for a sharp curve. Since the Nepali are not using a western style anvil a lot of my reasoning goes right out the window. I would at some point love go get back in front of a forge. It has been far too long.
frown.gif
Click to expand...
 
One of the reason for development of the shoulder (gee Guys, I always called it the elbow--but what do I know of anatomy) could be for conservation of material.

The nature of the Khukuri is to be point heavy and forward. You can get that feel by putting a definite bend (shoulder/elbow) and use less material to accomplish this. If you look at the nonshouldered and older examples, they seem to have about 50% more metal in them than our modern examples.

Or maybe the King of Goorkhas decided that a design change was necessary to differentiate between Modern Nepal and Ancient Nepal--sort of an intro into the new era
biggrin.gif


PS Where do you guys get all the "fullered" Khukuris? Everything I get always has a regular blade. By the way, nice Sirupati, Berk.
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Watakushi Wa Shinajin Desu
DeathDancer

[This message has been edited by DeathDancer (edited 02-26-2001).]
 
:
Rene the fullered H.I.Khukuri's in no particular order are the Hanuman, Kothimoda, Gelbu Special, Milennium Special, and the YCS if you were talking about the new models.
I have seen a few of the older WW I, WW II era and maybe a bit further back courtesy of Terry Sisco and most of them don't have fullers either and the ones that do are not very deep due to the thinness of the blades to begin with.
And some of those old ones are very, very thin. Terry had one the other day he showed me that had a distal tapered blade that was no more than 1/8" towards the point and more near about 5/64" or bout 0.080 inch.
It was a smaller size khukuri though.
Another interesting thing about the older khukuris that Terry pointed out to me is the distal tapered blades and the way that was
done.
The thickest part is at the bend, elbow or shoulder or whatever you want to call it and tapers equally pretty much, back to front.
Some of the old Chiruwa Style tangs are very, very thin at the back, one was about 1/32" to maybe 3/64 inch.

It's really neat being able to look the old khukuris over and compare them to todays as well as to each other.
There were as many or maybe even more different styles way back then as they are now with the same subtle differences between what are supposed to be the same model.

And Terry is fortunate to be able to do the excellent work he does, getting to see and handle all the old khukuris he does.
And one of these days Terry is gonna be a real authority on the subject of khukuris.
smile.gif



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>>>>---Yvsa-G@WebTV.net---->®

"VEGETARIAN".............
Indin word for lousy hunter.
 
'Ya know, with regards to this shoulder/elbow
area. About ten years back I saw a Public TV
special on the design and construction of
European cathedrals. In particular the various domed ceilings were analyzed by
structual engineers/architects? Although
these buildings and Khukruris seem different,
there are structural similarities. What? you
say... Turn the Khuk up on it's butt end.
What have you got? A line extending upward and then curving inward, right? What are the
points at which pressure will be applied to
this (lets call it a half-a-cathedral) structure? At the distal end (for ex. thrusting) and laterally on the supporting
column (chopping with the edge or striking bluntly with the spine of the Khuk). I'd
first think that any type of dome/curve would
automatically dissipate pressure equally
along it's surface. Using the same analogy
an Igloo can be a suprisingly strong structure. Well these engineers/architects
determined there is indeed a 'weak-point'
at the area where the straight column ends
and the curve begins. The cathedral builders
of old apparently knew this and resolved the
problem the same way the modern Kamis have.
By extending a right-angle(shoulder/elbow) along an outside wall at the point where an
inside curve begins. It all does the same thing then, reinforces key areas of the structure under stress situations. Which is
why I shared this perspective thing.

I don't know,-More coffee anyone?

 
:
Bro I imagine that the old ones were thin because of the scaricity of good steel.
And I'm also surprised not to see examples of either iron with a steel edge or folded steel as seen in some of the other old knives that are depicted on the Edged Weapons Website.
And perhaps the old kamis were better at forge welding and took more care in the making of khukuris making any welds
invisible.
And perhaps if some of the old ones in the museums were etched there would be some that showed those techniques.
Another thing that surprises me is the absence of khukuris made from the wootz steel made in
India.
It's a credit to the design of the khukuri that the thin ones gained such a reputation of being so deadly in the hands of the
Ghorka's.
It's also a credit to the old kamis that they were able to make a material stretch as far as they did in making the old khukuris.

I do have to say that the thinner old WW II I have can't hold a candle to the chopping power of the modern day khukuris from BirGhorka.
I know I keep bringing up the YCS a lot but there is something about it that makes it cut like a much heavier khukuri to me. Perhaps when Matt gets his he will use it and have a report for us so it won't be just me that feels that way.

I had my GRS and YCS out back today cutting a very large bushy privet that had several trunks.
The YCS would penetrate almost as deep as the GRS and would take a trunk 2 1/2" in dia down in 3 cuts where the GRS would do it in two, but that was using a 2 handed grip.
smile.gif

The YCS was much better at trimming the limbs due to it having better control but the GRS was better at cutting the larger pieces in two after it was cut down. Had I have had something to cut them in two on there might not have been as much difference.


------------------

>>>>---Yvsa-G@WebTV.net---->®

"VEGETARIAN".............
Indin word for lousy hunter.
 
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