Maybe I'm just nitpicking but...

K

killa_concept

Joined
May 19, 2009
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I think I've finally come to the conclusion that I very much dislike the karda/chakma set that came with my m43. I know the majority of people don't bother using them or simply replace them with other tools, but I personally consider them to be a very functional aspect of the kukri rig - I find the karda to be a great utility/carving knife and it tends to be my go to knife for tasks too small for my kukri or BK-2 (what I would generally bring with me camping or hiking). I even use the chakma to straight outen the kukri's edge before touching it back up with a mousepad/1000grit sandpaper and a strop (a small kit I keep with my gear). Lastly, as silly as it sounds, I find keeping the karda and chakma staying with the kukri to be very aesthetically pleasing due to the matching handles...

Anyways, my evaluation/complaint:
I find the set that came with my Sher(the tiger)-made 18" Vojpure to be outstanding - the karda in particular is magnificent: it's big, has a thick spine but with a steep edge bevel to balance, and is well hardened - very similar to how Sher makes his kukris. I just love using it and it probably sees just as much use as the kukri itself. The one that came with my 15" AK is also pretty nice. While small, it's a good size relative to the 15" AK and is similar in quality to the one that came with my Vojpure.

However, the one that came with my (young) Sher-made 18" m43 is a completely different story... On top of being even smaller than the one that came with my AK, this one has other issues that I find very displeasing. First off, its thick - but unlike the other two kardas, it's not particularly wide and comes with a fairly obtuse edge bevel. It tends to split things more than it does slice... the hardening also seems to have been rather poor - it takes a decent edge, but hardly keeps it when used. The handle is fairly thin too - I'm afraid of breaking it off if I use too much pressure... the chakma's handle is even worse in this regard - I don't dare and try to straighten my m43's edge with it for fear of the handle breaking and perhaps taking my fingers with it when my hand slips. In all honesty, this set feels like it was just tacked on with my m43 out of necessity for the tradition and hardly match up with the khukri... I've considered just replacing them all together, but it just proves to be an eyesore. For the time being, I've simply attached a Mora to my khuk :(
 
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The kardas and chakmas are usually made by young apprentices around the shop who are still learning to pound steel. They usually help out with making larger knives, and the kardas and chakmas is when they get the chance to do a mostly solo project.

Young Sher, having recently been an apprentice himself, probably has only the youngest and most inexperienced guys helping him out.

Not a justification if you aren't happy with them, but it's an explanation, anyway.
 
That is some interesting inside intelligence. I have not read that anywhere, as far as the apprenticeship aspect. I guess that is a logical progression.
 
I agree with you if a Kurkri doesn't have a usable karda and chakma, why bother with them at all..if they are going to be part of the set they should be just as usable as the Kurkri they are with. No one would order a dui-chirra with full kit and say oh it's OK if the tools are just for show. As far as the apprentice system goes it is a great system, I think it is too bad it has fallen out of use in this country, but standards of quality still have to be kept.
 
I've gone the opposite direction. I used to try and use the karda and chakma fairly often, if only to honour the kamis and Nepalese traditions.

Problem is, even my best karda (re-profiled by Sarge at one point) has always been at best an indifferent small knife. Too thick to slice or whittle, the edge geometry unhandy enough that I was always working against the tool. I always use a pocket-knife or short fixed-blade knife instead ... and am never without one or the other. Usually both, if I'm in the woods.

Same's true with the chakma. I love the notion of burnishing a dulling edge before having to use a stone, but my chakmas aren't hard enough to be up to the job. A pocket-sized carbide hone works better, pulled the "wrong way" along the blade edge. Same with a worn piece of butcher's steel. And if the blade's too far gone to be burnished back to a decent edge, I can always use the carbide hone as intended ... and sharpen it.

It's not that the Nepalese traditions had the idea wrong - you do want to pair a Khuk with a little knife, and something to dress the edge. And I've been using my khuks more than ever, through the wood-heating season. Still very much in love with versatility and efficiency of the khuk design ... but when my youngest accidentally broke the handle of my "best" karda the other day, the expected pangs weren't there. Now I've got an excuse to strip the scabbard of the extra bulk, and use the right tool for each job, with a clear(er) conscience.

t
 
You might send Yangdu an idea and see if she can help you out.

Ryan is right about the tools usually being made by apprentices.:thumbup: Also, keep in mind that Nepal does not exist in a vacuum. I would be willing to bet that any Nepali out chopping brush with his khuk is probably just going to bring an old file or maybe a butcher's steel or hone. The chakma and karda are very much part of tradition, but there are simply better made, cheap, mass produced tools that can go with them these days. The Kamis know that, and that's probably why they spend all their time and effort into making such a perfect khukuri blade and not really worrying about the lil' tools so much.
 
Well maybe it is because I have not had the opportunity yet to own one of the HI Khuks yet but I have not had a karda-chakma set worth a darn yet. I am awaiting my first one so I will reserve final judgment. However, as yet I have never had a pair to date worth using. The Khuks are fine and I have used them extensively but not the two extras. So they are there "for looks" as far as I am concerned. Like Tom though, I have never ventured out my door, let alone into the woods, without a way to sharpen my knife and a pocket knife worth using. So I have never really missed them. In fact much of the time fear of loosing them has found me leaving them home. Like I said though, maybe this will change when I get my first one from Auntie.
 
My chakmas work, but my kardas aren't always so hot, either. The karda on my M43 was actually a little bit crooked, and it's so blamed thick, that it's hard to get it to cut very well, no matter how well I sharpen its edge. I guess it simply needs re-grinding. (The ones with the Salyan are a little better; Bura, no doubt, has better apprentices.)

I've decided that if I ever take up knifemaking, my first project will be to make myself a new karda that fits the same size; that ought to take care of it.
 
Bottom line for me is that for most of what I need a short knife to do ... that knife works much better when it's thin. The thick spine that's simply brilliant in a khuk makes the average karda into a slug.

So I'm much better off using a quite different small blade to slice an apple or cut a thin piece of cheese. That's why God made Opinels, Moras, and Swiss Army knives. But if karda-making is how apprentice khuk-makers learn their chops, I guess I shouldn't be surprised that they take on the proportions of a CAK. I'm grateful that the reverse doesn't happen ... with CAKs taking on the proportions of an Opinel. :)
 
What I'm trying to say is HI is known for it's quality..period. That quality should extend to every part of the item you buy, whether it is the sheath, the frog on the sheath, Kurkri, or the accessory knives...otherwise they might just as well just sell the knife and forget the rest...now that being said all (not as many as some by a long shot) the kurkris I have owned by various kamis have had usable accessory knives...which is what they should be whether the buyer uses them or not anything else does not stand up to HI's history of quality.
 
I believe I've actually read before that the accessory tools were indeed made by the kami's apprentices, and I've stated in past posts that I'm very much for that (they have to learn the trade one way or another). However, I also believe that the kamis should be holding their apprentice's work to a higher level of expectation as it does reflect upon them. Everything about HI khuks has always screamed quality, but the karda/chakma for this m43 has been a real letdown.

warty said:
Well maybe it is because I have not had the opportunity yet to own one of the HI Khuks yet but I have not had a karda-chakma set worth a darn yet...
Click to expand...
The one that came with my Vojpure is amazing in my opinion. The geometry on the karda is just right: it's big, a usable length, somewhat thick but again - balanced by a steep bevel. You can see that I've given it a nice convex edge and that it's gotten some use - as has the chakma (which is hard enough to at least do some minor burnishing). I wish all kardas that came with HI khuks came like this. The one for the AK, while smaller, still has the same principles.

Satistal is 15" AK, neem is 18" Vojpure and horn is 18" m43:
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The spine on the m43's karda is quite thick - combine that with the fairly obtuse bevel and the short width and the thing can't slice worth a darn:
P1020741.jpg
 
WOW! Pix with something for scale reference? Who is this guy! ;)

The M43 one is a beast indeed! You could use it as a prybar, albeit a small one.

Like I said though, I am looking forward to my first HI Khukuri, which I will get later this month once the pay fairy visits my bank account.
 
warty said:
WOW! Pix with something for scale reference? Who is this guy! ;)

The M43 one is a beast indeed! You could use it as a prybar, albeit a small one.

Like I said though, I am looking forward to my first HI Khukuri, which I will get later this month once the pay fairy visits my bank account.
Click to expand...

I hope you meant the Vojpure one - that one is the true beast. I guess the m43 one could be used as a small prybar because of how thick it is, but that's about all it would be good for... because it has the same thickness as the vojpure one while being significantly smaller, it makes for a horrendous slicer :(
 
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Your Vojpure does indeed, it seems, have a fine karda: broad-bladed and well-defined. If I could trade up to something similar, I wouldn't be ashamed.
 
Those aren't too bad. I'm not knocking the Sergeant or his apprentices at all, but you should see the pair of kardas (neither one seems to be a chakma) that came with my Sgt. Khadka 18.5" Chainpuri. The Chainpuri is perfection itself, while the kardas... let me take a photo.

kardas.jpg


The 2 kardas are 0.071" thick and 0.064" thick. 1.81mm and 1.63mm, for the metric users. A couple "normal" HI kardas for comparison.

You can always regrind the bevels with a mill file. Too thick beats too thin, because you can remove metal easier than adding it on. Give it a puuko grind and you'll have no reason to complain that it doesn't slice! That also looks like a good thickness for a puuko of that size.

Personally, I look at it this way. A Kumar Karda costs about $40 or $50. If every karda and chakma were held to that standard, a khukuri would cost about $60-75 more. The smallest and most inexpensive blem knives I've seen on the DotD have been I think around $20-25, so even that quality would add $30-40. Some of that is shipping, but the khukuris come out of the exact same crate.
 
IMO, I don't really care too much about the karda and chakma. For me, they are almost all too small to use, no matter their geometry.

Other than that pic above, I've yet to see a karda that isn't at least serviceable. They are almost always dull, but so were most of my kukris. You can sharpen them. They aren't real hard, so you can give them their primary grind with a file and sharpen it from there.

Now let's face it, the kamis don't waste anything -- including time. A beginning apprentice isn't going to make something great, and they aren't going to hold up sending a kukri to the sarkis for sheathing and then shipping because the apprentice didn't do fantastic work. However, I have seen -- and own -- a fantastic example of a karda:
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Which has a nice scandi grind and handles much like a small puukko, even though it is twice as thick as one.

BTW, thickness doesn't always mean poor slicing ability. My R-10 is .270" thick at the scales, and yet it's one of the sharpest knives I own, and a fantastic slicer.
 
I've never given the karda and chakma much thought until reading this thread. I just grabbed an orphan karda from a loose sheath I had previously modified. It had rough bevels that I cleaned up with my diamond hone and then put an edge on.
It's very soft steel. I'd be just as happy without these accessory blades.
 
I like to use the karda also but my hands are kinda big. Some of mine are actually too small use without injury. I will post a few pics of another karda I have, it is very practical for me and I use it quite a bit. I think you will like the size.

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