Polearms!

E

Evolute

Joined
Mar 19, 2001
Messages
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Jerry Busse said about Paul's Hatchet: "If you're going to compare it to a full sized hatchet or kukri. . . it's gonna be begging for some leverage...."

and

"Now if your were to strap it to a Louisville Slugger, you could deliver some serious horsepower to the head, which would welcome the beating with open arms."

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How could I resist?

I don't have a baseball bat, but I did get a hold of a 2O inch by one inch wood dowel and 20 feet of 3mm woven nylon cord, to experience how my knives would perform when leveraged to the extreme.

The first task was to securely fasten a knife to the dowel. It was much easier than I expected. The Busse knife handles are well suited to the task. The front guard, rear guard, and three tubular rivets make for a total of five holes to run my line through to lock the knife to the wood securely, while the front finger groove and the mid-handle swell make for three narrowed areas to prevent cord slippage. The flatness of the micarta slabs helps keep the handle flush with the wood, and their checkered texture also helps keep the cord from slipping. I simply ran my cord through the handles and around the handles and dowel as tightly as I could a few dozen times. That was it.

I tried out my Paul's Hatchet, my Steel Heart, and my Battle Mistress, as polearms. The results were impressive. I didn't do any careful chopping comparisons, but it was clear that there were dramatic performance improvements. I'd estimate that the performance was improved somewhere in the range of several hundred percent, compared to using the knives without a pole attached.

Now I'm wondering about how smaller blades would perform when attached to a sufficiently large club. It's already clear that my Paul's Hatchet will chop (a lot) better when attached to a stick than my Battle Mistress will when used without a stick. How well might my Satin Jack perform? Could a Pepper Shaker be used as a serious chopper? I'll know after further experiments.

I'm thinking that this greatly extends the potential uses of the smaller knives. In a pinch, they could be made into usable choppers, while still having the delicate whittling control and fine slicing advantages of smaller knives. You can find a suitable club pretty easily in most woodland situations. All you need besides that is a fraction of an ounce of cord. It is easy enough to find a rod and securely attach a knife that I think this is a reliable survival-skill technique.

You all need to go try this. It is both useful and seriously fun.

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When I have the time, the materials, and the inclination, I will try to do some careful comparions of the performance of various knives when used with attached clubs to when used without attached clubs. I might also compare the performance increases of different weights and lengths of clubs.

Stay tuned.

--Mike
 
You all need to go try this. It is both useful and seriously fun.
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Hmmmm, strap Busse to a stick or build a trebuchet and launch cars like that Scottish guy does???:cool::cool: :cool:

Evolute,
I'd say you're running neck and neck with flaming pianos soaring at speeds unknown even to Bach!:eek::p:eek:

Yours in Nuclear catapulted INFI!:D

Kev
 
Strabs said: "Hmmmm, strap Busse to a stick or build a trebuchet and launch cars...."

"Or?" Both, I say!

Hey, Strabs, can I borrow your car?
 
I'd estimate that the performance was improved somewhere in the range of several hundred percent, compared to using the knives without a pole attached.
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You made a BM polearm! :eek:

I am amazed that was feasible. I can imagine attaching a PH to a pole, but a BM? That sounds complicated. Was it difficult? Also, I imagine as the aspect ratio of the handle increases, placing the handle's spine flat against the pole and then lashing it securely on would become more difficult.

Did you encounter any twisiting problems when chopping? I guess using a larger diamter piece of wood would reduce twisting, if that was a problem.

Your ideas about attaching smaller knives to poles are intriguing. The small knives used would have to be tough and durable, lest they are broken into pieces or have edge failures while chopping, but Busse offers knives suitable for the job. I imagine a BAG3 could be made a good chopper by the utilization of a pole, for example.

Of course, the poles and lashing would have to be replaced after a good amount of chopping, I presume, but that is to be expected.

I'm looking forward to hearing more about this :D
 
Evolute asked:Could a Pepper Shaker be used as a serious chopper?
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Don't know about chopping. But if you affix an AS to a 18"-20" long section from a 1-3/4" diameter oak closet rod at a 90 degree angle (so the axis of the AS blade is at right angles to the axis of the oak rod), you'd have a modernised version of a NW Coast native slave-killer. It's basically a club with a point sticking out the side of the club's head, like a mace with only one spike.

To affix the AS to the rod you could:
  • make a 1/4" slot (thickness of AS stock) in the end of the oak rod deep enough to accept the handle height of the AS or a bit more
  • drill hole(s) for the appropriate sized dowel(s) in the rod. The front hole on my AS mic's out at just over 5/16" (0.32" actual) and the second hole is a touch over 13/32" (about 0.413" actual).
  • make a split in the end of the dowels with a saw and make wedges wide enough to exert sideways pressure on the split
  • set the AS in the slot in the end of the oak rod aligning the hole(s) in the AS handle with the hole(s) in the oak rod
  • stick the dowel(s) through the hole(s) in the rod & AS handle
  • drive the wedges into the split(s) in the end of the dowel pieces to secure the dowels from working loose or falling out of the hole(s) in the oak rod
I wouldn't recommend gluing the dowels into the oak rod unless you wanna carry your AS around as a club from now on. ;) This arrangement might not work real well for chopping. But it would work as an expedient replacement for the spike on a spike tomahawk. To get even more leverage, make the angle between the oak rod and the AS blade axis more acute.

Evolute, thanks for the inspirational "what if" thread. :D Y'know, it might be an interesting experiment to fix up your hiking staff/stick specifically for rigging up a spear/chopper/spike blade on the end of it. Lots of possiblities, once the creative juices kick in.
 
Andrew said: "I can imagine attaching a PH to a pole, but a BM? That sounds complicated. Was it difficult?"

No, it was surprisingly easy.

"Also, I imagine as the aspect ratio of the handle increases, placing the handle's spine flat against the pole and then lashing it securely on would become more difficult."

It was immediately clear that the handle's wide aspect ratio and curvaceousness would make placing the handle's spine flat against the pole and lashing it securely difficult; therefore, I forewent that plan, and attached the knife with the flat of the micarta handle flush to the pole. The pole was on the side of the knife, not behind it.

"Did you encounter any twisiting problems when chopping? I guess using a larger diamter piece of wood would reduce twisting, if that was a problem."

There was some twisting, but it was very minor, a tenth of an inch, I'd guess. Just wrapping cord around numerous times made it pretty secure. If I'd wanted more security, when doing this in an actual survival situation, I'd probably try to (1) carve a flat area onto the stick where I'd be tying the handles on; (2) rough up the flat surface to keep the flat of the handles from sliding around against it--kinda like grip tape; (3) carve some grooves around the stick to hold the cord in place.

By the way, having the knife attached to the side, and having a small bit of twisting, did not bother me. I can't really estimate the loss in chopping power from these, but I can tell you that the chopping power was still HUGE. The small bit of twisting around really didn't cause me much trouble, and so I just ignored it.

"Your ideas about attaching smaller knives to poles are intriguing. The small knives used would have to be tough and durable, lest they are broken into pieces or have edge failures while chopping, but Busse offers knives suitable for the job."

I've damaged a lot of knives in my life through dumb antics, and I agree with you. I wouldn't try this with any other knives I own or have owned. I doubt my other knives would survive the ordeal, and I equally doubt that the manufacturers would honor my warranty, if I honestly explained to them that I'd used their knives for full-force, overhead, two-handed, pole-mounted chopping into dead hardwood limbs.

I got roundly castigated in the big thread a couple weeks ago for discussing why good warranties matter. (http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=1702605#post1702605) Just compare what others said then to Jerry suggesting that you try his blades mounted to a baseball bat or Jennifer suggesting that it's fun to watch the sparks fly when you chop cinderblocks at night with her knives!

My personal experience with my Busses, so far, is that they have a very wide parameter for acceptable use. I have been absolutely brutal with these knives, and I've barely managed to scuff the coating, much less dull them beyond what could be restored by incompetent and ill-equipped stropping. My experiences with these knives, so far, have inspired confidence.

"Of course, the poles and lashing would have to be replaced after a good amount of chopping, I presume, but that is to be expected."

Good point. My pole and cord seemed undamaged after about 50-75 chops. And I was just using the cheapest cord from REI. However, it does seem like a reasonable guess that this use will put heavy wear on them. I'll have to fool around some more before I have more to say about that. (By the way, I use Kelty TripTease cord when I'm backpacking; it's the toughest and strongest I've found.)

More soon....
 
Battle Mistress strapped to a stick, sounds like it would make
one heck of a sickle.
 
I now have some specific results of the increased power added by using my Paul's Hatchet as a poleaxe. These results are in comparison to the results posted here:

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=1754097#post1754097

I tied my Paul's Hatchet to a 3/4"x1.5"x26" board of unidentified scrap lumber with a little less than 20 feet of 3mm woven nylon cord, producing an overall poleaxe length of 29". I chopped into the same pressure-treated Douglas Fir 2x4s that I used in the tests in the link posted above.

With the added leverage of the poleaxe, it took me 87 chops to go through the 2x4. This is 331% as efficient as my previous result chopping the 2x4 with Paul's Hatchet--288 chops. This is also 247% as efficient as my previous result with the Steel Heart, and 161% as efficient as my previous result with the Battle Mistress.

I then had the same friend of mine (mentioned in the link above) repeat the test. With the added leverage of the poleaxe, it took him 30 chops to cleave through the 2x4. This is 533% as efficient as his previous result chopping through the 2x4 with Paul's Hatchet--160 chops. This is also 337% as efficient as his previous result with the Steel Heart, and 216% as efficient as his previous result with the Battle Mistress.

So, as you can see, using your blades as polearms drastically increases their chopping power. You can make your far smaller and lighter blades perform much better than your best chopper, simply by tying your smaller knives to big sticks/limbs. In most woodland settings, these sticks are easy to acquire. (If you use a walking stick, it's even easier.) Just make sure you keep some cordage with you on your woodland hikes. I think this can be a very worthwhile technique for emergency survival situations when only a smaller blade is available.

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A few additional comments:

My result in this test would have been far lower than 87 chops--more in the range or 50-60 chops--if I had been better at aiming the three inch wide blade on the end of a 26 inch club at a 2" wide piece of lumber. With practice, I'm sure my aim with such an unweildy beast can be improved, as my friend's performance demonstrates. Further, it would have been easier to aim at a a 4-6 inch wide log (a more real world case), as this would have been a much bigger target. Even with the aiming difficulties, the results were marked.

The cord had stretched some, and therefore loosened to the point where it needed to be re-tied, between my test and my friend's test. Use the least stretchy cord you can, and pull it as taut as possible.

The only place where the cord had worn noticeably was where it was nestled between the hatchet handle and the wooden extended handle. In the future, I will tie my knife handles onto my sticks in such manner that no cord is pressed between the knife handle and the stick.

The board used for this poleaxe conversion snapped on the final stroke of the test. Use stouter wood than we did.
 
Interesting results. A special heavy-duty extension arm for a PH would be an interesting aftermarket product.

It is very interesting how important skill/experience is when chopping. I can see why many highly skilled woodsmen take only a relatively small knife for heavy duty chores (although there are more reasons than just skill in chopping).
 
This is basically an extension of my last post above, to add specific results for the Steel Heart polearm and the Battle Mistress polearm.

For this test, I tied my knives to a 3/4"x1.5"x20" board of unidentified scrap lumber (the same one used for the Paul's Hatchet test, sawed off just below where it had snapped) with about 90 feet of 1.5 mm woven nylon cord (mason's line), producing an overall poleaxe length of 27" for the Steel Heart and 29" for the Battle Mistress. I chopped into the same pressure-treated Douglas Fir 2x4s that I used in the other tests.

With the added leverage of the polearm, it took me 70 chops to go through the 2x4 with the Steel Heart. This is 307% as efficient as my previous result chopping the 2x4 with the Steel Heart--215 chops. With the added leverage of the polearm, it took me 35 chops to go through the 2x4 with the Battle Mistress. This is 400% as efficient as my previous result chopping the 2x 4 with the Battle Mistress--140 chops.

Then I had the same friend of mine (mentioned previously) repeat the test. With the added leverage of the polearm, it took him 19 chops to cleave through the 2x4 with the Steel Heart. This is 532% as efficient as his previous result chopping through the 2x4 with the Steel Heart--101 chops. With the added leverage of the polearm, it took him 12 chops to cleave through the 2x4 with the Battle Mistress. This is 542% as efficient as his previous result chopping through the 2x4 with the Battle Mistress--65 chops.

In all testing permutations, the added leverage from being tied to a rod (for a total length of 27"-29") resulted in at least 307% of the original chopping power; in the hands of a more experienced chopper, it consistently lead to at least 532% of the original chopping power.

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A few additional comments:

As Andrew rightly noted, the differences in my chopping performances and my friend's demonstrates that strength, coordination, and skill can be nearly as significant factors as increased leverage.

We were doing these tests with the 2x4s placed on the flat top of a log round about three feet high, by my friend's tool shed. Below the log round, the ground is covered with a layer of granite rocks. In one case, with the Paul's Hatchet, I completely missed the log round, and swung my Pauls' Hatchet, with the rod extrension and additional leverage, full-force overhead, two-handed, straight into a chunk of granite. This resulted in a barely visible dent which I was able to completely straghten out with a few strokes on the edge of my porcelain coated sharpener. An true testament to how these blades simply laugh at extremely harsh treatment.

After some trial and error, I can now consistently tie the blades onto sticks tightly enough so that there is no blade play. Here's how: (1) using small diameter cord, tie it tightly to the front talon hole; (2) place the flat side of the blade handle against the rod, leaving just the blade edge sticking out beyond the rod's end; 3) step on your cord to hold it as taut as possible, then roll the blade handle and rod in your hands to wrap the cord around it, while maintaining maximum tautness at all times; (4) wrap around and around, down the handle as far as the handle goes without sticking out beyond the edge of the wood, then wrap it all the way back up to the front talon hole; (5) tie it off, and you're ready to wreak destruction!
 
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