problems with hemp rope cutting as a test of edge retention

[JDBLADE]

Firstly, I must state that any form of rope testing for edge-retention cannot be considered "scientific". Having said that I believe it is a usefull tool for Knife Reviews in that it gives you a "feel" for the knife. In my testing I use 3/8" manila rope for all the knives I test and wherever possible I endeavour to use the knife straight out of the box without altering the profile - I may resharpen the blade at the original profile. In my view the average person is seeking this type of information, anyway that is my experience here in Australia, because not all knife buyers are adept at reprofiling and want to buy a knife and use it straight out of the box.

Of course it depends on the type of review you are doing esp., if you are comparing different knives with different profiles. But, for the general run-of-the-mill out of the box reviewing rope testing is a usefull tool esp., if one has a fair amount of experience. As I said earlier it is a matter of "feel" and very often you can get to know the capabilities of a knife with that first rope cut which is a matter of testing cutting ability rather then edge retention. Now I know this is not scientific but it is a usefull tool. As far as edge retention goes I use 4 mediums to guage the ability of a knife to hold an edge they being: Rope, Leather, Cardboard and Hardwood. Of course there are so many variables involved in any form of edge retention tests and you try to eliminate as many of those variable as possible.

 

[Cliff Stamp]

Firstly, I must state that any form of rope testing for edge-retention cannot be considered "scientific".

By the same logic, using any medium to test edge retention can't be considered scientific (materials are not unscientific, just methods) thus it is impossible to scientifically test edge retention.

The basic defination of scientific is "to produce knowledge". Thus if you had a AISI 420 blade at 45 HRC and a S90V blade at 63 HRC you could not determine which one is the S90V blade by cutting rope because to do so would have produced knowledge and thus been a scientific experiment.

That is a bet I would take any day.

If you have a small 4" bowie and a large 10" bowie it doesn't take much work to "scientifically" show which one is the better chopper because the difference in performance is so great. However if you are comparing two 10" bowies from two different makers then it gets hard.

In that case you have to look at different chopping methods, different physical abilities, different types of woods, different conditions of the woods, etc. . Now you can make life easier by reducing the conclusion scope for example which one is a better chopper for you on pine.

Note here that the conclusion has to be considered to see if the method is scientific, you don't look at the method independently, what you are trying to get from it is what is important, it goes back to the basic defination of producing knowledge, does the work you have done allow you to make the conclusions you have stated.

This by the way it one of the oddest things that people have started stating before talking about knives. Comments like "this isn't a scientific review" or similar. What this translates to is : the following review contains no actual meaningful information about the knife, and if I was do to the same work again I could get totally different results.

If this is true why would you bother even posting it. If I didn't have enough confidence to think the results would be consistent if I was to do it again I surely would not post it in a public forum, well not as a statement anyway, I have asked questions before like I just saw XXX behavior in YYY, is this to be expected or similar.

-Cliff