Small carbon puukko from Ragweed Forge

Excellent review. It's interesting that the Scandinavian cultures seem to prefer guardless knives. Well, as seen by the knives sold at Ragweed Forge, and that doesn't include the Danish and Icelandic peoples.

Were you using the knife to carve to carve wooden bowls? If so, you may want to fix a typo. ;)
 
Good review, as usual!

The comments on this knife's handle are very similar to Jim Aston's in his "Mora" piece. Is there any reason to think that the "fire hardening" technique that he describes might not work well on this knife, also?
 
Yes, you can see guards on those knives but they are generally thought of as beginner blades which you graduate from when you have enough ecperience. Personally I prefer a guard, not a really large one like Ed Fowler uses as then you see loss of grip versatility and overall versatility. Even a small guard such as used on the Fallkniven or Swamp Rat blades makes a large difference in regards to security. Also I would want a handle which is somewhat biased so you can tell the blade orientation.

For general EDC use this is a very nice knife, it is basically a really stout paring knife. For carry outside however I would generally want something longer, the Mora 2000 has enough blade length to make it a much more efficient blade for a lot of tasks while not being so large it is cumbersome. It has enough weight to be used as a light chopper for limbs and more length for batoning. If I was carrying multiple knives however this puukko would come in handly on a lot of cutting as it excells on very light precision work. I would however prefer a full flat grind mainly to reduce the edge width and reduce sharpening time.

The edge holding of this puukko, while not at the same level of the current high grade cutlery steels is still solid. The weekend I used it to take a apart a 7.5 lb chicken for stock. Cut off the legs and wings, cut separated all the joints and cut the meat off the bones, trimmed off the breasts and tenders. The blade was still shaving well for most of the edge except through the tip which was slightly blunted due mainly from trimming the meat off the bones in the legs and wings as there was contact off the bones. Some light stropping (CrO, 5 passes per side) and it was all readily shaving again.

John, yes, that is a decent idea on most of these knives to both improve the finish and toughen up the wood.

-Cliff
 
This knife is (in traditional thinking) not a general purpose puukko and in my opinion should really not be tested as one.

Puukko does not have a guard, I do not know the origin of that feature because ample amount of guarded knives have been imported during the centuries so it is not lack of example. I have been using them as long as I can remember (about 40 years, I am not sure wheather that is increasing or decreasing ;) ) and have never had any problems with unguarded puukkos. Once you get used to it, it does not bother you, then again puukko is not generally used in such a way that slipping forward would be a problem.

Personally I prefer a somewhat wider handle and a pommel that drops a bit. Then again there is enough variation in puukko styles that any generalization is inaccurate (I guess that includes this one :D ).

TLM
 
TLM :

This knife is (in traditional thinking) not a general purpose puukko and in my opinion should really not be tested as one.
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It wasn't tested as a puukko, it was simply used as a knife. Now does it represent the performance you can expect of a puukko, well yes as it has a near idential steel, grind and handle and overall design features[*]. The only thing that doesn't make it a traditional puukko is that it isn't made in Finland.

Once you get used to it, it does not bother you, then again puukko is not generally used in such a way that slipping forward would be a problem.
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Yes, but this means that in many respects they are not as functional because you can either not use them to do certain tasks, or must use a generally inferior method such as thumb hooked over the of the handle.

[*] to clarify most puukkos are much fancier than this knife, Moras are essentially stripped down versions, see :

http://www.ragweedforge.com/FinnishKnifeCatalog.html

note however that some of the Finnish puukkos are almost idential to the above Swedish knife, for example :

http://www.ragweedforge.com/8224.jpg

http://www.ragweedforge.com/9221.jpg

These come with a leather sheath and fit and finish is probably higher than on the Moras.

-Cliff
 
I believe that pukko means knife in finnish. Thus a general purpose knife is a general purpose pukko. Either way, the blade you tested is a pukko, wether or not you tested is a pukko. I agree with Tommi that it is a little on the small side to be a general purpose knife.

I also agree with Tommi that the lack of a guard on this type of blade is not a drawback. I find it amazing that you criticize a traditional design honed to perfection over a few hundred years for a lack of guard. Most people are impressed by this particular knife style and come to the conclusion, that if you use this style of knife as a knife, you don't need a guard.

Guards have some problems. For some cuts they get in the way. For the culture this knife came from, the cheap pukko style knife is used and abused because of the low price and overal utilitarian nature. A guard would increase the price. In addition, this knife is designed to go with a simple pocket sheath. W/o a guard it's easier and cheaper to make the sheath and you get better knife retention.
 
brownshoe :

Either way, the blade you tested is a pukko, wether or not you tested is a pukko.
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Tommi's arguement is that it must be a Finnish knife for it to be a puukko, this is a Mora knife made in Sweden and thus to a lot of people isn't a puukko. It is a similar viewpoint found with many of the people on the HI forum which view a khukuri as being made out of forged carbon steel, having a particular shape and with a cho. If any of these are missing it isn't a khukuri. Thus you can't have a stainless steel khukuri for example in their eyes. Personally I view knives by design, much looser labeling, I would call a stainless steel blade a khukuri if it had that general shape regardless if it had a cho or not (not that I would want a stainless khukuri).

I find it amazing that you criticize a traditional design honed to perfection over a few hundred years ...
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If everyone thought this way we would all still be using stone hand axes which were honed to perfection for ~one million years before someone got the idea to attach them to sticks, designs evolve, blind dogmatic rigidity does nothing but induce stagnation. Of course lots of other cultures have honed designs over long periods of time for near identical tasks and to very different endpoints. As well, lots of traditional elements have no functional ability and can even negtively effect peformance but will stay due to tradition. Of course from an outsider point of view these elements have no value, not to mention the required range of tasks may not be identical so design aspects would have to change accordingly regardless of how long they have been in place.

A guard would increase the price.
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For one, you can get Mora puukkos with guards (~$10) far cheaper than finnish puukkos without them. Most puukkos (Finnish) are actually not inexpensive, adding a guard would do little to the end cost. This particular model is mainly a paring / precision carver and thus having a guard would be more of a drawback, but on something larger like the Mora 2000, it can be of benefit. However on that particular one, due to the handle contouring and grippy nature of the rubber grip I have not found it to be a problem, though I have still to use it in poor conditions (fat / oil, extreme cold etc., injury etc. ) when you tend to want more handle security.

-Cliff
 
Puukko is a finnish word for a certain type of knife. If you use that word you have to accept its meaning, otherwise use the swedish/norwegian/whatever word.

As you should know a clear definition is just about impossible.

If you want to know why I dont call it a general purpose puukko we can continue on that.

Puukko was/is used for a range of tasks and over the years I have noticed that other knife using cultures have difficulties understanding the the differences with their local knives, apparently so.

I am not certain about perfection but I do know that "a few hundred years" is not enough, something like a thousand is more appropriate.

TLM
 
TLM :

If you want to know why I dont call it a general purpose puukko ...
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I would agree with that perspective, as stated in the review the blade is a little small and narrow for a general purpose blade. This is a specialized carving / paring knife.

It regards to EDC, especially for work in the woods, it would make a very nice complement to the other single-bevel grind blade I reviewed awhile back :

http://www.physics.mun.ca/~sstamp/knives/butcher_puukko.html

Personally I would prefer a slightly heavier blade for most brush work, or at least a small folding saw for harder woods, but those two would combine for a very functional pair in any case.

For EDC carry I would prefer the Mora 2000 (if I had to pick that style of blade).

-Cliff
 
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