Cliff Stamp
BANNED
- Joined
- Oct 5, 1998
- Messages
- 17,562
I was interested in mainly the difference between the blade curvatures on the two knives as they are totally opposite. The Patrol Machete has a recurved shape and presents a large hollow, or basically a big serration to the material being cut. This is a very old blade shape commonly used in many harvesting knives like sickles. The advantage of the design is that it locks the material in place. Take a hawskbill blade which is very dull and hook the blade through a loop of rope and pull, the rope can be cut no matter how dull the blade, if you exert enough force. However with an upswept blade, like a skinner, the rope will just slide along the blade and not be cut if the edge is excessively dull.
However what if the blades are very sharp? I used both the Patrol Machete and the Golok on everything from light grass to stalky weeds up to 3/8" of an inch thick and there was really no difference in the cutting ability. The handles are very different in feel, but just going by how the blades cut it was difficult to tell them apart. When the knives are sharp, they cut this material so easily it offers very little resistance . I did find was that technique was more critical with the Patrol Machete. If I entered at the wrong angle, the hook could catch and not cut, and the blade could torque violently in my hand. The same thing with the Valiant would cause a much lower response as the blade can't lock into the vegetation the same way.
Moving onto some small wood, alders up to 1/2" thick, both blades easily cut through many sections at once (don't be impressed this is softer wood than pine). The blades would easily take down a full patch in a few passes. Again no real difference noted in ease of cutting, but the twisting of the Patrol Machete was more violent on a sloppy stroke. However this wasn't a problem to avoid, however for a novice to machete use, it might be a serious problem especially if they don't know what is causing it. But if you have used machetes before, you will see it for what it is right away.
In short, I found that the hooking action of the Patrol Machete didn't offer any functional advantage as compared to the upswept Golok on the types of vegetation we have around here, and in some cases could actually be problematic. However the raw cutting ability is very high, in the same class as the Golok. Now of course there are lots of other advantages to recurved blades and sickle like designs, but I was in this case just looking at one specific aspect. It would be interesting to try this out on some briar like material, maybe the difference would be much stronger there.
In regards to handles, the Valiant grip suits me like it was made for me personally. I grip up around the top and use a lot of wrist snap. Even though it has a high sheen, it is actually quite grippy. I never even had a hint of movement during any of the above cutting. The handle on the Patrol Machete however is far too slick. I had to use a laynard which was tight around my wrist, and used a partial two fingered grip around the back of the handle. This allows an open grip on the backswing which reduces handle fatigue. I will checked the grip however eventually to raise the security.
This has been all I had really intended to do, but there were a few pieces of 2x4 scrap lying around so I cut a section off with each blade to see the difference in binding. This was a poor wood to use though, as while it was seasoned it also had some rot so it was falling apart under the cutting. I was going light so it was taking a ~dozen hits to go through a piece. Both blades cut a similar levels and no difference in binding, but again the wood was falling apart. The Golok however took heavy edge roll because of the wood cutting. The edge was damaged throughout the contact area, which started about an inch back from the tip. I then cut a empty soda can in half in another area further back and this got damaged as well. The Patrol Machete didn't suffer any edge damage on the wood.
I checked the edge on the Golok under magnification and it was fractured in places up to 0.3-0.4 mm deep and one mm long. These were triangular notches. In other places there were large mashed in regions. The damaged section was about four inches long, and towards the tip. The same place that I noticed was soft on the last blade. When I sharpened the blade a large burr formed, which was surprising. You could see a thin strip, hair like in size along the edge. I cut it off with strokes going into the edge, creating a slight edge micro-bevel, and then bled this back into the main bevel by working the hone towards the edge for a few minutes, and then finishing on CrO. It now shaves smoothly. There were no large hollows in the grind on this one like on the last one, that is a major improvement obviously.
Maybe the excessive damage was due to the same thing that caused the burr, a bit of weakened steel left along the edge. It isn't much of course, we are talking fractions of a mm. I will look at it again once I get to do some more work, hopefully in a few days. While I did notice damage on the other Golok in the same region, this one was a bit worse. Now you can just move back into the fulled hardened edge region of course. However this lowers your draw cutting ability significantly, and for this blade it just doesn't "feel" like the right method to use for a lot of wood working.
Past Golok comments :
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=210810
Past Patrol machete comments :
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=194054
The edge on this Patrol Machete was from 0.025-0.035" thick behind the edge, much thicker than on the previous ones, it should be enough for some decent wood working. The angle ranges from 16 to 18 degrees per side, the bevel grind is a bit sloppy it is much wider on one side than the other, the thickness measurements were on the thin side. The edge thickens to even more, up around 0.055" at the tip which is good as that can often see some inclusion contact. It was hair shaving sharp out of the box and scored well on the thread and poly cutting, more on that in a later post.
-Cliff
However what if the blades are very sharp? I used both the Patrol Machete and the Golok on everything from light grass to stalky weeds up to 3/8" of an inch thick and there was really no difference in the cutting ability. The handles are very different in feel, but just going by how the blades cut it was difficult to tell them apart. When the knives are sharp, they cut this material so easily it offers very little resistance . I did find was that technique was more critical with the Patrol Machete. If I entered at the wrong angle, the hook could catch and not cut, and the blade could torque violently in my hand. The same thing with the Valiant would cause a much lower response as the blade can't lock into the vegetation the same way.
Moving onto some small wood, alders up to 1/2" thick, both blades easily cut through many sections at once (don't be impressed this is softer wood than pine). The blades would easily take down a full patch in a few passes. Again no real difference noted in ease of cutting, but the twisting of the Patrol Machete was more violent on a sloppy stroke. However this wasn't a problem to avoid, however for a novice to machete use, it might be a serious problem especially if they don't know what is causing it. But if you have used machetes before, you will see it for what it is right away.
In short, I found that the hooking action of the Patrol Machete didn't offer any functional advantage as compared to the upswept Golok on the types of vegetation we have around here, and in some cases could actually be problematic. However the raw cutting ability is very high, in the same class as the Golok. Now of course there are lots of other advantages to recurved blades and sickle like designs, but I was in this case just looking at one specific aspect. It would be interesting to try this out on some briar like material, maybe the difference would be much stronger there.
In regards to handles, the Valiant grip suits me like it was made for me personally. I grip up around the top and use a lot of wrist snap. Even though it has a high sheen, it is actually quite grippy. I never even had a hint of movement during any of the above cutting. The handle on the Patrol Machete however is far too slick. I had to use a laynard which was tight around my wrist, and used a partial two fingered grip around the back of the handle. This allows an open grip on the backswing which reduces handle fatigue. I will checked the grip however eventually to raise the security.
This has been all I had really intended to do, but there were a few pieces of 2x4 scrap lying around so I cut a section off with each blade to see the difference in binding. This was a poor wood to use though, as while it was seasoned it also had some rot so it was falling apart under the cutting. I was going light so it was taking a ~dozen hits to go through a piece. Both blades cut a similar levels and no difference in binding, but again the wood was falling apart. The Golok however took heavy edge roll because of the wood cutting. The edge was damaged throughout the contact area, which started about an inch back from the tip. I then cut a empty soda can in half in another area further back and this got damaged as well. The Patrol Machete didn't suffer any edge damage on the wood.
I checked the edge on the Golok under magnification and it was fractured in places up to 0.3-0.4 mm deep and one mm long. These were triangular notches. In other places there were large mashed in regions. The damaged section was about four inches long, and towards the tip. The same place that I noticed was soft on the last blade. When I sharpened the blade a large burr formed, which was surprising. You could see a thin strip, hair like in size along the edge. I cut it off with strokes going into the edge, creating a slight edge micro-bevel, and then bled this back into the main bevel by working the hone towards the edge for a few minutes, and then finishing on CrO. It now shaves smoothly. There were no large hollows in the grind on this one like on the last one, that is a major improvement obviously.
Maybe the excessive damage was due to the same thing that caused the burr, a bit of weakened steel left along the edge. It isn't much of course, we are talking fractions of a mm. I will look at it again once I get to do some more work, hopefully in a few days. While I did notice damage on the other Golok in the same region, this one was a bit worse. Now you can just move back into the fulled hardened edge region of course. However this lowers your draw cutting ability significantly, and for this blade it just doesn't "feel" like the right method to use for a lot of wood working.
Past Golok comments :
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=210810
Past Patrol machete comments :
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=194054
The edge on this Patrol Machete was from 0.025-0.035" thick behind the edge, much thicker than on the previous ones, it should be enough for some decent wood working. The angle ranges from 16 to 18 degrees per side, the bevel grind is a bit sloppy it is much wider on one side than the other, the thickness measurements were on the thin side. The edge thickens to even more, up around 0.055" at the tip which is good as that can often see some inclusion contact. It was hair shaving sharp out of the box and scored well on the thread and poly cutting, more on that in a later post.
-Cliff