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Price is$300$250 ea (shipped within CONUS). If you live outside the US, I will contact you after your order for extra shipping charges.
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Sunday Knife Shenanigans!
- Thread starter DerekH
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Very different tools when you get down to it. The BK4 doesn't have as high a grind, nor as much weight, so they weren't really comparable.
Just fine. Surprised me but they musta got the heat treat right. At that price point I assumed there would be a corner cut somewhere. Aside from uneven primary grinds and a less than stellar factory edge, there were not many issues with the knife at all.
You don't. Sorry. To be honest, you don't want one. At a hair under 2 pounds, she is way too heavy to use effectively. (Or rather her balance is such that she feels too heavy to use effectively.) She is too fat to chop properly, more so destroying the things she hits rather than cutting them. She is more axe than knife. If there was a zombie apocalypse, she would be great, but that is about it.
It was a very interesting day. We came up with a number of different tests and comparisons and went through and got to see just how different all these knives are. Performance-wise, the two most comparable are the BK9 and the Camp 10. Throughout various chopping tests they were pretty much neck and neck. Interestingly the sweet spot on the 9 was in one place for chopping, in another for cutting through things in one swipe. Could have been bad technique, but it was definitely noticeable throughout all our experiments. The six inch chop really gave us insight into how well a knife was sticking and biting with a uniform amount of force, and it forced us to really make sure we were hitting with the sweet spot each time. What surprised me most I think is that the Big Brother has a sweet spot darn near at the very end of the knife. Getting it to hit with a solid thud was a chore trying to do it like the other knives. That may be by design since it is foremost a fighting knife however.
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I might be asking too much Derek, but how would you rate each of those big blades, in chopping, slicing, and lets say batoning? Using a 1-5(1 the lowest, 5 the highest) scale? Just the top three or four would be fine, if you don't mind the work?
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Where are you located? We might be able to find a way to get together and me avoid the work entirely. 
I didn't spend enough time to rate every knife like that, or even a few of them. The testing was mostly chopping, but I can give you a pretty good estimate of the top performers in each category.
Best slicer hands down is the Collins WW2 Machete knife. Nothing else even comes close. The BK5 would be second place but that is pretty well expected.
Best batoner is Sheila. She has more mass and a much more consistent convex, so at batoning, she is the champion. Second place would be the BK2, but that is only because it too is a quarter inch thick knife. None of the others come close to that.
Best chopper, that one, well, if I am generous, a tie between the BK9 and the Camp 10. Different strokes though as they are very different knives, primarily in shape. BK9 is more froe like, and that is a benefit over a curved blade batoning into something as you are going to have to baton more to get through to compensate for that curve. That estimation is chopping into a hard piece of oak. In a coniferous tree there is no telling, and in a soft wood there is no telling, so I can't say for certain, and what is best at the time might not be best overall because of that. Something else to keep in mind is steel, because the BK9 we used has been through several different trees and pieces of wood, this was the first time the Camp 10 got to do any serious cutting. It might break tomorrow for all I know, whereas we know for certain the BK9 is good to go. Really it is too early to tell, but I can say the Camp 10, from what I have seen so far, holds it's own, even for a Chinese made knife. Time will tell whether or not that holds true.
Personally one of the things I really like is that there is a very small number of readily available modern styled production khukris (or khukri like objects) out there. The Camp 10 fits that niche and gives me something I personally have been wanting for awhile now. No offense to HI or any of those manufacturers, but the idea of a stick tang khukri made on a homebuilt coal forge doesn't get my motor going quite the same way as something with modern styling and looks. That might be silly, and aesthetics should come after utility, but I have for a long time been a proponent of utilizing more modern materials, manufacturing, and styling on knives as opposed to the other end of the spectrum, and I am excited that it seems more people are finally doing that.
Of course this is all my opinion, so take it for what it is worth.
I didn't spend enough time to rate every knife like that, or even a few of them. The testing was mostly chopping, but I can give you a pretty good estimate of the top performers in each category.
Best slicer hands down is the Collins WW2 Machete knife. Nothing else even comes close. The BK5 would be second place but that is pretty well expected.
Best batoner is Sheila. She has more mass and a much more consistent convex, so at batoning, she is the champion. Second place would be the BK2, but that is only because it too is a quarter inch thick knife. None of the others come close to that.
Best chopper, that one, well, if I am generous, a tie between the BK9 and the Camp 10. Different strokes though as they are very different knives, primarily in shape. BK9 is more froe like, and that is a benefit over a curved blade batoning into something as you are going to have to baton more to get through to compensate for that curve. That estimation is chopping into a hard piece of oak. In a coniferous tree there is no telling, and in a soft wood there is no telling, so I can't say for certain, and what is best at the time might not be best overall because of that. Something else to keep in mind is steel, because the BK9 we used has been through several different trees and pieces of wood, this was the first time the Camp 10 got to do any serious cutting. It might break tomorrow for all I know, whereas we know for certain the BK9 is good to go. Really it is too early to tell, but I can say the Camp 10, from what I have seen so far, holds it's own, even for a Chinese made knife. Time will tell whether or not that holds true.
Personally one of the things I really like is that there is a very small number of readily available modern styled production khukris (or khukri like objects) out there. The Camp 10 fits that niche and gives me something I personally have been wanting for awhile now. No offense to HI or any of those manufacturers, but the idea of a stick tang khukri made on a homebuilt coal forge doesn't get my motor going quite the same way as something with modern styling and looks. That might be silly, and aesthetics should come after utility, but I have for a long time been a proponent of utilizing more modern materials, manufacturing, and styling on knives as opposed to the other end of the spectrum, and I am excited that it seems more people are finally doing that.
Of course this is all my opinion, so take it for what it is worth.
mrn8
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Can't beat a day like that! Good good, good steel, good friend.
If I'm understanding correctly, you found the Kabar Camp 10 and BK9 to both be better choppers than the Machax? Seems counter-intuitive, but I've yet to use the Machax, so I'm not entirely familiar with how it handles and what it's best uses are.
Sheila looks like a beaut!
If I'm understanding correctly, you found the Kabar Camp 10 and BK9 to both be better choppers than the Machax? Seems counter-intuitive, but I've yet to use the Machax, so I'm not entirely familiar with how it handles and what it's best uses are.
Sheila looks like a beaut!
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Thanks for the pics. I've been curious about the Camp lineup. Love the blade shape, and glad to see it's holding up well.
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From left to right, bottom to the top, we have Ka-Bar Big Brother, Becker BK4, Becker BK9, Kershaw Camp 10, rehandled Collins WW2 machete, custom BK handled knife I had made (Sheila), Becker BK2, Becker BK5, Becker BK16 FFG.
I was pervin on Sheila. I had to know " what is that?"
I was pervin on Sheila. I had to know " what is that?"
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The project was originally called the Brutus, but had been dubbed Sheila later. Mostly cause she is a tank. And totally unreasonable in any way shape or form when it comes to anything other than chopping. Want to get them panties moist though? Sheila was last sharpened by Jerry Fisk. She shaves babies.
Here is the original-ish thread on her: http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/s...-begins-Brutus-(Updated-05-14-11)-Pics-on-p-4
Here is the second thread: http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/849781-BRUTUS-(A-K-A-DH-Potato-4)
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