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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.
Order here: https://www.bladeforums.com/help/2024-traditional/ - Order as many as you like, we have plenty.
testing?
- Thread starter nagod
- Start date
- Joined
- Oct 25, 2004
- Messages
- 3,178
Testing? Heh. I'm somewhat reluctant to discuss this these days but since you asked...
Okay, first things first -- be safe. Seriously. No matter what method you're using to test something, start at the bottom and work your way up. The goal is not to break the tool, but to see how far it can safely go without serious damage. If I intentionally break my khukuri trying to find out what it can do I may be a bit wiser afterwards but I no longer have a khukuri, so now how do I chop wood? Take it easy and work up to it and remember, you're not just testing the khukuri but you're also testing yourself.
Consider safety gear. I won't preach to you about it because I often disregard it myself, and I have the scars to prove this. Just consider it. Solid footwear and pants, gloves, eye protection, etc.
UB used to advise us to use what's sometimes known as the Yvsa Receipt Inspection:
1. Visual check. Everything tight and shipshape? Any visible flaws in the steel or handle? Does it look like it's ready for some hard work? If yes, proceed.
2. Chop some wood. Stop when you're tired or scared. The knowledge and experience of the tester will be what determines how the information gathered as such is interpreted. Keep an eye on edge retention, possible damage, loosening of the fittings, and warping or bending.
3. Hit some more wood but use the flats of the blade. You decide how hard to go but, again, start small. Keep in mind that most manufacturers consider this to be gross abuse and will void the warranty; I'm not aware of HI taking this view but again, keep it in mind. If I made knives and you broke one by slapping the flats on a block of wood and asked me for a refund, I'd most likely tell you to go to hell. That's not what they're made for but it's good to know how they handle this. Be very careful; if the blade breaks, the edge may wind up facing you.
4. Hit yet more wood with the spine. Same as above and again, be careful -- in this case if the blade breaks that edge will be facing you when it does.
5. Sink the edge into a sturdy block of wood and try some prying. Gradually apply more and more pressure until you're satisfied. What you're looking for is some degree of deflection of the blade under load and a return to true when the load is removed. The thickness of the blade, your strength/weight, the integrity of the wood and other variables will be involved in the final result so again, some knowledge and experience is necessary to draw a good conclusion from this. At 230 lbs. I seldom apply my entire body's weight to a khukuri (especially the longer ones) but I have on occasion.
Some more stuff that I like to do:
6. Etch and polish. I want to "see" the steel and its heat treat. This hardly tells the whole story but it does assist me in my judgement.
7. Observation of sparks and "feel" while doing the initial sharpening on the belt sander. The sparks can tell me things about its alloying; the amount of drag against the belt varies with hardness and gives me additional clues about how it was heat treated.
8. File test. I have a Nicholson that I use for nothing other than checking hardness. This won't give me an exact amount but it gives me a ballpark figure. It will definitely tell me whether it's softer, harder, or about as hard as the file is.
9. Measurements. Weight, length, and (especially) point of balance are recorded. This is more for sharing data than anything else. If the piece feels right then it feels right, regardless of its physical dimensions. I don't do this until after I've used it; I don't want less than optimal dimensions influencing my impression of its performance.
If everything is good to this point, I'll chop some firewood with it just to be sure. Assuming that nothing has gone wrong I then take the khukuri out into its natural environment -- hiking, camping, hunting or some such -- and see how the whole package performs in the field. (Or did. I no longer work outdoors.) The ultimate result of all of this determines whether it gets a nice polish, a coat of oil, and a spot on my sword rack...or whether it winds up on "User Row" on the edge of the work bench and is lucky if it sees soap and water after use, never mind polish.
I no longer chop metal, concrete, rocks, telephone poles, or any of the other inappropriate objects that I used to test on. It proves little besides my ignorance; more importantly, I already have a few pieces that passed these tests and require no others. When I did do these, though, I did so with the understanding that if I wrecked a khukuri I would not complain about it and not ask for a refund. This sort of thing is abuse, plain and simple, and I don't expect the warranty to cover it.
Okay, first things first -- be safe. Seriously. No matter what method you're using to test something, start at the bottom and work your way up. The goal is not to break the tool, but to see how far it can safely go without serious damage. If I intentionally break my khukuri trying to find out what it can do I may be a bit wiser afterwards but I no longer have a khukuri, so now how do I chop wood? Take it easy and work up to it and remember, you're not just testing the khukuri but you're also testing yourself.
Consider safety gear. I won't preach to you about it because I often disregard it myself, and I have the scars to prove this. Just consider it. Solid footwear and pants, gloves, eye protection, etc.
UB used to advise us to use what's sometimes known as the Yvsa Receipt Inspection:
1. Visual check. Everything tight and shipshape? Any visible flaws in the steel or handle? Does it look like it's ready for some hard work? If yes, proceed.
2. Chop some wood. Stop when you're tired or scared. The knowledge and experience of the tester will be what determines how the information gathered as such is interpreted. Keep an eye on edge retention, possible damage, loosening of the fittings, and warping or bending.
3. Hit some more wood but use the flats of the blade. You decide how hard to go but, again, start small. Keep in mind that most manufacturers consider this to be gross abuse and will void the warranty; I'm not aware of HI taking this view but again, keep it in mind. If I made knives and you broke one by slapping the flats on a block of wood and asked me for a refund, I'd most likely tell you to go to hell. That's not what they're made for but it's good to know how they handle this. Be very careful; if the blade breaks, the edge may wind up facing you.
4. Hit yet more wood with the spine. Same as above and again, be careful -- in this case if the blade breaks that edge will be facing you when it does.
5. Sink the edge into a sturdy block of wood and try some prying. Gradually apply more and more pressure until you're satisfied. What you're looking for is some degree of deflection of the blade under load and a return to true when the load is removed. The thickness of the blade, your strength/weight, the integrity of the wood and other variables will be involved in the final result so again, some knowledge and experience is necessary to draw a good conclusion from this. At 230 lbs. I seldom apply my entire body's weight to a khukuri (especially the longer ones) but I have on occasion.
Some more stuff that I like to do:
6. Etch and polish. I want to "see" the steel and its heat treat. This hardly tells the whole story but it does assist me in my judgement.
7. Observation of sparks and "feel" while doing the initial sharpening on the belt sander. The sparks can tell me things about its alloying; the amount of drag against the belt varies with hardness and gives me additional clues about how it was heat treated.
8. File test. I have a Nicholson that I use for nothing other than checking hardness. This won't give me an exact amount but it gives me a ballpark figure. It will definitely tell me whether it's softer, harder, or about as hard as the file is.
9. Measurements. Weight, length, and (especially) point of balance are recorded. This is more for sharing data than anything else. If the piece feels right then it feels right, regardless of its physical dimensions. I don't do this until after I've used it; I don't want less than optimal dimensions influencing my impression of its performance.
If everything is good to this point, I'll chop some firewood with it just to be sure. Assuming that nothing has gone wrong I then take the khukuri out into its natural environment -- hiking, camping, hunting or some such -- and see how the whole package performs in the field. (Or did. I no longer work outdoors.) The ultimate result of all of this determines whether it gets a nice polish, a coat of oil, and a spot on my sword rack...or whether it winds up on "User Row" on the edge of the work bench and is lucky if it sees soap and water after use, never mind polish.
I no longer chop metal, concrete, rocks, telephone poles, or any of the other inappropriate objects that I used to test on. It proves little besides my ignorance; more importantly, I already have a few pieces that passed these tests and require no others. When I did do these, though, I did so with the understanding that if I wrecked a khukuri I would not complain about it and not ask for a refund. This sort of thing is abuse, plain and simple, and I don't expect the warranty to cover it.