My friend
came to visit for Christmas in Finland from Singapore and she bring me a knife
from her trip to Philippines cause she knew that I´m kind of “knife nuts”. She
asked there parang and something handmade. So she got this and it´s somekind of
mix of a parang and western style bowie with sawback and weird notch on back
which is maybe decoration.
I can see
that it´s definitely handmade due the unevenness, but I think blade is “machine
cut” into shape and then heat treated and sharpened. Tang is stick tang and
goes through handle. Handle is bent downward and have decorated head . Handle
looks like ones parangs have. Handle material something hard black stuff I´m
not so professional to tell what it is, but I think it´s somekind of natural
material.
Blade is
around 4-5mm thick and made of carbon steel. It have concave grind and
secondary bevel just like bowies normally do. Sharpening starts quite far and
there´s 2-3cm of unused part on the blade so I thought to make choil for
fingers so I can choke up for finer tasks like whittling something or so.
Sheath is cheaply made somekind of fabric /
nylon riveted together with maybe carton(?) insert. I have to remake sheath
definitely. Traditionally parangs have wooden sheath that is wrapped around
waist with piece of cord.
Cause all
my blades are users so also this will not end up on the wall so I´m going to
test it today how it works. It´s anyway very interesting and different from my
other blades so I´m interested to see how it works out for me.
It's a nice-looking knife, but I could never understand adding anything that would make the knife harder to withdraw from a wound.
VastaaPoistaVery unique knife. Looking forward to the field review. :)
VastaaPoistabmatt
Certainly has character. I am not much fun on saw back knives, but this one has something appealing. Perhaps the combination of Rambo knife + Asian knife handle shape?
VastaaPoistaYep, definitely interesting mix. I have never seen knife like that before. I tried it a bit yesterday on some bush clearing and shelter pole making and it works quite nicely being very tip heavy and then good for chopping tasks. Downward bent handle gives also extra boost for blows. Decorated knob had some sharp edges which were not so finger friendly when gripping with 3 fingers for powerful chopping. Maybe I will sacrifice some of it´s decoration in the shrine of practicality.
VastaaPoistaIt would be easy to make to perform better with better sharpening which was originally quite "rough"
Sawback is not for sawing, but it worked ok for notching. That interesting groove on start of sawback is meant for decoration / design I think, but it worked just fine with standard sized firesteel giving very good sparks.
- Finnman
Gorges Smythe:
I didn´t fully understand what did you mean with this: "make the knife harder to withdraw from a wound"
Can you explain a bit?
He means that the saw teeth would make it harder to pull the knife out of someone if you stabbed them. :o
VastaaPoistabmatt
that "interesting groove", i am guessing that it meant for bottol opening. have seen such on some "survival" knives.
VastaaPoistayes that maybe can be also bottle opener which I couldn´t test cause didn´t have any bottle with cap like that. But sure it´s very imporant function in the bush :)
VastaaPoista- Finnman
First of all, i think that the "weird" notch behind the saw teeth, is just a poorly made bottleopener. Maybe the people who did your knife, dont use bottleopeners and as they copied the design from those cheap ramboknives with bottle openers, they just ground a nothch, that does look like a poor opener, but has no real function.And a bottle opener IS a lame tool in any knife IMO. You can perhaps file it sharp with a chainsaw file, the bottom of the notch and use it as a cutter, for strings, cord etc. You can also continue the row of saw teeths, with grinder/file, to make the saw more effective, as if there is a saw, it should be somewhat useful, and modifying it to work better, is far easier than trying to remove the teeths fully. But, a saw, that can do just a bit of notching can be useful, in primitive trap making and bow making etc.
VastaaPoistaSecondly, i am Very interested to know what sort of joint there is, between the handle and the knife. I mean the shape, of tang . That blade is looking quite massive, and the handle is pretty small. Near the cross guard, few cm´s away from it,towards blades tip, theres tiny "holes"...is that a ground welding seam ? Or a mark made from hammer when its been maybe forged ?
Could the blade be removed from handle, is it glued, or only riveted ?
How does a New chainsaw file bite to the blades edge?