Re: Four new machetes reviewed.
Oct 3, 2011 14:10:19 GMT
Post by S. Thomas on Oct 3, 2011 14:10:19 GMT
Picked these up, all from Machetespecialists.com.
1) Martindale 13" Crocodile Golok #2.
$32.99 USD. Vacillated for months before taking the plunge and buying this, after reading numerous reviews online. Was expecting a "tree beater", but it turned out to be not bad. Was sharp out of the USPS shipping box. Only had to touch it up a little bit with a fine lathe file, aluminum oxide stone and diamond grit impregnated "butterfly sharpener"
Handle unvarnished, but smooth. You may want to do work on this to finish it to your liking, perhaps to take the edges down to meet the tang and eliminate that gap btwn. the two grip halves. You`ll see past the top of the handle where the forte begins there is kind of a sloping "shoulder" with two shallow notches; don`t know the purpose of these but I tried choking up on the handle and using both, then the first one only, as finger notches for whittling with the bottom of the forte. The blade is too thick for this to be very effective. Looking closely at the Machetespecialists pic, there appear to be fine, shallow teeth on the back side of the blade; this is an artifact. They are not present on the actual golok. The right side of the blade has a series of three numbers,a dash, followed by four more numbers, and a "broad arrow" after these.
2) Imacasa 14.5" Bolo.
$9.99 USD. Picked this up hoping for a slightly better quality bolo than the Tramontina I already have. Blade had the usual rough primary grind I`ve come to expect from Imacasa. They do this, I`ve read, to allow customers to sharpen them to their own preferred edge style. This can be a real b!#(h for those who don`t have access to a belt sander. The blade has distal taper; it`s very, very thin, thinner than a butter knife at the tip of the blade. I question the necessity, as well as the sensibility of this, since the blade is around 3/16"-3 mm. to start with. The primary grind has almost completely sharpened both sides of the blade forward of where the sharpened "false edge" begins. You won`t have to do much filing up here; mostly smoothing out the rough edges. Up around here on the primary side of the blade is where I`ll do most of my chopping anyway. Below the halfway point of the blade, the forte, is where I`ll do a lot of filing. Just up from the shoulder of the handle has not been roughly ground at all. I`m able to do a two handed grip on this without hurting myself; that`s how far up the forte is dull. Haven`t done any field trials with this yet. Handle appears to be pine.
3) Bellotto 14" Cocoa Machete.
$11.99 USD. Bought this to have a slightly thicker Latin machete than most others commercially available. Website claims 2.2 mm. This seems not far off, judging by a metal metric/ English-Imperial ruler I have here. My vernier calipers and micrometer are at work.
The black "raw metal" appearance was appealing, also. The blade is covered in lacquer/varnish. Edge was working sharp out of the box. Just removed the lacquer with a file and gently touched up the edge with it. Has "Bellotto" stamped into the left side of the blade forward of the handle, in line with the blade. Had the sharp primary factory grind all the way to the tip of the blade. Am very pleased with overall quality of this, my first Bellotto machete. My money was well spent on this one. Might buy the 10" Cocoa machete. Don`t like machetes much longer than 14-16". I can`t fit them inside a backpack like I can all these.
A note about machete blade lengths: "Prior to World War II a 22 inch machete was in use by the Army, but trials in Panama showed that a shorter design was better. The machete adopted as the M-1942 was an 18-inch straight back modification of the Collins commercial type, proved by extensive use in the tropics." Source: www.olive-drab.com/od_edged_weap ... achete.php Most of the machetes in the Closeouts section at Machetespecialists.com are over 18" in length, which leads me to infer that they have a more difficult time selling machetes longer than this, and/or that there is more demand for machetes with blades shorter than this.
4) Finally, what I consider to be the best chopper-cutter-whittler out of all four machetes reviewed here:
The Martindale 12" Crocodile Jungle Machete.
$63.99 USD :shock: I had a difficult time finding any information about this machete online despite much searching. Most of what I found was just retail sites and a few for sale on ebay. Falling "follying?" once again into the mindset of "Bah, it`s all just numbers in cyberspace" I bought one. It`s a very good tool. The website classifies it as a "sax" machete. My brother called it a "broadleaf machete". I might call it a "humpbacked golok". Certainly one of the most strikingly unique machetes I`ve ever seen. Blade distally tapers from about 5/32" at beginning of forte to about 1/32" at tip of blade. Right side of blade is plain with no details or features. Left side has the series of three and four digits, below which is stamped what I suspect is the year of manufacture, 2000, to the left of all this is the "Broad Arrow", "an identification mark...that the British government puts on its property, as formerly on prisoners` uniforms." Source: Webster`s New World Dictionary of the American Language-Second College Edition. Handle is lightly varnished; it`s a bit shinier than the Golok #2, and has a slight tacky feel. Two drops of dried varnish are visible at the bottom of the handle. Lanyard hole might need to be reamed out or re-drilled. The rivet holes are filled with dried grey putty or epoxy of some kind to make a smooth handle all around. Top parts of the two handle halves are flush with the full, flat tang; bottom may or may not need work, depending on your preference and/ or product consistency. Martindale has put more work into finishing this handle than the Golok #2. For over $60.00 USD I hope so. Blade was sharp out of the box, but I touched it up just the same with the same tools mentioned above.
All these save the Imacasa bolo were tested on poplar, cottonwood and aspen; all same genus but diff. species. Relatively soft, but oak doesn`t grow here and I had no lumber made of it handy. I just walked up the block and down the trail to get to the closest machete fodder I could. The trials made on freshly beaver felled trees ranging from 3-5" thick. Golok #2 and Bellotto performed well, but both glanced a few times making diagonal chops across the grain at angles round about 45 degrees. I didn`t time how long it took to chop through these trees; these are all very rough assessments of performance. The whittling tests performed on aspen branches about 1" thick; sharpening these to a point, as well as cutting diagonally through with a single cut by pressing the blade hard against the wood. Golok #2 performed miserably as a whittler-cutter, due to it`s thickness and extreme edge profile. Bellotto performed well; the sharp factory primary grind begins just below the shoulder of the handle, making this kind of whittling very easy. Martindale 12" Jungle performed superbly at everything I did with it. It`s easily the best performer of all three I tried. It`s a superb chopper on the soft woods I tried it on. Bites deep and takes big chips out. Very happy with it.
That`s all. Best wishes.
1) Martindale 13" Crocodile Golok #2.
$32.99 USD. Vacillated for months before taking the plunge and buying this, after reading numerous reviews online. Was expecting a "tree beater", but it turned out to be not bad. Was sharp out of the USPS shipping box. Only had to touch it up a little bit with a fine lathe file, aluminum oxide stone and diamond grit impregnated "butterfly sharpener"
Handle unvarnished, but smooth. You may want to do work on this to finish it to your liking, perhaps to take the edges down to meet the tang and eliminate that gap btwn. the two grip halves. You`ll see past the top of the handle where the forte begins there is kind of a sloping "shoulder" with two shallow notches; don`t know the purpose of these but I tried choking up on the handle and using both, then the first one only, as finger notches for whittling with the bottom of the forte. The blade is too thick for this to be very effective. Looking closely at the Machetespecialists pic, there appear to be fine, shallow teeth on the back side of the blade; this is an artifact. They are not present on the actual golok. The right side of the blade has a series of three numbers,a dash, followed by four more numbers, and a "broad arrow" after these.
2) Imacasa 14.5" Bolo.
$9.99 USD. Picked this up hoping for a slightly better quality bolo than the Tramontina I already have. Blade had the usual rough primary grind I`ve come to expect from Imacasa. They do this, I`ve read, to allow customers to sharpen them to their own preferred edge style. This can be a real b!#(h for those who don`t have access to a belt sander. The blade has distal taper; it`s very, very thin, thinner than a butter knife at the tip of the blade. I question the necessity, as well as the sensibility of this, since the blade is around 3/16"-3 mm. to start with. The primary grind has almost completely sharpened both sides of the blade forward of where the sharpened "false edge" begins. You won`t have to do much filing up here; mostly smoothing out the rough edges. Up around here on the primary side of the blade is where I`ll do most of my chopping anyway. Below the halfway point of the blade, the forte, is where I`ll do a lot of filing. Just up from the shoulder of the handle has not been roughly ground at all. I`m able to do a two handed grip on this without hurting myself; that`s how far up the forte is dull. Haven`t done any field trials with this yet. Handle appears to be pine.
3) Bellotto 14" Cocoa Machete.
$11.99 USD. Bought this to have a slightly thicker Latin machete than most others commercially available. Website claims 2.2 mm. This seems not far off, judging by a metal metric/ English-Imperial ruler I have here. My vernier calipers and micrometer are at work.
The black "raw metal" appearance was appealing, also. The blade is covered in lacquer/varnish. Edge was working sharp out of the box. Just removed the lacquer with a file and gently touched up the edge with it. Has "Bellotto" stamped into the left side of the blade forward of the handle, in line with the blade. Had the sharp primary factory grind all the way to the tip of the blade. Am very pleased with overall quality of this, my first Bellotto machete. My money was well spent on this one. Might buy the 10" Cocoa machete. Don`t like machetes much longer than 14-16". I can`t fit them inside a backpack like I can all these.
A note about machete blade lengths: "Prior to World War II a 22 inch machete was in use by the Army, but trials in Panama showed that a shorter design was better. The machete adopted as the M-1942 was an 18-inch straight back modification of the Collins commercial type, proved by extensive use in the tropics." Source: www.olive-drab.com/od_edged_weap ... achete.php Most of the machetes in the Closeouts section at Machetespecialists.com are over 18" in length, which leads me to infer that they have a more difficult time selling machetes longer than this, and/or that there is more demand for machetes with blades shorter than this.
4) Finally, what I consider to be the best chopper-cutter-whittler out of all four machetes reviewed here:
The Martindale 12" Crocodile Jungle Machete.
$63.99 USD :shock: I had a difficult time finding any information about this machete online despite much searching. Most of what I found was just retail sites and a few for sale on ebay. Falling "follying?" once again into the mindset of "Bah, it`s all just numbers in cyberspace" I bought one. It`s a very good tool. The website classifies it as a "sax" machete. My brother called it a "broadleaf machete". I might call it a "humpbacked golok". Certainly one of the most strikingly unique machetes I`ve ever seen. Blade distally tapers from about 5/32" at beginning of forte to about 1/32" at tip of blade. Right side of blade is plain with no details or features. Left side has the series of three and four digits, below which is stamped what I suspect is the year of manufacture, 2000, to the left of all this is the "Broad Arrow", "an identification mark...that the British government puts on its property, as formerly on prisoners` uniforms." Source: Webster`s New World Dictionary of the American Language-Second College Edition. Handle is lightly varnished; it`s a bit shinier than the Golok #2, and has a slight tacky feel. Two drops of dried varnish are visible at the bottom of the handle. Lanyard hole might need to be reamed out or re-drilled. The rivet holes are filled with dried grey putty or epoxy of some kind to make a smooth handle all around. Top parts of the two handle halves are flush with the full, flat tang; bottom may or may not need work, depending on your preference and/ or product consistency. Martindale has put more work into finishing this handle than the Golok #2. For over $60.00 USD I hope so. Blade was sharp out of the box, but I touched it up just the same with the same tools mentioned above.
All these save the Imacasa bolo were tested on poplar, cottonwood and aspen; all same genus but diff. species. Relatively soft, but oak doesn`t grow here and I had no lumber made of it handy. I just walked up the block and down the trail to get to the closest machete fodder I could. The trials made on freshly beaver felled trees ranging from 3-5" thick. Golok #2 and Bellotto performed well, but both glanced a few times making diagonal chops across the grain at angles round about 45 degrees. I didn`t time how long it took to chop through these trees; these are all very rough assessments of performance. The whittling tests performed on aspen branches about 1" thick; sharpening these to a point, as well as cutting diagonally through with a single cut by pressing the blade hard against the wood. Golok #2 performed miserably as a whittler-cutter, due to it`s thickness and extreme edge profile. Bellotto performed well; the sharp factory primary grind begins just below the shoulder of the handle, making this kind of whittling very easy. Martindale 12" Jungle performed superbly at everything I did with it. It`s easily the best performer of all three I tried. It`s a superb chopper on the soft woods I tried it on. Bites deep and takes big chips out. Very happy with it.
That`s all. Best wishes.