Kris Cutlery Dadao: 0 out of 5 stars
Jun 27, 2020 20:38:00 GMT
Post by fatebinder on Jun 27, 2020 20:38:00 GMT
INTRODUCTION
Hello everyone, long time lurker, first time reviewer. Before I begin I want to apologize for the lack of Photographs showing off this sword. The reason for this is because I won't be taking any more than I have for obvious reasons if you read this review, so read on to see why
Now, I collect a wide assortment of cutlery, I have trained in several martial arts, I have over 30 years of experience with sharp steel swords and tools, and my tastes in blades have shifted over the years to all different kinds of swords and blades. I am always on the lookout for something unusual. And for this blade I was looking with a slight focus on practical weapons and tools that could serve well in the hands of a marauding survivor in a mad max apocalypse. Oh I have plenty of "safe queen" blades that are far less practical, but get me something rugged and brutal and effective, and sometimes I sit up and take special notice. Well, this is what drew me to the Kris Cutlery Dadao, I like the concept of the Dadao, a beefy rugged chopper made to intimidate, behead and maybe chop down a tree or two to create an ambush on a road. So I was looking for something rugged, a beater with style, but not the cost of a Zombie tool.
It also reminded me a great deal of Prince Ashitakas sword form Princess Mononoke, but less "pretty."
I found Kult of Athena had a limited supply of them, so I saved up some cash and made my order. 140 dollars and about 2 weeks later, it was in my hands and here is my review.
HISTORICAL OVERVIEW
The Chinese Dadao was a cheap chopping blade of sometimes questionable quality. Unlike many modern remakes, they were not always big heavy impractical objects (like the Cold Steel variety), sometimes they were more like a Machete, thinner, and shorter. However, I would admit that this Kris Kutlery Dadao is more like a miniature non frills version of a Horse Cutting sword (Kangxi sword, or Zhanmadao). Anyway Dadao were simple and cheaply made, a sheet of steel cut to shape, given a long handle and sharpened in many cases. Not unlike grabbing a lawn mower blade and modifying it and slapping a handle on it, or taking a truck spring and doing the same. But cheap and simple need not mean useless or flimsy, though there were many reports of them breaking, there were also many stories of them being used in last ditch assaults and taking many heads against the Japanese who were armed with rifles.
FULL DISCLOSURE
None I have literally no connection to anyone, the only bias I had was being the one who spend his hard earned money and wanted to love this sword. As mentioned above I have a soft spot for rugged unusual designs like this.
Initial impressions
My initial impression was excellent, it was exactly what I was looking for. The package was in good shape, and the sword was packed with a LOT of brown paper padding, as It came without a scabbard of any kind, they had to wrap it up and put a lot of added protection in the box. I didn't mind the lack of a scabbard, but I'm a handy person and figured making it a sheath of some kind, maybe a nice stained wood scabbard, would be a fun summer project. The balance was very lively due to the long handle, the ring pommel gave me fantasies of holding it with my pinkie finger as I nocked and fired an Arrow Prince Ashitaka style. I was looking forward to putting this through it's paces.
The Statistics (copied from KOA)
Overall Length: 27 3/8'' Blade: 14 15/16''
Blade: 1060 High Carbon Steel
Weight: 1 lb 12.4 oz
Edge: Sharp
P.O.B.: 2 3/4''
Thickness: 9 mm - 5.4 mm
Width: 38.9 mm - 45.3 mm
Grip Length: 10''
Pommel: unknown
Components
The blade:
The blade is made with a Diamond Cross section, adding a wide central ridge. This is an unusual design for a single edged blade. Further more the "point" of the blade was just a flat "chop" at the end at a very obtuse angle, so it doesn't have a ton of thrusting potential, however it comes sharpened, and in a pinch could thrust a soft target effectively, though not deeply. I feel a more sharp angle would have made this a better more useful design, but I could modify that if I felt strongly enough about it. So far so good.
The Handle:
This is where the show falls apart... I really appreciate the length, it adds a lot of options for such a short design. I can choke all the way up, and get speed and agility, two hand grip for extra power, choke down for better reach and even more power and mass in the swing. The wrap was some kind of shoelace cord... it was "loosish" however, with a little effort with my fingernail I can shift it up and down. It also appeared to be spot glued in place. Not a good sign Kris Cutlery! But not a big deal, I like project blades sometimes, and I am a big fan of Using Clear Lacquer on cord tsuka on cheap katana to make them last forever but still feel just soft enough to be usable. This would get the same treatment, or maybe I would redo it completely with something more modern like a tennis racket tape. The ring pommel feels very thin, and flimsy, almost as if I could bend it if I put a little effort into it... I expect a ring pommel to ultimately be made of the tang itself and be strong enough to take a hit in a close in brawl. This? Think extra extra heavy gauge clothes hanger wire.
At this point I was already deducting at least a whole star... but then I saw the way the tang, pommel and handle are all connected, and I saw how thin the tang was made. This blade is about 4 cm (1.5 inches) wide at the guard. Which is quite stout. But the tang, which is clearly visible due to extremely amateur fitting, is barely 1.5 cm wide. (about half an inch or less) And about 1 cm thick... For a blade as thick, wide and heavy as it is, with the design philosophy of a dadao... This barely even qualifies as a Stick tang. This is almost as bad as rat tail tang on a display sword... Now, had the tang been thicker (at least double the width), or full, or had the blade been smaller, this could work fine, as most people know a stick tang can work fine if the design is done right.
However, I looked carefully at the union of the barely there guard and the handle, and noted that the transition from blade steel to tang steel was a SHARP 90 degree angle. And the design of the guard and tang and grip intersection was what I call breakage prone. If the tang was about 2 times as wide, or if the transition had a curve in it instead of a 90 degree corner, if the guard wasn't positioned in such a way to cause added stress on the blade and tang, i might have felt better about this. But so far... I was losing faith in this design.
The handle is held in place by what appear to be mekugi like bamboo pins, flush and glued into the handle. A tried and tested design, though a little different due to the glue. So this wasn't an issue, except for the fact that that the pins are about 8 mm in diameter. This means that the pins are literally more than half the width of the tang, which means that there is not a lot of material left for the tang to have strength. This might be fine if the pins were far enough down the tang, but they would have to be near the pommel to be honest. And they would have to be perfectly centered. But let me put this in perspective - an 8 mm pin means that at BEST, on a 1.5 cm wide (at thickest) tang, there is less than 5 mm of steel on either side of the hole... and if the smiths messed up the alignment?
I have enough of a collection and over 30 years of practical blade experience, cutting everything from tatami and pool noodles to chopping trees down with heavy machetes... I know a bad design when I see one. Kris Cutlery committed the cardinal sin of being too cheap, had they doubled the width of the tang, and boosted the price to compensate, it would have been a better design.
While the historical examples of Dadao often were cheap and not top quality and often broke, this was not a cheap hastily made war-sword, this was made by a reputable smith for 130 bucks...
2.5 stars off... I had a feeling this was going to be a bad review...
The Guard:
A simple block of unremarkable metal meant to separate the blade from the hands, not usable for any defensive action. Nothing to see here really, aside from it's relation to the tang and handle.
Handling characteristics:
This was it's most redeeming quality, the combination of a long handle and moderately short blade, but with a stout mass in the blade meant when you hold it near the guard it can easily sing and dance in one hand, you can twirly it around, and do some great fun fighting moves when you kill water bottles. And changing grip can dramatically change how the sword feels. I loved it. I was almost willing to give it an extra star. But that tang still gave me pause, I would have to test cut!
TEST CUTTING
This is where the whole show came crashing down, as predicted, the sword failed within the first 15 minutes of using it.
I began with the usual, water bottles, I was nervous cutting them, especially when the dullish edge didn't cut through and acted more like a baseball bat... I could feel the vibration and stress. I already saw that the pommel looked different, I thought it was my imagination so I Moved on to a few small dead branches thinner than a finger on a tree I was pruning, and it handled this better... as wood doesn't need a razor edge to chop.
I ended up on a fresh cut piece of softwood. A branch about half as thick as your wrist, maybe 2 inches in diameter that I dragged from the compost pile that was put there a day earlier and had already done some chopping on with another test blade (a Boshin Kukri, which did much better). You need to believe me when I tell you I started off slow and soft, giving it love taps, just to see how it would do. This was a CHOPPER, and this means they need to be able to take pretty serious chopping forces, even if just because the weight distribution. So I slowly and carefully ramped up. Trying different grip positions.
Right away, The balance started to feel off, and the ring on the pommel appeared to be bending from the vibration, something was terribly wrong... I looked at the sword wondering why the balance felt off, and I saw to my horror that the blade was bending at the guard.
I know what some of you might be thinking: "He's using a sword to chop a piece of wood that isn't allowed to move around... what does he expect?"
I want to reiterate I KNOW swords, I KNOW tools, I KNOW this is not an AXE, and that TANG worried me, but I did not buy this beautiful yet ugly thing to be a safe queen, I bought this design because In theory it is supposed to be like an all purpose tool sword. I should be able to take off heads, maybe chop down trees if need be. I quote from the KOA website for this blade:
"Due to its cleaver-like blade some historians have suggested that the Dadao has its origins as an agricultural tool that was turned into a military weapon fit for outfitting levied troops. Whether or not that is the real origin it became a reality when the Dadao was manufactured in mass numbers to outfit Chinese nationalist troops with a fighting sidearm to resist the Japanese Invasion in the Second Sino-Japanese War. It developed a reputation for effortlessly removing enemy heads and a mere glance at the blade gives immediate credence to such claims."
I am telling you no matter what he target was this blade would fail, I have wall hangers that would have easily survived this test, I wasn't even to the point where I was abusing it yet. For a blade advertised as being BATTLE READY and based on a design that was an agricultural tool turned weapon that effortlessly removed heads... this thing was a bad fail.
I have enough years using and modding and abusing swords and blades to know what to expect from a functional blade design. Any sword in my arsenal would not have been damaged in the slightest from the way I was testing this. And considering the design (in theory) was meant to be rugged and more like a combat machete... I was literally babying this thing. I was hitting this softwood target with less force than I would hit my dog. Had this been a tatami, or a person, it wouldn't likely even cut them. If this was tatami or a person it would have suffered the same damage! If you missed your test cut on the tatami or a water bottle and hit the stand it would have broken or been deformed from that just as easily.
I grabbed my camera, and took a video right away, I had every intention of getting my money back or something, so I decided to show KOA the result with evidence. I showed them on the video how hard I was tapping the blade, and as I did, it snapped on the second love tap.
I examined the the parts, and I saw exactly what I predicted, the mekugi hole was basically about as far off center as you could get without missing completely, leaving about 1 mm of steel. And this was exactly where the tang bent and failed.
I took the opportunity to unwind the cord, and saw what looked like DIRT with grass and even dog hair in it glued to the ring pommel as if meant to create more mass for the cord or hold the wire ring in place?
Conclusion and bottom line:
The whole thing is an utter fail... I am disgusted by this whole affair. Why spend 150$ of my hard earned money on I have already wasted my time on this blade enough, I don't feel like adding much more to this review, so I am skipping the pros and cons section and all the rest of the minutia.
I contacted KOA with the video, and I asked for a refund or store credit... it took well over a week to get a reply, I guess Covid is partly to blame so I wasn't mad about this. But instead of a refund or credit, instead they scolded me for using it on wood, telling me like a child that it's only meant for bottles and tatami... but that the maker said the tang could have been badly tempered... So they sent me out a new one So I'm very disappointed with KOA on this too, I WAS going to use the credit toward a more expensive sword I had my eye on, but now even if given that credit I won't bother, because I can't trust that I will be protected from a bad blade design.
I have sent them a lot of business over the years and while I understand their position, I still feel cheated. This sword should never have been advertised as battle ready nor talk about being based on a design for chopping heads etc. I plan on selling this on Ebay, maybe someone will want it for display purposes? I can see why Kris Cutlery Discontinued it... I had thought it was just because it was ugly and nobody wanted it... But maybe it was because people just knew it was not worth it?
So Do not under any circumstances purchase this sword unless you want it for display purposes only. Which I can't imagine you would want since it is not meant for display, it's ugly as can be, and also useless.
Hello everyone, long time lurker, first time reviewer. Before I begin I want to apologize for the lack of Photographs showing off this sword. The reason for this is because I won't be taking any more than I have for obvious reasons if you read this review, so read on to see why
Now, I collect a wide assortment of cutlery, I have trained in several martial arts, I have over 30 years of experience with sharp steel swords and tools, and my tastes in blades have shifted over the years to all different kinds of swords and blades. I am always on the lookout for something unusual. And for this blade I was looking with a slight focus on practical weapons and tools that could serve well in the hands of a marauding survivor in a mad max apocalypse. Oh I have plenty of "safe queen" blades that are far less practical, but get me something rugged and brutal and effective, and sometimes I sit up and take special notice. Well, this is what drew me to the Kris Cutlery Dadao, I like the concept of the Dadao, a beefy rugged chopper made to intimidate, behead and maybe chop down a tree or two to create an ambush on a road. So I was looking for something rugged, a beater with style, but not the cost of a Zombie tool.
It also reminded me a great deal of Prince Ashitakas sword form Princess Mononoke, but less "pretty."
I found Kult of Athena had a limited supply of them, so I saved up some cash and made my order. 140 dollars and about 2 weeks later, it was in my hands and here is my review.
HISTORICAL OVERVIEW
The Chinese Dadao was a cheap chopping blade of sometimes questionable quality. Unlike many modern remakes, they were not always big heavy impractical objects (like the Cold Steel variety), sometimes they were more like a Machete, thinner, and shorter. However, I would admit that this Kris Kutlery Dadao is more like a miniature non frills version of a Horse Cutting sword (Kangxi sword, or Zhanmadao). Anyway Dadao were simple and cheaply made, a sheet of steel cut to shape, given a long handle and sharpened in many cases. Not unlike grabbing a lawn mower blade and modifying it and slapping a handle on it, or taking a truck spring and doing the same. But cheap and simple need not mean useless or flimsy, though there were many reports of them breaking, there were also many stories of them being used in last ditch assaults and taking many heads against the Japanese who were armed with rifles.
FULL DISCLOSURE
None I have literally no connection to anyone, the only bias I had was being the one who spend his hard earned money and wanted to love this sword. As mentioned above I have a soft spot for rugged unusual designs like this.
Initial impressions
My initial impression was excellent, it was exactly what I was looking for. The package was in good shape, and the sword was packed with a LOT of brown paper padding, as It came without a scabbard of any kind, they had to wrap it up and put a lot of added protection in the box. I didn't mind the lack of a scabbard, but I'm a handy person and figured making it a sheath of some kind, maybe a nice stained wood scabbard, would be a fun summer project. The balance was very lively due to the long handle, the ring pommel gave me fantasies of holding it with my pinkie finger as I nocked and fired an Arrow Prince Ashitaka style. I was looking forward to putting this through it's paces.
The Statistics (copied from KOA)
Overall Length: 27 3/8'' Blade: 14 15/16''
Blade: 1060 High Carbon Steel
Weight: 1 lb 12.4 oz
Edge: Sharp
P.O.B.: 2 3/4''
Thickness: 9 mm - 5.4 mm
Width: 38.9 mm - 45.3 mm
Grip Length: 10''
Pommel: unknown
Components
The blade:
The blade is made with a Diamond Cross section, adding a wide central ridge. This is an unusual design for a single edged blade. Further more the "point" of the blade was just a flat "chop" at the end at a very obtuse angle, so it doesn't have a ton of thrusting potential, however it comes sharpened, and in a pinch could thrust a soft target effectively, though not deeply. I feel a more sharp angle would have made this a better more useful design, but I could modify that if I felt strongly enough about it. So far so good.
The Handle:
This is where the show falls apart... I really appreciate the length, it adds a lot of options for such a short design. I can choke all the way up, and get speed and agility, two hand grip for extra power, choke down for better reach and even more power and mass in the swing. The wrap was some kind of shoelace cord... it was "loosish" however, with a little effort with my fingernail I can shift it up and down. It also appeared to be spot glued in place. Not a good sign Kris Cutlery! But not a big deal, I like project blades sometimes, and I am a big fan of Using Clear Lacquer on cord tsuka on cheap katana to make them last forever but still feel just soft enough to be usable. This would get the same treatment, or maybe I would redo it completely with something more modern like a tennis racket tape. The ring pommel feels very thin, and flimsy, almost as if I could bend it if I put a little effort into it... I expect a ring pommel to ultimately be made of the tang itself and be strong enough to take a hit in a close in brawl. This? Think extra extra heavy gauge clothes hanger wire.
At this point I was already deducting at least a whole star... but then I saw the way the tang, pommel and handle are all connected, and I saw how thin the tang was made. This blade is about 4 cm (1.5 inches) wide at the guard. Which is quite stout. But the tang, which is clearly visible due to extremely amateur fitting, is barely 1.5 cm wide. (about half an inch or less) And about 1 cm thick... For a blade as thick, wide and heavy as it is, with the design philosophy of a dadao... This barely even qualifies as a Stick tang. This is almost as bad as rat tail tang on a display sword... Now, had the tang been thicker (at least double the width), or full, or had the blade been smaller, this could work fine, as most people know a stick tang can work fine if the design is done right.
However, I looked carefully at the union of the barely there guard and the handle, and noted that the transition from blade steel to tang steel was a SHARP 90 degree angle. And the design of the guard and tang and grip intersection was what I call breakage prone. If the tang was about 2 times as wide, or if the transition had a curve in it instead of a 90 degree corner, if the guard wasn't positioned in such a way to cause added stress on the blade and tang, i might have felt better about this. But so far... I was losing faith in this design.
The handle is held in place by what appear to be mekugi like bamboo pins, flush and glued into the handle. A tried and tested design, though a little different due to the glue. So this wasn't an issue, except for the fact that that the pins are about 8 mm in diameter. This means that the pins are literally more than half the width of the tang, which means that there is not a lot of material left for the tang to have strength. This might be fine if the pins were far enough down the tang, but they would have to be near the pommel to be honest. And they would have to be perfectly centered. But let me put this in perspective - an 8 mm pin means that at BEST, on a 1.5 cm wide (at thickest) tang, there is less than 5 mm of steel on either side of the hole... and if the smiths messed up the alignment?
I have enough of a collection and over 30 years of practical blade experience, cutting everything from tatami and pool noodles to chopping trees down with heavy machetes... I know a bad design when I see one. Kris Cutlery committed the cardinal sin of being too cheap, had they doubled the width of the tang, and boosted the price to compensate, it would have been a better design.
While the historical examples of Dadao often were cheap and not top quality and often broke, this was not a cheap hastily made war-sword, this was made by a reputable smith for 130 bucks...
2.5 stars off... I had a feeling this was going to be a bad review...
The Guard:
A simple block of unremarkable metal meant to separate the blade from the hands, not usable for any defensive action. Nothing to see here really, aside from it's relation to the tang and handle.
Handling characteristics:
This was it's most redeeming quality, the combination of a long handle and moderately short blade, but with a stout mass in the blade meant when you hold it near the guard it can easily sing and dance in one hand, you can twirly it around, and do some great fun fighting moves when you kill water bottles. And changing grip can dramatically change how the sword feels. I loved it. I was almost willing to give it an extra star. But that tang still gave me pause, I would have to test cut!
TEST CUTTING
This is where the whole show came crashing down, as predicted, the sword failed within the first 15 minutes of using it.
I began with the usual, water bottles, I was nervous cutting them, especially when the dullish edge didn't cut through and acted more like a baseball bat... I could feel the vibration and stress. I already saw that the pommel looked different, I thought it was my imagination so I Moved on to a few small dead branches thinner than a finger on a tree I was pruning, and it handled this better... as wood doesn't need a razor edge to chop.
I ended up on a fresh cut piece of softwood. A branch about half as thick as your wrist, maybe 2 inches in diameter that I dragged from the compost pile that was put there a day earlier and had already done some chopping on with another test blade (a Boshin Kukri, which did much better). You need to believe me when I tell you I started off slow and soft, giving it love taps, just to see how it would do. This was a CHOPPER, and this means they need to be able to take pretty serious chopping forces, even if just because the weight distribution. So I slowly and carefully ramped up. Trying different grip positions.
Right away, The balance started to feel off, and the ring on the pommel appeared to be bending from the vibration, something was terribly wrong... I looked at the sword wondering why the balance felt off, and I saw to my horror that the blade was bending at the guard.
I know what some of you might be thinking: "He's using a sword to chop a piece of wood that isn't allowed to move around... what does he expect?"
I want to reiterate I KNOW swords, I KNOW tools, I KNOW this is not an AXE, and that TANG worried me, but I did not buy this beautiful yet ugly thing to be a safe queen, I bought this design because In theory it is supposed to be like an all purpose tool sword. I should be able to take off heads, maybe chop down trees if need be. I quote from the KOA website for this blade:
"Due to its cleaver-like blade some historians have suggested that the Dadao has its origins as an agricultural tool that was turned into a military weapon fit for outfitting levied troops. Whether or not that is the real origin it became a reality when the Dadao was manufactured in mass numbers to outfit Chinese nationalist troops with a fighting sidearm to resist the Japanese Invasion in the Second Sino-Japanese War. It developed a reputation for effortlessly removing enemy heads and a mere glance at the blade gives immediate credence to such claims."
I am telling you no matter what he target was this blade would fail, I have wall hangers that would have easily survived this test, I wasn't even to the point where I was abusing it yet. For a blade advertised as being BATTLE READY and based on a design that was an agricultural tool turned weapon that effortlessly removed heads... this thing was a bad fail.
I have enough years using and modding and abusing swords and blades to know what to expect from a functional blade design. Any sword in my arsenal would not have been damaged in the slightest from the way I was testing this. And considering the design (in theory) was meant to be rugged and more like a combat machete... I was literally babying this thing. I was hitting this softwood target with less force than I would hit my dog. Had this been a tatami, or a person, it wouldn't likely even cut them. If this was tatami or a person it would have suffered the same damage! If you missed your test cut on the tatami or a water bottle and hit the stand it would have broken or been deformed from that just as easily.
I grabbed my camera, and took a video right away, I had every intention of getting my money back or something, so I decided to show KOA the result with evidence. I showed them on the video how hard I was tapping the blade, and as I did, it snapped on the second love tap.
I examined the the parts, and I saw exactly what I predicted, the mekugi hole was basically about as far off center as you could get without missing completely, leaving about 1 mm of steel. And this was exactly where the tang bent and failed.
I took the opportunity to unwind the cord, and saw what looked like DIRT with grass and even dog hair in it glued to the ring pommel as if meant to create more mass for the cord or hold the wire ring in place?
Conclusion and bottom line:
The whole thing is an utter fail... I am disgusted by this whole affair. Why spend 150$ of my hard earned money on I have already wasted my time on this blade enough, I don't feel like adding much more to this review, so I am skipping the pros and cons section and all the rest of the minutia.
I contacted KOA with the video, and I asked for a refund or store credit... it took well over a week to get a reply, I guess Covid is partly to blame so I wasn't mad about this. But instead of a refund or credit, instead they scolded me for using it on wood, telling me like a child that it's only meant for bottles and tatami... but that the maker said the tang could have been badly tempered... So they sent me out a new one So I'm very disappointed with KOA on this too, I WAS going to use the credit toward a more expensive sword I had my eye on, but now even if given that credit I won't bother, because I can't trust that I will be protected from a bad blade design.
I have sent them a lot of business over the years and while I understand their position, I still feel cheated. This sword should never have been advertised as battle ready nor talk about being based on a design for chopping heads etc. I plan on selling this on Ebay, maybe someone will want it for display purposes? I can see why Kris Cutlery Discontinued it... I had thought it was just because it was ugly and nobody wanted it... But maybe it was because people just knew it was not worth it?
So Do not under any circumstances purchase this sword unless you want it for display purposes only. Which I can't imagine you would want since it is not meant for display, it's ugly as can be, and also useless.