Thai Kukri

[Slugless]

L&G -

I did a quick search on this forum to see what anyone had to say about the Thai Kukri.

My GF went to india & I asked for "a real kukri, not a tourist job. I want an army type one." So what I get appears to be a flash tourist job with "AR M Y" badly stamped on it. She meant well.

So I ebayed and found this:



I pulled it out to dispose of the Halloween pumpkin before it started to rot. Whooeee, with a slicing chop I couldn't even tell the gourd was there. Not that a pumpkin is representative of anything but a squash, but still. Made me think of you guys *sniff*

The blade is 10.5" long. The tip is almost in line with the handle, so it should stab well. Made from heat treated spring steel. 3/16" thick.

Anybody know any more about these things? How about sheaths? I've seen River City sheaths mentioned on here. The knife doesn't have a guard, dunno if that'd be an issue.

 

[gb6491]

If you do a Google search for E-nep or Enep knife you will find some informative discussion on the various knife forums for this style of Thai knife. Looks like you have a nice one.
Regards,
Greg

 

[CWL]

Typical design for SE Asian utility knife. Also commonly known as Parang, Barong, Bolo etc. Very useful tool, designed for heavier cutting than So. American Machete.

I like it.

 

[average_shooter]

Interesting. I don't know much about Thai Kukris, but I spent a couple months in Nepal.

What I was told is that the shape of the blade itself represents the Himalayas; the way the blade goes up to an apex then bends down represents Everest and the rest of the mountains. When a soldier kills an enemy the blood flows over the blade and off the tip, a sort of offering to the gods.

A friend of mine ran into a Gorkha soldier overseas who expanded on this and explained that all the soldiers have their own names inscribed on the blade so the blood of the enemy must flow over it. Kind of the ultimate way to say "You're mine, sucka!"

As I understand, they are not really intended as a stabbing weapon. The power lies in the slashing stroke. Essentially the inside curve of the blade is sharpened, which is "backwards" from most common blades. As the blade is drawn through a target the target is drawn towards the handle to the sharpest part of the blade while the mass at the end of the blade helps with a more powerful stroke.

If any of this is wrong I'm sure others will be along to correct me. Nice knife!

ETA: The ones I saw in Nepal were mostly like the second one from the bottom in your picture.

 

[Slugless]

Aaah. An e-nep! Or Aranyik.

AvgShooter,

The second one from the bottom is a kukri (sp). You're right, definitely not a stabbing weapon.

What I look for in a stabbing weapon (feel free to correct me, I'm mostly a gun guy) is for the tip to be in line with the tang. The kukri is very far from that.

The use of the word "kukri" I think is confusing the issue. Take a look at the bottom knife, the e-nep. When I play with it, it stabs well. Actually, that's one of the main reasons I chose it over a "real" kukri. (Also not to annoy the GF, it was better to get something different than a replacement for her gift). Plus the leaf spring detents are cool.

I don't know of a good way to test the heat treat. I don't like chopping wood with a knife. (Brush/scrub oak branches sure. To me a knife like this uses a sliding chop, not a straight on chop. But again I'm only a softcore knife guy, although I have built a couple) On another forum someone talked about testing it on cow bones. But the description on ebay matched the description of the good ones (at least as far as I can remember) as per:

http://www.britishblades.com/forums/showthread.php?t=44041

 

[Don Gwinn]

Take legends about where blood flows and all that with a grain of salt. I'm not saying nobody in Nepal does the bit with the name on the blade for that purpose, because maybe somebody does, but I haven't heard that from anybody who's spent time in Nepal dealing with kukris. Same thing with representing the mountains in the blade shape. That's the kind of thing maybe somebody came up with at some point long after the design became popular. Could have been the guy you were talking to. If they designed the kukri to mimic the mountains and ended up with something that works that well, they got REALLY lucky!

 

[wulfbyte]

In my opinion - the best site for Khukuri knives on the internet:

http://www.khukuriblades.com/

Followed closely by:

http://www.nepalesekhukuri.com/index.html

And I believe they both sell blades manufactured at the same place.

An excellent discussion of knives of this type can be found here.

 

[hso]

Take a magnifying glass and look at the edge, then take it out and chop down a 3" hickory and chop though it again. Look at the edge and see if it is chipped or rolled. If it is neither you've got a good heat threat.

 

[mercop]

One would be wise to learn to use and defend against Kukri and Machete type weapons with the influx of MS13 types. These are their tools of choice. Their weapons are not talismans but tools they have wielded since birth. Even a dull Machete can lop an arm off.

I am married to guns but have a love affair with knives and sticks.

 

[average_shooter]

Take legends about where blood flows and all that with a grain of salt.

Fair enough. In my defense the whole name-on-the-blade thing came from my best friend currently deployed overseas who apparently ran into a Gorkha at some point. I know, I know, friend of a friend said so, so it must be true. Back to the grain of salt... But I'm just saying.

Funny story sidenote; the village I stayed in used to have a knife maker... until he was killed in a knife fight. Try to figure that one out.

 

[rodregier]

re: killed knife maker

in a similar vein, being a gunsmith doesn't necessarily make one a gun fighter

 

[pendentive]

E-nep
Made in the city Aranyik (or Aranyig), Thailand.

It's a blade unique to that area and (to me anyway) easily recognizable and like no other.

Looks like your has been rehandled or has a new handle style...typically they would come with a hidden tang handle that is round and "beaded"...like this one:

Great knives. They usually have a depression in the blade...which shows you that they were once a car/truck spring (that is where the U-Bolt would've held the springs together, etc.)


Great find!

 

[Don Gwinn]

That one's pretty, too . . . . neat!

 

[Slugless]

Pend -

I concur - neat!

There were a bunch like mine available on ebay, all of them had the same handle style. So I think it's a new style, not a retrofit.

The handle is a bit of a weak point. The shape isn't too bad but it's got a glossy slick varnish on it. I'd rather have it a little rougher. Hmm, maybe a winter project.

The leaf spring detents are cool, sold me on the knife.

Hey - how have you found the heat treat on your knife / knives? I've not had a chance to try hso's tip. (we don't have hickory trees in Houston & I don't know when I can visit my relatives in West Virginia. Maybe some 3" oak branches)

Regarding the heat treat test, I tried the chopping thing on my Mountain Man bowie that I built. I was taking bark off of a Ponderosa pine (pine beetles ) and ended up doing some wood chopping by the nature of the task. I put the rolled edge down to the fact that a knife is not an axe, not the heat treat.

The bowie's a stainless blade and I've never seen a stainless axe. My metallurgy class was too long ago for me to extrapolate my limited knowledge of martensitic stainless steels to the rolling of knife edges while chopping on trees. Dunno.

 

[PTK]

I used to have a stainless khukuri... I wish I never bought it, it was obviously junk.

I now have three Himalayan Imports khuks and love all three.

For anyone reading this thread, if you haven't tried a good khukuri, go buy one. They're well worth the $50-100 you'll spend on an entry level one, and will outlast and outperform most any machete you can buy.

http://www.himalayan-imports.com/