Distal taper in a hunting knife??

Lerch

Well-Known Member
I was wondering if a distal taper would be desired on a hunting knife and more importantly if there would be any pros or cons of this??

just curious if i should be doing this on my knives or not?

thanks
steve
 
When me and my buddies skin and gut our elk with our knives we like to have the distal taper because it allows for a finer cut and a pointer edge.

In my opinion I think they should have them.
 
It is also going to depend on the thickness of the blade to start with. If you are starting out with 3/16" then it would be a good idea. If you made your blade out of 3/32" to keep the weight down and allow better slicing then you probably wouldn't want to have much. Of course, I wouldn't want to do much prying apart joints with the latter knife but it might make a great skinner. Form follows function.

Doug
 
I use to make a fair amount of Skinner/Hunters and always did a distal taper.
As stated by the others it does depend on how thick of steel you start with?

Distal really helps reduce resistance when thrusting into the meat when starting a cut, also you can get a finer edge towards the tip. Make a couple and see how they work for you?

Laurence

www.rhinoknives.com/
 
The first question should be, what is the game being skinned, then blade geometry can be decided on. There's a lot of difference between skinning a moose and skinning a rabbit.
 
Thankyou all very much,

I was thinking in more of a general term as to what knives a distal taper would be prefered on and what the pros and cons would be. The answers make a lot of sense and help a lot.

Form follows function, makes sense

thanks for the info

steve
 
I really think there are alot of pros to using a distal taper on any hard use knife. Not only does it afford you a finer point, a distally tapered blade offers greater resiliency under hard use.
 
I've never found any situation where a blade/knife should not have a distal taper. It simply makes a knife a "better" knife. Lightens weight, adds lateral strength, makes a knife "lighter and faster" feeling. It does require a bit of a learning curve to grind if you are accustom to or have only ground "straight thickness" blades, but I simply can't image producing a knife without a distal taper. Of course there will be some unique application here and there where you might not want a distal taper....but those are pretty "specialized" and somewhat rare cases.
 
In general, I would agree with Ed, but I think that a blade weighted towards slicing in it's design, like a dedicated skinner, chef's/carving/bread knife, or a filleting/boning knife would be better without much, if any distal taper. I would also be starting out with a thin blade. This is one area where one is likely to run into differences of opinion more than right and wrong ideas. Many, if not most, things in knife making involves compromise between elements and each maker has to decide on how they want to make that compromise. I've also seen dedicated choppers that combine both a distal and proximal tapers; the blade was thickest at the "sweet spot" and tapered from there to both the tip and the tang. As an aside, you will also sometimes see this in broken back seax designs, both historical and reproduction, just simply because that is the way they tend to forge out. The metal is upset in the forward area of the blade when the downward bevel is forged into the profile and never got drawn out except toward the tip.

Doug
 
OK, there's all together too much agreement here - so someone has to take a contrary position. I'll take it - not necessarily because I hold that opinion - just for the sake of debate. :)

I've seen makers do a distal taper continuous all the way from the hilt to the tip. Dang it looked pretty - but then he had to skeletonize the whole darn handle to fix the imbalance. Heaven knows why "form and function" dictated a thicker tang than blade.

Now the part of a hunting blade that faces biggest risk is the tip - joints - splitting pelvis - heck, even getting dropped on the rocks. So if the tip can get by thin, why in the heck does the rest have to be fat and heavy? Please don't tell me that Busse drives a blade four inches into a tree and then hangs a volkswagen off the tang. That is NOT a hunting knife.

So my question is "What the heck are you doing with the tang or even the proximal blade section, that requires it to be fatter than the tip?"

Resolved: Proximal taper may be butt ugly but it makes more sense. :)

(presumption: we all agree that vetral taper of the blade is good. )
 
(presumption: we all agree that vetral taper of the blade is good. )
Quote from Rob at Ca.

No we don't!!!
if it's a Scandi or Saber grind! Those can be the same until you grind in the cutting edge.:biggrin:

Laurence

www.rhinoknives.com
 
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