Advice For A Meat Cleaver

Randy Lucius

Randy Lucius

Well-Known Member
I have a friend that owns a great BBQ restaurant. He has one of my knives and mentioned that he would like to have a meat cleaver for the restaurant. He’s a great guy and helps a lot of people so I would like to make one as a gift to him. I don’t have a clue where to start. What steel? What thickness? What grind? I’d like to make a test cleaver before I make his. Should I do the ol’ Forged In Fire antler chop? :) It will be in a commercial environment so it will have to handle some abuse.
 
Randy - I have made one mini cleaver. I had a piece of 1/4 inch 1095 that was big enough. It was actually a bit thicker than .250. Like around .280. You could go stainless in the commercial environment. I know you can easily find 440c in thicker sizes. Not sure about any others. I do not use much stainless other than 440c.

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Dennis Morland said:
Randy - I have made one mini cleaver. I had a piece of 1/4 inch 1095 that was big enough. It was actually a bit thicker than .250. Like around .280. You could go stainless in the commercial environment. I know you can easily find 440c in thicker sizes. Not sure about any others. I do not use much stainless other than 440c.

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I made a few of these but I don’t think it will work. :)
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First of all MERRY CHRISTMAS TO EVERYONE!!!!

owns a great BBQ restaurant
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That in itself means you have to follow a "different" guideline. Theses days, if you have a wood or other non-synthetic handled knife in any restaurant, the business simply will not pass a health/safety inspection. That really limits what you can use. It's not happened in our area yet, but several other cities around our state have made it "law" that any cutlery item used in a public restaurant must be made of stainless steel. If you're lucky, you won't have to deal with that bull in your area.....but I'd check.

That aside, consider how much use the clever will see...which is suspect would be substantial in a BBQ restaurant. The Dexter posted above is about as "ideal" as you can get for a using clever. Keep it "light and fast"..... with just enough weight to accomplished the light chopping required....you have to remember....any weight you build into a clever must be picked up....for every chop it takes. ;) When choosing handle material, keep it simple, and think in terms of it being cleaned MANY times a day, with chemicals.....definitely some type of synthetic. Right now, I'm building a specialized "tool" for a local BBQ outfit. They save their leftover pulled pork for adding to the next day's beans.....and freeze it. I'm building them a "tool" of AEB-L and HDPE handles for "prying" that frozen pull pork apart. It's one of those knives where I had to put aside my deep desire to make it look good....because of it's use in a restaurant. But, no other restaurant in town will have any tool like it! :)
 
I doubt he will be chopping through any bone dealing with BBQ unless it’s ribs. I would ask to be sure. Ed is the expert but if it’s just for “chopping” meat think more like a Nakiri or a fat chef’s knife as far as construction goes. I love cleavers and have made several but mostly I make them for meat cutting. I made one from 5160 with some weight and a convex grind for butchering sheep at my in-laws man will it chop bone.
 
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