Whoa... what? That massive piece of steel just snapped like that? Damn... wouldn't have expected that, especially with 1095. Crappy heat treatment, I guess?
+Skallagrim my suspicion is that quality control realized it's supposed to have that little cutout at the base of the blade after the heat treatment, grinding, and sharpening and the guy he sent to fix it ground it in without doing anything to preserve the temper (likely because he or she normally does that before the blade's been ground at all so they're not used to worrying about it) this is why the edge closer to the base is more dull (the edge melted a bit on a microscopic level) and why it snapped like a twig right there at that angle. for that price they should always have a decent heat treatment, even with that much supposedly high quality steel.
***** that's my suspicion. also, as some have mentioned elsewhere in this comments section, that little divot of a choil at the base of the blade just made the blade more likely to snap there, especially if the blade is getting some sort of rotary force applied to its edge like if someone were to be holding the handle firmly and batoning it through a bend in the grain of some wood for instance. without it it likely wouldn't have snapped.
I had Hope's for this knife. It turned me off to Kabar. No matter, you introduced me to Bark River, LT Wright, Lon Humphrey and others. Bought two Crusaders, Retribution, Jessmuk and others after watching your videos.
+PREPAREDMIND101 Anyone who says batoning doesn't have its place is simply ignorant. Ever heard of a froe or shingle axe? Same thing. Plenty of cases where batoning is advantages over using an axe. Splitting a knotted up piece of wood for anything but a test of the steel is just plain stupid and not something you would do in a typical situation.
***** I use small biostoves almost every day and for me an axe or hatchet is simply too much to carry daily for this task. i can easily process down the wood i need using a knife. Batoning has its place but maybe not for everyone.
+Dan Schwemin Jr Also, don't most axes have a lower HRC and steel that'll bend rather than break like the knife in the video? And the forces are concentrated in a completely different direction. When you baton, you usually hit near the tip of the blade, which means that there's a bit of leverage involved, which does put a lot more strain on any weak spot in the blade.
+Dan Schwemin Jr It;s really easy to see how batoning is something that can easily damage a knife. I do baton every now and then, but the last couple of times Ive been out and I had to process fireword, I did it with my small axe with a 20 inch handle and a small folding saw. I didn't bother with a fixed blade, I just took a folder with me and it was only used to gather birch bark and cut open the hotdog packaging, hah. All of this probably weighs just a little more than one of those monster jack-of-all trades blades.
+Dan Schwemin Jr that depends on the width of the blade and the grind. if it's ground out of a quarter inch thick steel plate, but it's a full flat grind or even a slight hollow grind then it's going to be a lot better suited for multiple tasks than this was. I literally own two woodcutting axes with a thinner edge geometry than this knife. I use both of them to split the larger logs down because one of them is too short, and the other, while having a hammer, is a dedicated chopper that wouldn't split anywhere near as well as this knife could, even right now.
OH SH*T, that thing broke like a match stick haha. I've heard from a couple people who broke the tip off of theirs and another person who said theirs broke just like yours, you're the first one to get it on video though. I have one of these knives, I'm glad mine didn't break, I'm guessing Ka-bar's heat treatment is a real crap shoot!
lol - as soon as i saw the knife i thought - there's a break point / weak spot just in front of the handle. imagine this in cold weather - it would of broke earlier. cant believe it - i knew ka-bar done a cheap made run of zombie knives around the $60 mark but at this price range there is no excuse. lets hop the customer service is sweet. well done cheap ass survival knife too :) awesome test
+Fenrir Lokisson I was thinking the same thing, but a clean break like that is telling me they did not heat treat properly. I am guessing this is a new knife design and have not ironed out the heat treatment for 1/4" thick blade.
+funkyprepper The Cheap zombie line was only 60 when they were being produced in Taiwan. after that they were being produced in America for around 150.
I'm one of those anti batoning freaks, but, I get the durability testing. I don't think what you did was abused by any means. Bad tempering/heat-treat I'm guessing. I'm sure if you get another it would hold up just fine. Beautiful reaction my man, it was awesome.
Gottcha, nah I didn't have a problem with my knife,I got me a puukko knife for bushcraft ,I know what it can handle but I still will get a hatchet or the skrama from Finland as a chopper blade,an or use my puukko or mora for food prep.
@@cbr600rrturbo,bro I totally get an understand you the way you test your knives, an plus your funny as shit brother tac,love the channel, I got a big blade you might like tac,it's the 240 skrama from Finland as a chopper blade, it's 80crv2 carbon steel, full tang construction, runs about 96.00 with the leather sheath, roughly 62 to 65.00 without, 9.00 shipping depending on where you live, it's one bad blade tac,an I know how you like big blades, thanks again for the video.
Maybe they drilled out the coil after heat treatment was already finished. Sometimes, a tiny soft spot is all it takes to hit to crush a large hard thing. Just like with a coconut ;D Well, be sure to contact KA-BAR to send you a new blade and then, test it again ! I so wanna know whether this was just one knife witch didn't turn out alright or if all of them are like this.
But Ka Bar replaced it within 2 weeks - pretty quick considering I live in Asia. Anyway, it broke when I (tried to) batoned through a piece of PINE! I committed to the Potbelly after watching numerous reviews. Needless to say, I was thorough disappointed. And to make matters worse, it happened in the midst of a friction fire class, after I had told my students the importance of a good knife. Haha! Everyone demanded that I disclose the brand so that they can avoid making the same mistake. Cheers.
Well, could have been a bad heat treat, but if I was designing that knife, the relief radius (choil) would be a minimum of 2X larger. I'm sure you'll follow up with results of your contact with Kabar. I'm real interested in their response. Good one, Tactical.
Holy. Fucking. Shit. That was both epic and distressing....your reaction was the best part haha. Weak spot for sure...could be a complete aberration, or maybe the way they're making that little choil is messing with all of them?? Time to get a few more from them and see....nice work Tac Man.
Thanks for posting this Tac! I was looking at ordering one of these this past weekend, but got sidetracked and never got to do it. You saved me some money!
I used to have that knife, pre-PM101. Never batoned with it, but it chopped like a demon on meth. I just can't take that handle. Still can't believe it snapped like that. That's the risk you take with mass produced knives. I really don't believe it's a design thing...Probably just a bad heat treat. You gotta individually thrash your knives before trusting them. All production knives have documented breaks. That's the first broken potbelly I've seen.
I uncovered the fatal flaw by sheer chance, which was sub-freezing temperatures. That got then to switch to a tougher fiberglass reinforced material. I did one extremely hard use test in the summer, then one more when it got to the same temps that broke the earlier version. The steel might be 3cr, but that seems fine in this case. What's nice is the convex grind and the ULU shaped edge. If you have an abrasive belt sharpening system, you can get them ungodly sharp very easily. The SCAXE2 can do a lot of other bushcraft stuff. The 2L can easily split wood. They both perform way outside what you'd expect. Two of my all time favorite Schrade products.
This is what happens when people come up with ridiculous blade designs! This knife is so out of proportion! Around the finger choil the blade is way too narrow regardless of how tick it is! I doubt it is the heat treat that caused it to fail! Kabar has increasingly been neglecting their quality control! Almost every knife I have got from them is not straight and is bent! Their flat grind bevels are in some cases over a quarter of an inch higher on one side and so when they heat treat the blade it tends to bend! Thank you Tac for the amazing videos bro!
+TheSuperDerp yeah, but at least if it'd snapped at a different angle he could have ground it into a smaller utility knife. (I've done this with knives that snapped before)
A full quarter inch thick piece of...Pot Metal with a pot belly. The named it wrong. I have the same M Tech knife by the way. It was $8.56 including shipping. I agree. These sub-nine dollar knives are great. The MT-151 is also terrific.
This is a very good reason why you test the tools you'll need in an emergency. Condor knife would've kicked that particular Kabar in the nut sack. Too bad for Kabar, hope they address the issues for their sake.
Thanks for the video. From my observations it appears like a design flaw. Starting with the steel IMHO Cro-Van steel is harder than plain 1095 but more brittle and more susceptible to shock failure. If you add the possibility that the steel was not well tempered this will add to the knife's brittleness. The knife did well up until batoning broke it. Design-wise, if you pay close attention to the final strike, it occurs in-front of the handle where handle and blade narrow right above its notch. The edge held-up well but the knife as a whole appears to be too hard, brittle and does not resist shock well. If you listen to the sound the two broken pieces make when they came into contact, it's very high pitched; similar to the sound two chrome wrenches would make if they where struck together.
If you think about it, that's the weakest point from tip to butt. Makes sense that it would break there, even with such a decent quality steel. Thinnest part, right in the middle. You've got two points of pressure on either end and it quite simply was the weakest spot in between two impact/pressure points.
Wow brother tactical, wow... I had that knife on the short list, now it goes into the do-not-buy bin. What a bummer, at 65$ or so on Amazon the stats on it looked good, I was going to get one. Thanks for helping myself make an informed decision.
This is not good for KaBar...That would not be good to spend the $$$$ on a beefy knife and then go out and have it fail when it was not that stressed...
wow never expected that even with the video title and here I have been thinking of buying one of these knives for a while bad temper on that knife way too brittle I guess we will see how the replacement holds up - cheers bro
+guncotton 1 was kinda expecting the handle scales to crack off during batoning or something. I've had that happen a couple of times. something that would be a deal breaker, but that would at least leave a fixer upper functional.
A heat treatment issue for sure, look at the crystallization at the fracture. Then again, could have to do with modern production methods. Not forging a blade, just cutting them out of sheet steel and grinding to shape. A major concern with modern manufacturing of knives and other steel products.
that little cutout where it broke is unnecessary especially considering it doesn't come with a fire rod to use plus you can use the the top of the blade to do that with
I could see from the grain that steel wasn’t tempered or annealed properly. When good steel shears like that, it shouldn’t look like cast iron. It’s most likely made from recycled steel. Not virgin steel. When rolled, recycled steel forms pressure cracks on the outside. If you don’t grind these micro fractures away, they will cause a failure later.
I believe that the first version of this knife was flat grind and very rugged and at some point Ka-bar started making them hollow grind and they had some quality control issues. I know with the newer versions it's more of a flat grind and I was told they had taken care of the heat treatment problems. If you use images you can see the 3 versions, this one being the one with a sharp heel on the blade which I think is the second Ka-Bar version with problems.
I leave my HD outdoor work to my Ontraio Raider bowie... I have a couple Ka-Bar products, but it seems in the past few years their knives haven't been holding up all too well and snapping at the guards and shit.. Couple of friends swore by them, but now they question Ka-Bar. Seems like the high chrome content of the Crovan makes it a bit brittle for any major abuse..
Every now and then we purchase a lemon, one in a million fails. I don't own the Potbelly, but I have thought about purchasing one, I'm sure Ka-bar will be amazed at the failure and send you a brand spanking new one.. One thing I did notice though, it broke at the thinnest and obviously weakest point... I hope you'll pursue this and test another one for us, I'm curious with the outcome.. As always thank you for sharing your thoughts and experience on this broken down blade, I appreciate it sir Tac.
Your $9 survival knife is thinner. I own the potbelly - but i have a rule. When you strike a knife you are indeed putting microscopic fractures into it. If you insist on using knives like axes, you are going to have this problem until you find the $9 knife specifically built for batoning. Cool test though, i do know why it broke where it did. As you can see the the belly of the knife reaches a decent 1.75 inches, but near the hilt where yours broke it's only an inch. I bought this knife because it was the exact length from my elbow, to my clenched fist. It feels like an extra spider joint. I call it Tarsus. Just a few weeks ago, i wrapped paracord where yours broke, which gave me jimping. Wrapped the crappy handles with tape and she's a fighter. Not a beater for chopping trees. If it doesn't cut an arm completely off, it'll get pretty deep, and at least break...well...everything. Sorry about your 66 Bux though! Shi**y!
You know what would be interesting? Take a fine file, which would be around 62-67 HRC hardness, and when a knife fails like try to file material at different points on the blade. It would give you a good indication of the hardness. For instance, with 1095, which is a good tough Steel at 56-59 HRC, the file should bite into it a bit. If it does not, then the tempering of the steel is too low. In that case the file would just skim across the material barely taking metal off as 1095 can get up to 62-64 HRC. I think it would give you a bit more information as to what the flock is going on.
The heat treat seems fine due to the fine grain structure. It also broke at the the choil (stress part). The video proves any cut out, holes, big jimping or choil near the transition part between the handle and the blade is a bad design.
Nice vid brother. And as Chris says beneath, soon the "anti-batoning" horde will sweep over this vid, as they have on some of our vids. But i recon this is the heat treating, not 1/4 inch steel should break after these tests. Stay true and honest brother! Snake
Even if it hadn't broke I would never buy one. The design and price turned me off. I do have a BK-7 that I love though. I wouldn't hesitate to buy another Kabar product because all knife companies let a bad one get out every now and again. The Buck Hoodlum is a prime example. Even some semi custom makers have a bad one occasionally. Great video as usual Tac!
I have an idea I have done : it is possible that the cutting geometry has greatly amplified the lever on impact. you know those cradles to lift the bikes ? or pianos ? with little strength you get a lot of leverage .
Wow! People wonder why I dont trust KaBar. They do have some good blades but it always seems like its a hit or a miss, important to test them out. For a $150, I would of got a Tops Longhorn Bowie. People say Tops is overpriced, well I've never seen a Tops break like that either. Good video Tac, I wonder what KaBar will say, especially for that price point, you'd think the Q/C would be better as far as all aspects of producing that knife.
Wow that is pretty crazy. The fact that it broke in an non-impact area tells me it broke from shock. Likely this means that the steel was still stressed in heat treat, in other words it may not have been annealed properly. Also I noticed it had 90 degree edges, around the relief where it snapped, not sure how big of a factor this is, but I have heard rounding corners is supposedly better; for stress cracks more easily form in those right angle corners, where as a rounded corner distributes the shock more uniformly. Once again, don't know how true that is, but I do notice most higher end choppers tend to have rounded off corners, but that could just be for ergonomics and atheistic reasons.
As soon as I saw that fuckin cut out I thought I bet the test fail will snap at the hilt end...and yep..I was right! Why the fuck does a well established knife company who have been making blades for a million years put a fuckin cut out weak spot in the blade for????? Good test Tac, you're the man.
dude....ka bar is slipping down to condor standards when it comes to heat treat, i spent $60 on a usmc, and broke it in under a week, i have a Ontario sp1, and rat7 and i beat the snot outta them on a regular basis and never had a prob, i did end up getting another usmc, but it just hangs on my wall to look good, but 1/4 inch????!!!! im still in a little shock, the sp1 runs circles around the ka bar, take care tac!
This is why you test your equipment before you have to rely on it! Not just the model of knife you want to use, but the same knife you are taking with you!
hay let us all know what K-Bar say when you contact them it would be nice to know if they will replace it or give it the big one and plead over abuse or some crap like that ye? let us know dude. ps good vid just shows you don't always get what ya pay for.
While i do baton smaller wood from time to time...i find batoning large wood unnecessary...froe's and axes use a lower carbon steel than most knives with a longer draw for the temper...1095 has a high carbon content and unless drawn back considerably is not a candidate for high impacts and stress....1055 would be a better choice...or a blade with a differential heat treat. Setting up hunting camps for clients is about the only time we process large amounts of fire wood and when splitting down rounds into woodstove size, we use splitting malls and wedges...as a matter of fact even a wooden wedge works well for batoning and only takes a few minutes to knock up. The truth is, each time you bind up a knife blade in a log and pound on it, forcing it through a knot (or several knots) your placing severe stress on that knife...and your doing damage to the steel, even though that damage is not always visible, its there. It may not break or bend right away, or even for some time...but sooner or later, the accumulative effects of the severe stresses imparted on the steel will eventually lead to a failure...this is not just my opinion...this is a fact. "Steel should always win over wood" is a myth...if that were true you would never need to sharpen a wood chisel, or any other steel blade used for cutting wood...right??? Like i said...i do on occasion do some light batoning myself....but i would not recommend using this technique on larger wood, especially if your knife is made from a steel with a high carbon content...or one that has a high rockwell tempering left on the steel.....Batoning is rarely needed anyways...i'll demonstrate this one day in a video...atb amigo...woods
My usmc batons fat logs and I'm surprised the rat tail hasn't snapped on it. Crazy to see that chunk of steel just snap with a little tap like that haha
Dammnnnn!!!! I have to know, did Kabar replace it for you?? I have been binge watching your vids bro and I have to say you are awesome. I love your reviews. I seen you came out with Tac unfiltered, so Now I have to sub that channel as well.
I have a ten dollar coleman that looks fairly similar (similar grind, similar shape, similar handle) but has the exact opposite issue. I tried batonning some tindersticks off of a pine log for starting the grill up because my mom keeps putting it too close to the leaky window in the mud room and it gets slightly damp and the blade has a nasty wave to it now. these days I just use it as a backscratcher since it can't hold an edge very well either. (bad enough that the edge has noticeably deteriorated even though I've only used it on my back. my skin is literally harder than the shitty stainless steel they used)
That really needs to go back to Kabar to see why it failed. Bad heat treat or damaged steel when they plasma cut the blank? That cheap hard use knife keeps looking better and better. I don't feel so bad about some of the cheap stuff I have in my small collection now.
I am no pro (I'm kidding I'm super knowledgeable on this) But That break looked too curved for comfort. I think the temper might have been questionable on the blade. Then again that's why we have axes
That sucks man. From what a few marines have told me they have had problems with their Kabars too (I know not the same knife) but I kinda just thought that that's just marines being marines (ie. breaking shit). I hope Kabar does well by you on this one.
my kabar pestilence chopper broke dong some normal semi lightish chopping. broke on the edge about two inch up from the handle about 4 inches, broke a sliver half the blade wide out
Wow, Say Heah Tac't, After watching We All Juggle Knives, I bought the Potbelly and the Parangatang, Both cost me around $150.00 including shipping from Basically Knives, anyhow, I got mine at the end of summer especially giving my Rodent Rucki a rest as my Long Knife against the brambles, Your wood's prolly are similar to mine, I'm just west of you in The Buckeyes Country, Anyhow two failure's in two weeks grrrrrrrr, I can't take it, But with mine, I guess so far so good, And here I thought the Potbelly was next thing to white bread, I never would of believed it, Especially how easy it broke, as if it was staged, But I know you better. Heah Buddy, Thanx for sharing and again Happy Thanksgiving to you and the Ms.'s, , , Oh Yrah, I'll buy that Sheath, , ,
Yep. These things are junk. I had one and it couldn't even handle a bit of chopping back in 2016. Blade chipped on a direct chop ( no twisting to remove blade or anything). Emailed ka bar to tell them their knife isnt strong enough for the australian bush. No response. Another company which has been hollowed out and living off the brand.
Hey, Tac - I think that the actual review turned out to be on the backup knife :) What knife is the backup ? Looks like the Trailmaster - but at 9 bucks it definitely ain't
That sucked on a major level😳 I can't believe it broke. I guess it did the ka-bar SNAP! To bad I been wanting to get one for awhile. Probably not now. Time for an Esee 5.
What a let down! OMG, it was caught on video. I rewatched it so many times and still can't believe it. I wanted to like this knife. Now I'm gonna look for a different one. Come on Kabar!
Part II. Yes knives are not axes or chisels or saws or hammers but it is mutually accepted that we put them to all sorts of uses. A knife is a multi- tool, albeit it an unintended one but one all the same. So a reasonable bit of batoning should be acceptable and withstandable in a survival situation. Tac did not baton the hell out of it like a lunatic but did so in a controlled easy manner. The Kabar Potbelly failed where it should not have done, especially being a quarter inch thick of 1095 Cro Van. Shit design, not shit usage.
great vid / reaction. Also, it was kinda cool to see you and Skallagrim get together. I've been independently subscribing to both channels for year/years. Guess the moral to the vid story is Do Not Baton a Bear with this knife.
I'm no expert but I'm guessing maybe a hairline stress fracture was formed from the grinding process or heat treating and it got through quality control some how.
Update when you get a reply from Kabar please. Sorry this happened tactical, usually hear Kabars are good and .25" thick. I do not know why they have that curve right there. Looks stupid to me, but I could be wrong.
get rid of the finger choil and taper the tang into the blade a little more it would of lasted longer.. the weakness is the edge grind to the back of the choil
Could be a bad batch of steel. Happens some times, where the smelter puts too much or too little of one of the ores that are mixed to make the type of metal you want.
So glad I never bought this and went for the esee 6. I would like to see you punish one though as I've not put mine through its paces Yet. Love the vids Tac.
Wow! Broke 2 blades this past weekend my self tac! One snapped in half and one took a quarter sized chip from a very small piece of red oak. Shit happens i guess. Great funny vid as always! I'm sure it was a bad treat bro. Kabar will make good on it.
P.S. If you talk to KABAR remind them that a survival knives that break are not survival knives!
Whoa... what? That massive piece of steel just snapped like that? Damn... wouldn't have expected that, especially with 1095. Crappy heat treatment, I guess?
+Skallagrim my suspicion is that quality control realized it's supposed to have that little cutout at the base of the blade after the heat treatment, grinding, and sharpening and the guy he sent to fix it ground it in without doing anything to preserve the temper (likely because he or she normally does that before the blade's been ground at all so they're not used to worrying about it) this is why the edge closer to the base is more dull (the edge melted a bit on a microscopic level) and why it snapped like a twig right there at that angle. for that price they should always have a decent heat treatment, even with that much supposedly high quality steel.
+PsylomeAlpha
That sounds like quite a plausible explanation.
*****
I've noticed a concerning trend of companies not actually training their employees.
+PsylomeAlpha So they didn't temper it properly essentially?
*****
that's my suspicion. also, as some have mentioned elsewhere in this comments section, that little divot of a choil at the base of the blade just made the blade more likely to snap there, especially if the blade is getting some sort of rotary force applied to its edge like if someone were to be holding the handle firmly and batoning it through a bend in the grain of some wood for instance. without it it likely wouldn't have snapped.
Whoa!! That's like watching someone else go through my SCAXE2 moment.
I had Hope's for this knife. It turned me off to Kabar. No matter, you introduced me to Bark River, LT Wright, Lon Humphrey and others. Bought two Crusaders, Retribution, Jessmuk and others after watching your videos.
"UNLEASH THE ANTI-BATONING HORDE!!" (ducks for cover)
+PREPAREDMIND101 Anyone who says batoning doesn't have its place is simply ignorant. Ever heard of a froe or shingle axe? Same thing. Plenty of cases where batoning is advantages over using an axe. Splitting a knotted up piece of wood for anything but a test of the steel is just plain stupid and not something you would do in a typical situation.
***** I use small biostoves almost every day and for me an axe or hatchet is simply too much to carry daily for this task. i can easily process down the wood i need using a knife. Batoning has its place but maybe not for everyone.
+Dan Schwemin Jr Also, don't most axes have a lower HRC and steel that'll bend rather than break like the knife in the video? And the forces are concentrated in a completely different direction. When you baton, you usually hit near the tip of the blade, which means that there's a bit of leverage involved, which does put a lot more strain on any weak spot in the blade.
+Dan Schwemin Jr It;s really easy to see how batoning is something that can easily damage a knife. I do baton every now and then, but the last couple of times Ive been out and I had to process fireword, I did it with my small axe with a 20 inch handle and a small folding saw. I didn't bother with a fixed blade, I just took a folder with me and it was only used to gather birch bark and cut open the hotdog packaging, hah. All of this probably weighs just a little more than one of those monster jack-of-all trades blades.
+Dan Schwemin Jr that depends on the width of the blade and the grind. if it's ground out of a quarter inch thick steel plate, but it's a full flat grind or even a slight hollow grind then it's going to be a lot better suited for multiple tasks than this was. I literally own two woodcutting axes with a thinner edge geometry than this knife. I use both of them to split the larger logs down because one of them is too short, and the other, while having a hammer, is a dedicated chopper that wouldn't split anywhere near as well as this knife could, even right now.
OH SH*T, that thing broke like a match stick haha. I've heard from a couple people who broke the tip off of theirs and another person who said theirs broke just like yours, you're the first one to get it on video though. I have one of these knives, I'm glad mine didn't break, I'm guessing Ka-bar's heat treatment is a real crap shoot!
A little scary seeing this creeping into their 1095cv knives.
+PREPAREDMIND101 kabar better get this sorted out...shyte like this can sink a model quick!
lol I thought after you reviewed this thing it was indestructible
+WeAllJuggleKnives its funny seeing my two favorite knife guys watching each others vids
Its most likely not that steel and just that cut out on the blade. Not structurally safe just a bad design.
Daaaaaaamn!!! It looked like a tank, and exploded like one!
LMAO.
Ukrainian Javelins have entered the chat
lol - as soon as i saw the knife i thought - there's a break point / weak spot just in front of the handle.
imagine this in cold weather - it would of broke earlier.
cant believe it - i knew ka-bar done a cheap made run of zombie knives around the $60 mark but at this price range there is no excuse.
lets hop the customer service is sweet.
well done cheap ass survival knife too :)
awesome test
+funkyprepper I think the biggest problem is the steel,too much carbon for such a big knife
right! expensive isn't always better! I loved that $9 knife. I have a few knife vids if u wanna check them out :)
+Fenrir Lokisson I was thinking the same thing, but a clean break like that is telling me they did not heat treat properly. I am guessing this is a new knife design and have not ironed out the heat treatment for 1/4" thick blade.
+Jack Mehov It's been around for years. I had one 5 or 6 years ago.
+funkyprepper The Cheap zombie line was only 60 when they were being produced in Taiwan. after that they were being produced in America for around 150.
I'm one of those anti batoning freaks, but, I get the durability testing. I don't think what you did was abused by any means. Bad tempering/heat-treat I'm guessing. I'm sure if you get another it would hold up just fine. Beautiful reaction my man, it was awesome.
+ohjust1moreknife thanks man you get it, some people don't understand im doin this for them
Same here,bad heat treatment an there was a weak spot also, I just didn't like the handle shspe.
@Re nato ,yeah I agree.
Gottcha, nah I didn't have a problem with my knife,I got me a puukko knife for bushcraft ,I know what it can handle but I still will get a hatchet or the skrama from Finland as a chopper blade,an or use my puukko or mora for food prep.
@@cbr600rrturbo,bro I totally get an understand you the way you test your knives, an plus your funny as shit brother tac,love the channel, I got a big blade you might like tac,it's the 240 skrama from Finland as a chopper blade, it's 80crv2 carbon steel, full tang construction, runs about 96.00 with the leather sheath, roughly 62 to 65.00 without, 9.00 shipping depending on where you live, it's one bad blade tac,an I know how you like big blades, thanks again for the video.
Maybe they drilled out the coil after heat treatment was already finished. Sometimes, a tiny soft spot is all it takes to hit to crush a large hard thing. Just like with a coconut ;D
Well, be sure to contact KA-BAR to send you a new blade and then, test it again ! I so wanna know whether this was just one knife witch didn't turn out alright or if all of them are like this.
But Ka Bar replaced it within 2 weeks - pretty quick considering I live in Asia. Anyway, it broke when I (tried to) batoned through a piece of PINE! I committed to the Potbelly after watching numerous reviews. Needless to say, I was thorough disappointed. And to make matters worse, it happened in the midst of a friction fire class, after I had told my students the importance of a good knife. Haha! Everyone demanded that I disclose the brand so that they can avoid making the same mistake. Cheers.
Well, could have been a bad heat treat, but if I was designing that knife, the relief radius (choil) would be a minimum of 2X larger. I'm sure you'll follow up with results of your contact with Kabar. I'm real interested in their response. Good one, Tactical.
Was not expecting that brother. Has to be because a flaw in the blade itself. Wow!
Holy. Fucking. Shit. That was both epic and distressing....your reaction was the best part haha. Weak spot for sure...could be a complete aberration, or maybe the way they're making that little choil is messing with all of them?? Time to get a few more from them and see....nice work Tac Man.
+EveryDay Knife Guy - GIVEAWAY OPEN thanks man!
Thanks for posting this Tac! I was looking at ordering one of these this past weekend, but got sidetracked and never got to do it. You saved me some money!
People often say "The knife isn't made for that" but honestly there's no excuse for this failure..
I used to have that knife, pre-PM101. Never batoned with it, but it chopped like a demon on meth. I just can't take that handle. Still can't believe it snapped like that.
That's the risk you take with mass produced knives. I really don't believe it's a design thing...Probably just a bad heat treat. You gotta individually thrash your knives before trusting them. All production knives have documented breaks. That's the first broken potbelly I've seen.
+John Sun Sorry....Wasn't a Fiskars X7 after all.... ;)
Just out of curiosity...Have you ever tried the Schrade SCAXE2 or 2L?
I uncovered the fatal flaw by sheer chance, which was sub-freezing temperatures. That got then to switch to a tougher fiberglass reinforced material. I did one extremely hard use test in the summer, then one more when it got to the same temps that broke the earlier version. The steel might be 3cr, but that seems fine in this case. What's nice is the convex grind and the ULU shaped edge. If you have an abrasive belt sharpening system, you can get them ungodly sharp very easily. The SCAXE2 can do a lot of other bushcraft stuff. The 2L can easily split wood. They both perform way outside what you'd expect. Two of my all time favorite Schrade products.
This is what happens when people come up with ridiculous blade designs! This knife is so out of proportion! Around the finger choil the blade is way too narrow regardless of how tick it is! I doubt it is the heat treat that caused it to fail! Kabar has increasingly been neglecting their quality control! Almost every knife I have got from them is not straight and is bent! Their flat grind bevels are in some cases over a quarter of an inch higher on one side and so when they heat treat the blade it tends to bend! Thank you Tac for the amazing videos bro!
Wow. I don't think anyone expected that. I'd be interested to hear what KaBar says. Mistakes can happen I guess. Great video as usual buddy.
On the plus side, that looked like a clean and easy break. Much nicer than a bunch of flying metal shards, or a big jagged crack.
+TheSuperDerp yeah, but at least if it'd snapped at a different angle he could have ground it into a smaller utility knife. (I've done this with knives that snapped before)
A full quarter inch thick piece of...Pot Metal with a pot belly. The named it wrong. I have the same M Tech knife by the way. It was $8.56 including shipping. I agree. These sub-nine dollar knives are great. The MT-151 is also terrific.
I've got your Mtech knife and really like it. It shined in all your videos of it
This is a very good reason why you test the tools you'll need in an emergency. Condor knife would've kicked that particular Kabar in the nut sack. Too bad for Kabar, hope they address the issues for their sake.
Thanks for the video. From my observations it appears like a design flaw. Starting with the steel IMHO Cro-Van steel is harder than plain 1095 but more brittle and more susceptible to shock failure. If you add the possibility that the steel was not well tempered this will add to the knife's brittleness. The knife did well up until batoning broke it. Design-wise, if you pay close attention to the final strike, it occurs in-front of the handle where handle and blade narrow right above its notch. The edge held-up well but the
knife as a whole appears to be too hard, brittle and does not resist shock well. If you listen to the sound the two broken pieces make when they came into contact, it's very high pitched; similar to the sound two chrome wrenches would make if they where struck together.
If you think about it, that's the weakest point from tip to butt. Makes sense that it would break there, even with such a decent quality steel. Thinnest part, right in the middle. You've got two points of pressure on either end and it quite simply was the weakest spot in between two impact/pressure points.
Wow brother tactical, wow... I had that knife on the short list, now it goes into the do-not-buy bin. What a bummer, at 65$ or so on Amazon the stats on it looked good, I was going to get one. Thanks for helping myself make an informed decision.
This is not good for KaBar...That would not be good to spend the $$$$ on a beefy knife and then go out and have it fail when it was not that stressed...
wow never expected that even with the video title and here I have been thinking of buying one of these knives for a while bad temper on that knife way too brittle I guess we will see how the replacement holds up - cheers bro
+guncotton 1 was kinda expecting the handle scales to crack off during batoning or something. I've had that happen a couple of times. something that would be a deal breaker, but that would at least leave a fixer upper functional.
A heat treatment issue for sure, look at the crystallization at the fracture. Then again, could have to do with modern production methods. Not forging a blade, just cutting them out of sheet steel and grinding to shape. A major concern with modern manufacturing of knives and other steel products.
I think they blew it with the tempering process. It almost shattered. Way too brittle. Thanks Tac! That's Why You Test Them!
that little cutout where it broke is unnecessary especially considering it doesn't come with a fire rod to use plus you can use the the top of the blade to do that with
Lmao. Choils aren’t for ferro rods, they’re for sharpening. You should learn more about knives before commenting on design aspects.
I could see from the grain that steel wasn’t tempered or annealed properly. When good steel shears like that, it shouldn’t look like cast iron. It’s most likely made from recycled steel. Not virgin steel. When rolled, recycled steel forms pressure cracks on the outside. If you don’t grind these micro fractures away, they will cause a failure later.
Well there goes that whole full tang myth. Bet a mora pathfinder wouldn't break. Good vid man
Thanks for the review almost bought one
I believe that the first version of this knife was flat grind and very rugged and at some point Ka-bar started making them hollow grind and they had some quality control issues. I know with the newer versions it's more of a flat grind and I was told they had taken care of the heat treatment problems. If you use images you can see the 3 versions, this one being the one with a sharp heel on the blade which I think is the second Ka-Bar version with problems.
I leave my HD outdoor work to my Ontraio Raider bowie... I have a couple Ka-Bar products, but it seems in the past few years their knives haven't been holding up all too well and snapping at the guards and shit.. Couple of friends swore by them, but now they question Ka-Bar. Seems like the high chrome content of the Crovan makes it a bit brittle for any major abuse..
Man, I've been wanting this knife for about a year, I'll guess I'll keep my poopy mtech trailmaster knock off
Every now and then we purchase a lemon, one in a million fails. I don't own the Potbelly, but I have thought about purchasing one, I'm sure Ka-bar will be amazed at the failure and send you a brand spanking new one.. One thing I did notice though, it broke at the thinnest and obviously weakest point... I hope you'll pursue this and test another one for us, I'm curious with the outcome.. As always thank you for sharing your thoughts and experience on this broken down blade, I appreciate it sir Tac.
Your $9 survival knife is thinner. I own the potbelly - but i have a rule. When you strike a knife you are indeed putting microscopic fractures into it. If you insist on using knives like axes, you are going to have this problem until you find the $9 knife specifically built for batoning. Cool test though, i do know why it broke where it did. As you can see the the belly of the knife reaches a decent 1.75 inches, but near the hilt where yours broke it's only an inch. I bought this knife because it was the exact length from my elbow, to my clenched fist. It feels like an extra spider joint. I call it Tarsus. Just a few weeks ago, i wrapped paracord where yours broke, which gave me jimping. Wrapped the crappy handles with tape and she's a fighter. Not a beater for chopping trees. If it doesn't cut an arm completely off, it'll get pretty deep, and at least break...well...everything. Sorry about your 66 Bux though! Shi**y!
You know what would be interesting? Take a fine file, which would be around 62-67 HRC hardness, and when a knife fails like try to file material at different points on the blade. It would give you a good indication of the hardness. For instance, with 1095, which is a good tough Steel at 56-59 HRC, the file should bite into it a bit. If it does not, then the tempering of the steel is too low. In that case the file would just skim across the material barely taking metal off as 1095 can get up to 62-64 HRC. I think it would give you a bit more information as to what the flock is going on.
The heat treat seems fine due to the fine grain structure. It also broke at the the choil (stress part). The video proves any cut out, holes, big jimping or choil near the transition part between the handle and the blade is a bad design.
Great morals here! Money does not talk when it comes to knifes! Great vids Tactical!!!
Nice vid brother. And as Chris says beneath, soon the "anti-batoning" horde will sweep over this vid, as they have on some of our vids.
But i recon this is the heat treating, not 1/4 inch steel should break after these tests.
Stay true and honest brother!
Snake
I wonder if heat treatment was even done right on this knife, I did want to buy one but not now, Great video. thanks
Even if it hadn't broke I would never buy one. The design and price turned me off. I do have a BK-7 that I love though. I wouldn't hesitate to buy another Kabar product because all knife companies let a bad one get out every now and again. The Buck Hoodlum is a prime example. Even some semi custom makers have a bad one occasionally. Great video as usual Tac!
Great video thanks. They need to change the name to pot metal not pot belly. Broke like cast metal. Maybe it was a bad batch.
I have an idea I have done : it is possible that the cutting geometry has greatly amplified the lever on impact. you know those cradles to lift the bikes ? or pianos ? with little strength you get a lot of leverage .
"I just brooooke iiit! 😢😢😢"
Simply awesome reaction Man!
Wow! People wonder why I dont trust KaBar. They do have some good blades but it always seems like its a hit or a miss, important to test them out. For a $150, I would of got a Tops Longhorn Bowie. People say Tops is overpriced, well I've never seen a Tops break like that either. Good video Tac, I wonder what KaBar will say, especially for that price point, you'd think the Q/C would be better as far as all aspects of producing that knife.
Wow that is pretty crazy. The fact that it broke in an non-impact area tells me it broke from shock. Likely this means that the steel was still stressed in heat treat, in other words it may not have been annealed properly.
Also I noticed it had 90 degree edges, around the relief where it snapped, not sure how big of a factor this is, but I have heard rounding corners is supposedly better; for stress cracks more easily form in those right angle corners, where as a rounded corner distributes the shock more uniformly. Once again, don't know how true that is, but I do notice most higher end choppers tend to have rounded off corners, but that could just be for ergonomics and atheistic reasons.
As soon as I saw that fuckin cut out I thought I bet the test fail will snap at the hilt end...and yep..I was right! Why the fuck does a well established knife company who have been making blades for a million years put a fuckin cut out weak spot in the blade for????? Good test Tac, you're the man.
dude....ka bar is slipping down to condor standards when it comes to heat treat, i spent $60 on a usmc, and broke it in under a week, i have a Ontario sp1, and rat7 and i beat the snot outta them on a regular basis and never had a prob, i did end up getting another usmc, but it just hangs on my wall to look good, but 1/4 inch????!!!! im still in a little shock, the sp1 runs circles around the ka bar, take care tac!
hell yea Tac .... i love seeing that kabar snap ... fricking killer!!!!!!!!
They have redesigned them. I have a newer one. It still has the notch but it is quite a bit different.
This is why you test your equipment before you have to rely on it! Not just the model of knife you want to use, but the same knife you are taking with you!
Thats like the Pace picante commercial when you mention New York
hay let us all know what K-Bar say when you contact them it would be nice to know if they will replace it or give it the big one and plead over abuse or some crap like that ye? let us know dude.
ps good vid just shows you don't always get what ya pay for.
Yup, that broke EXACTLY where I thought it would. It will be interesting to hear what KaBar says.
While i do baton smaller wood from time to time...i find batoning large wood unnecessary...froe's and axes use a lower carbon steel than most knives with a longer draw for the temper...1095 has a high carbon content and unless drawn back considerably is not a candidate for high impacts and stress....1055 would be a better choice...or a blade with a differential heat treat.
Setting up hunting camps for clients is about the only time we process large amounts of fire wood and when splitting down rounds into woodstove size, we use splitting malls and wedges...as a matter of fact even a wooden wedge works well for batoning and only takes a few minutes to knock up.
The truth is, each time you bind up a knife blade in a log and pound on it, forcing it through a knot (or several knots) your placing severe stress on that knife...and your doing damage to the steel, even though that damage is not always visible, its there.
It may not break or bend right away, or even for some time...but sooner or later, the accumulative effects of the severe stresses imparted on the steel will eventually lead to a failure...this is not just my opinion...this is a fact.
"Steel should always win over wood" is a myth...if that were true you would never need to sharpen a wood chisel, or any other steel blade used for cutting wood...right???
Like i said...i do on occasion do some light batoning myself....but i would not recommend using this technique on larger wood, especially if your knife is made from a steel with a high carbon content...or one that has a high rockwell tempering left on the steel.....Batoning is rarely needed anyways...i'll demonstrate this one day in a video...atb amigo...woods
Baaad heat treat. Thanks for showing the truth.
My usmc batons fat logs and I'm surprised the rat tail hasn't snapped on it. Crazy to see that chunk of steel just snap with a little tap like that haha
Dammnnnn!!!! I have to know, did Kabar replace it for you?? I have been binge watching your vids bro and I have to say you are awesome. I love your reviews. I seen you came out with Tac unfiltered, so Now I have to sub that channel as well.
I have a ten dollar coleman that looks fairly similar (similar grind, similar shape, similar handle) but has the exact opposite issue. I tried batonning some tindersticks off of a pine log for starting the grill up because my mom keeps putting it too close to the leaky window in the mud room and it gets slightly damp and the blade has a nasty wave to it now. these days I just use it as a backscratcher since it can't hold an edge very well either. (bad enough that the edge has noticeably deteriorated even though I've only used it on my back. my skin is literally harder than the shitty stainless steel they used)
Man that sucks ! I thought maybe the tip would have broke before it would have broke at the handle !!!
Sure hope it was just a bad heat treat with your knife. I just ordered one,it’ll be in next week.
U did goodjob!!!
That really needs to go back to Kabar to see why it failed. Bad heat treat or damaged steel when they plasma cut the blank? That cheap hard use knife keeps looking better and better. I don't feel so bad about some of the cheap stuff I have in my small collection now.
I am no pro (I'm kidding I'm super knowledgeable on this)
But
That break looked too curved for comfort.
I think the temper might have been questionable on the blade.
Then again
that's why we have axes
OMG!!!!!! What have You done to it!?!?!?! Such a lovely knife!!!! ;) I've got one of these, and now I am afraid to use it :D
+Thomas “GreedyBiologist” Willows Look into Ka-Bar's warranty service. If you got a bad one I'm sure they'd take care of you
wow great vid tac didn't believe what i saw
Hey tack, I just came over from Chris's Chanel (pm101) and I gotta say love your vids. My question is, what is the $9 piece of poo ?
thanks man! bud k night ranger
"there ya go. $9."
cracked me up!
That sucks man. From what a few marines have told me they have had problems with their Kabars too (I know not the same knife) but I kinda just thought that that's just marines being marines (ie. breaking shit). I hope Kabar does well by you on this one.
Oh man.. that price...for that quality. Thanks for saving our wallet with yours Tac.
When you look at it and think about it, it is a pretty good spot for all the stress to go.
my kabar pestilence chopper broke dong some normal semi lightish chopping. broke on the edge about two inch up from the handle about 4 inches, broke a sliver half the blade wide out
Wow, Say Heah Tac't, After watching We All Juggle Knives, I bought the Potbelly and the Parangatang, Both cost me around $150.00 including shipping from Basically Knives, anyhow, I got mine at the end of summer especially giving my Rodent Rucki a rest as my Long Knife against the brambles, Your wood's prolly are similar to mine, I'm just west of you in The Buckeyes Country, Anyhow two failure's in two weeks grrrrrrrr, I can't take it, But with mine, I guess so far so good, And here I thought the Potbelly was next thing to white bread, I never would of believed it, Especially how easy it broke, as if it was staged, But I know you better. Heah Buddy, Thanx for sharing and again Happy Thanksgiving to you and the Ms.'s, , , Oh Yrah, I'll buy that Sheath, , ,
Yep. These things are junk. I had one and it couldn't even handle a bit of chopping back in 2016. Blade chipped on a direct chop ( no twisting to remove blade or anything). Emailed ka bar to tell them their knife isnt strong enough for the australian bush. No response. Another company which has been hollowed out and living off the brand.
Hey, Tac - I think that the actual review turned out to be on the backup knife :) What knife is the backup ? Looks like the Trailmaster - but at 9 bucks it definitely ain't
That sucked on a major level😳 I can't believe it broke. I guess it did the ka-bar SNAP!
To bad I been wanting to get one for awhile. Probably not now. Time for an Esee 5.
What a let down! OMG, it was caught on video. I rewatched it so many times and still can't believe it. I wanted to like this knife. Now I'm gonna look for a different one. Come on Kabar!
Part II. Yes knives are not axes or chisels or saws or hammers but it is mutually accepted that we put them to all sorts of uses. A knife is a multi- tool, albeit it an unintended one but one all the same. So a reasonable bit of batoning should be acceptable and withstandable in a survival situation. Tac did not baton the hell out of it like a lunatic but did so in a controlled easy manner. The Kabar Potbelly failed where it should not have done, especially being a quarter inch thick of 1095 Cro Van. Shit design, not shit usage.
I'm not a big k-bar fan but I gotta say that looked like a defective knife to me. keep up the awesome videos Playboy !
Requesting a video on the different grinds for steels! Benefits and such of different grinds!
great vid / reaction.
Also, it was kinda cool to see you and Skallagrim get together. I've been independently subscribing to both channels for year/years.
Guess the moral to the vid story is Do Not Baton a Bear with this knife.
I'm no expert but I'm guessing maybe a hairline stress fracture was formed from the grinding process or heat treating and it got through quality control some how.
Update when you get a reply from Kabar please. Sorry this happened tactical, usually hear Kabars are good and .25" thick. I do not know why they have that curve right there. Looks stupid to me, but I could be wrong.
It was going so well!
get rid of the finger choil and taper the tang into the blade a little more it would of lasted longer.. the weakness is the edge grind to the back of the choil
@7:23-did your magazine fall out of your pistol? Good knife test, agree with everyone on the weak spot where the notch is.
Whoa, I just going to buy one of these! Thanks for the review man.
Could be a bad batch of steel. Happens some times, where the smelter puts too much or too little of one of the ores that are mixed to make the type of metal you want.
+Will hdg I think your right
It looks more like the steel was WAY to hard, that is probably why it broke at that weak point from shock.
So glad I never bought this and went for the esee 6. I would like to see you punish one though as I've not put mine through its paces Yet. Love the vids Tac.
I was expecting it to snap at the tip the whole video, but THIS!
This is why I'd never baton with a knife, unless its L6/Sawmill carbon steel otherwise never.
Bummeroo! BTW, what is the name of the cheap $9 knife? Keep the videos coming! Your channel rocks!
Q: Why must we baton with knives?
A: Because it's fun as hell. Yeehaw! I love it.
This is the fourth time I have seen a potbelly fail 3 times by batoning and then by chopping
Wow! Broke 2 blades this past weekend my self tac! One snapped in half and one took a quarter sized chip from a very small piece of red oak. Shit happens i guess. Great funny vid as always! I'm sure it was a bad treat bro. Kabar will make good on it.
Thank you for doing this test. was thinking about buying one. I'll look elsewhere
Dam I like that knife, yah phone k-bar lets us know what they say, I was gone on that knife, now I'm not sold. Good vid brother tac ommmm.lol