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Tom Brown Tracker - my way

Sld1959

Sld1959

Ronin
A while back a friend and I took a horse ride around the fences of a hunt club he belongs to and does maintenance on. We spent the night in a nice well equipped blind about halfway through and spent the night around the camp fire sipping and jawing. One of the topics was his interest in the movie The Hunted and the real star, the Tom Brown Tracker knife. He asked what I thought and other than being acquainted with it I had little practical knowledge. So he challenged me to make one.

After a lot of study and reading of the design and specs here is my version. It's close, minus the serrated or saw back section on the spine. I dislike saw backs, they can weaken a blade, and serrations on a knife which may be used for food prep simply add places for bacteria to grow. Also I added my special hollow pins to allow for the blade to be lashed to a pole, something I have done occasionally for many years, side note I happen to see it on knives like some Tops blades the past few years too.

The blade is forged and yes I left some hammer marks in it like he wanted. I am going to spend a couple days seeing how mine fulfilled the design specs. Here is a link for anyone interested, it's a pdf.


Here is the finished blade, the last knife I am doing all by hand. From now on its bench grinders and belt sanders in stead of files and sanding blocks. The top is the first hand forged one I actually made and kept instead of scrapping or giving away.

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Took it with me last night when I was removing a small garden fence to have a ramp put up at mom's. It chopped thru the rails and broke apart the latice with ease especially when I choked down for leverage as the design parameters specified. Pretty much worked as expected. This afternoon I have some work on a new blind will wring it out a bit more.
 
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Sld1959 said:
A while back a friend and I took a horse ride around the fences of a hunt club he belongs to and does maintenance on. We spent the night in a nice well equipped blind about halfway through and spent the night around the camp fire sipping and jawing. One of the topics was his interest in the movie The Hunted and the real star, the Tom Brown Tracker knife. He asked what I thought and other than being acquainted with it I had little practical knowledge. So he challenged me to make one.

After a lot of study and reading of the design and specs here is my version. It's close, minus the serrated or saw back section on the spine. I dislike saw backs, they can weaken a blade, and serrations on a knife which may be used for food prep simply add places for bacteria to grow. Also I added my special hollow pins to allow for the blade to be lashed to a pole, something I have done occasionally for many years, side note I happen to see it on knives like some Tops blades the past few years too.

The blade is forged and yes I left some hammer marks in it like he wanted. I am going to spend a couple days seeing how mine fulfilled the design specs. Here is a link for anyone interested, it's a pdf.


Here is the finished blade, the last knife I am doing all by hand. From now on its bench grinders and belt sanders in stead of files and sanding blocks. The top is the first hand forged one I actually made and kept instead of scrapping or giving away.

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Click to expand...
One of my all time favorite movies. Outstanding job on the knife.
 
Ok spent some time working with it making a blind in a downed pine tree and basically it worked as well as any knife of its size I have used. Obviously the utility one might find with the saw teeth is lacking.

Tested the most obviously different feature in what I will call the tillering notch. The separate section near the copper bolster of the knife. I am not positive about how other versions are ground in this section but on mine I put a wider bevel more akin to an ax than a razor. I will explain this selection more in depth later. The tillering notch worked very well when I quickly tillered the basic shape of a handmade bow. The notches sides kept the ad hoc draw knife in a straight line. Now I will say this here, EXTREME CAUTION MUST BE USED TO USE THIS AREA AS A DRAWKNIFE. You are pulling a sharp knife towards you with your hands on a sharp blade.

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Now this tillering notch may seem to be innovative however its at least 40 years old to my knowledge. In this knife I made about 40 years ago you will see the same section of blade. I "borrowed" the design of this blade many years ago from the late great Bob Egnath. He ground his tillering section with an ax grind which I have followed to this day. BTW the handle of this may look uncomfortable however it is really very comfortable for a left hander the crown curves perfectly for left handed use. I call it king of Texas because it came from a massive Texas whitetail antler.

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I tried lashing it to a pole using the hollow pins to make a pole arm. Worked just as expected. It also worked to cut a branch way up yonder. I would never use it as a throwing spear, never seen the sense in throwing what might be your most important tool. If you lost or broke it you could be in a world of hurt.

Overall it's a good knife. Don't see it as being a better or worse design than 100 others I have used of similar size. It works exactly as advertised, given you have the knowledge to use it making traps etc

One thing I will say, the handle is comfortable. It works the way it's designed, you can choke down comfortably to get a bit more chopping leverage. But... it limits the hold on the knife to basically a saber type grip, which could more or less problematic according how you need to use the blade.
 
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