Razel Nax – CRKT: Wait What?
by StuartB
I won the Razel Nax from the Knife Magazine Weekly Open Thread (WOT) – a great weekly meme-fest/knife chat presented by Clay Aalders on the Knife Magazine website. A free blade, cool, sounds wonderful, but what had I won? I quickly checked the webs and found several reviews, including some YouTube videos with presentations and unboxings, clearly, the Nax certainly peaked people’s interest, yet, oddly, I managed to find only one review where the blade was actually tested and used. This seemed strange, given that the blade shape, size, weight and construction was such a departure from the norms, why did they not put it to the test, does it work? John Graham, the designer, describes the Nax as a blade that falls somewhere between a knife and a hatchet, while at the same time following his stylized Wharncliffe edge with an abrupt chisel point, similar to what is found on his smaller Razel knives. So, why not test it against hatchets and knives in real world testing?
I had joked in the WOT comment section that the blade shape and size looked perfect for chopping down my late season tomato plants here in the yard. I was semi-serious, as I couldn’t see from the description what else this blade could be suited for. It seems too short and light to really be a chopper at only 11” and 11.3oz, too short to baton much with a short 4.3” blade, the 1075 steel stock is 0.20” thick with a thick 20 deg leading edge and thicker/steeper chisel edge, so not really a slicer for camp kitchen chores. My wife thought, at first, that it was some weird form of bushcraft kitchen spatula, given its shape, until she picked it up and realized, disappointedly, that it was made of steel rather than silicone.
I will say that the Nax is an intriguing and attractive package. The overall aesthetic looks like some kind of steam punk object repurposed as a weapon by post-apocalypse survivors. The micarta handles looked very vintage and distressed; clearly, they had had quite a struggle fixing it to the tang given the unevenness and gaps to the edges, but the steel pins and cord barrels looked like they were doing a solid job of holding it all together. The blade finish is listed as ‘stone washed’, well ‘brick washed’ may have been more descriptive; the blackened 1075 looked pretty beaten up, perhaps ‘ruggedized’ would be more fitting. That said, it looked tough and ready for action, except the edge bevels looked as uneven as the handles and about as sharp. After some testing with the original edge, I reset the bevel to the same angle with a sharper and more consistent 20deg long edge and 25deg chisel end. The Nax has a well-made taco style kydex sheath with a snap buckle to help retention. The sheath does not have a belt loop, but the rivet holes could allow for some way to carry, like a Tek-lok style clasp, if required.
Bushcraft/camping aficionados generally suggest that the optimum load out for most camp tasks is a combination of an axe and a smaller fixed blade. Maybe a bigger knife might bridge both tools and span the different requirements between carving, fire making and food prep. The Nax seems to contest this and act as a single tool that covers the whole range.
In order to put the Nax to the test I picked the smaller 7” Gerber hatchet and a Mora Basic 511 to try out some comparative tasks in the back yard. In my tests even the smaller 7” hatchet over-powered the Nax on chopping and rough carving tasks (shaping a spoon blank), the Nax had neither the weight or leverage to make up for its lack of ‘oomph’.
The blade geometry made splitting or battoning a chore. The high flat grind seemed to bind into the wood rather than split it and the short abrupt tanto style blade made striking the blade tip impossible on wood thicker than 4 inches wide. For splitting, the longer handle of the Fiskars X7 made the comparison even more stark, the hatchet just had way more power and control.
For finer tasks like curls or cuts, the Skandi grind of the Mora had it beat hands down, not just for carving notching and feather sticks, but the Nax’s thin handle and rough spine made for hot spots and a fatigued wrist as the Nax wanted to constantly twist out of your grip and the thumb ramp was fairly sharp. The Nax failed to outshine a knife/hatchet combo in wood processing, so how did it fair in food prep?
In the kitchen, despite the high flat grind, the thick blade stock and thickness behind the edge did not lend itself to easy cutting or slicing. I tried several tasks, but most notably the tomatoes and apples really showed up the Nax’s lack of skills in the peeling and slicing department. The deep blade was too thick to get into the bottom of peanut butter or jam jars (a critical camp task!), and the Wharncliffe edge and textured blade face made spreading anything on toast more of a smear campaign when compared to a butter knife. Perhaps cutting a chicken carcass would have been a better test, but I didn’t have one to hand (Mrs. B is a pescatarian). Again, the Nax was bettered by the more appropriate tools.
Looking to see where it might excel, I took the Nax out for a week on Owens Valley to see how it worked during a week camping out of the Jeep. The best use I could find for it was splitting kindling for a fire. The wood I had was old construction roof batons with plenty of nails, that I really didn’t want to smack into with the softer steel of my hatchet. Using the front chisel edge and hammering on the pommel the Nax did a fair job at splitting and allowed the blade to be positioned precisely enough to avoid any nails. The micarta scales held up to the beating, but having the tang exposed at the pommel might help in the long run. However, for any tasks bigger than that it was so just much easier to just bust out an axe and go at it. It did work on cleaning small, pencil size branches from larger logs and I tried it on some work clearing light brush, but again the longer blade and speed of a machete would have been more useful and safer for either task.
I was running out of ideas to find a niche for the Nax. So, what about those old tomato plants? Back to the yard. Hardened stems, twisty stalks, leafy greens, chopped, cut or sliced the Nax aced it all. Could it be done as well with my garden knife (Mora Companion Stainless MG), sure, would be as much fun, not even close. Had I found the Nax’s calling? Maybe – you have to hand it to John Graham for making a tool that raises a smile.
The Nax seems to have some appeal as a ‘Jack of all trades’, but there is always a reason we have specialized tools for various tasks. If pushed, the Nax could do most things …. but just not as well. Would the Nax be a good swap for a hatchet and companion knife combo for a camp trip? Absolutely not, and for the weight saving I would take a larger fixed blade or add a folding pocket saw to the pack instead. How about replacing just the hatchet or just the knife, again no. Critically, would I pay $90 for the Nax, when I could use that money to buy a new knife or axe that would be better value and better suited to its task? Not really, and for that money I could buy the Fiskars X7, a Bahco Laplander saw and a Mora knife and still have money left over for candy for the car ride. I could not find anything that it did so much better that would justify me taking it camping other than for the novelty and enjoyment of playing with such a unique blade. Maybe that is its calling; it is kind of fun to bash around with and it’s certainly a good looking, well made ‘thing’. That may be enough for some, and I do feel that we should cheer for designs that try to push the boundaries, well done Graham and CRKT. The Nax is both novel and cool looking, and it may just be the one tool you need, especially if you are confronted with a yard full of aging tomato plants.