Tennessee’s Fred Pearson has taken to the outdoor gear market with an interesting take on the trusty survival axe. The designer’s Kukrax aims to combine the best bits of a modern-day tactical tomahawk with the curvy nature of a kukri machete, offering a unique and seemingly highly efficient way to cut through your timber.
The Kukrax is intended as a civilian version of the Kukrax Fighting Axe Pearson showed off at an armaments show in in 2018. Both seek to combine the primary functions of a tomahawk or hatchet with the geometry of the kukri, a curved machete used by the Gurkhas of Nepal and India in the 19th century.
This unique melding of old weaponry and modern survival tools measures 15.75 inches (40 cm) in length and is made from full tang carbon steel, finished in black traction powder coating. The blade’s edge, meanwhile, measures six inches (15 cm) long.
The might of the Kukrax was put to the test by historical weapons expert Matt Easton over at his organization’s Youtube channel, where its wood-chopping abilities were compared to that of a regular axe. Easton was left “genuinely astonished” at how quickly the tool cut through the timber, with the curvy nature seeming to offer the perfect leverage, despite the Kukrax’s comparatively relatively short stature.
Pearson is offering two versions of the Kukrax through his website, with the 28-oz (800 g) Kukrax Tak Axe featuring a black canvas handle priced at US$250, and the lighter 26-oz (740 g) Kukrax Pak Axe with a walnut handle priced at $240.
Kukrax survival axe takes a tactical tomahawk and makes it curvy [New Atlas]