I grow and harvest sugar cane and eucalyptus on my property. So all my blades get really used. All my life I used tramontina machetes and thought they were the best. Well before I went down there this last time I found my Collins & Co. Legitimus machete made in the 1940s that my father had given me a long time ago.

The Legitimus is by far the best mechete I have ever seen in person. It blew away all my tramontinas, and I have about 15 of them that we use to harvest the sugar cane with. I sharpened it one time when I got there and it stayed razor sharp till the day I left(3 years of daily use). I cut down trees with the thing almost everyday.

Since then I have been trying to find another one.

It never rusted just got a really nice black patina. My INFI blades never even thought about rusting. Even the ones I left in my closet for months on end. The leather sheaths turned green and grew about a inch of hair but the blades were pristine.

I think that is what tends to happen to blades that get used all the time in environments like that. I know I had a shotgun that had no bluing on the barrel. It would start to look a little reddish and I would hit it with a scotch brite pad and good to go. Later on sometime down the line I would see it agin, same thing, and just a VERY thin layer of oil on a different pad after removing the rust with the first one. The barrel actually got a sort of satin finish to it and finally got THAT patina and rust wasn't really a problem ever again.

You might get in the net and see if you can find a collins & co machete, get one and see what happens. Who knows, you may get lucky! Oh and I LOVE the taste of Cane when you just cut it and then chew on it. YUMMY!

When I was stationed in the Philippines and started living off base, our house was on the edge of a SEVERAL Hectar cane field and we got it all the time.

You know, you MIGHT want to check into a hand made machete. I have read several GOOD reviews about P.J. Tomes. Yeah they are pricy, but just one for yourself may not be all that bad if it would last you long enough.

My understanding is that the Bulldog is/was a Military Overrun, so it's not really custom, just not a civilian production model, but I could be wrong.




Dan said it was SR-101, I asked him at Blade. My guess would be the 56-58 Rc range. The SV LE is the only blade that Dan has released with a hardness of 62-64 Rc, that I know of.




My SR-101 LE's (and uncoated SR101) have done well as far as oxidation goes, but I usually wipe them down regularly with Marine grade Tuf-cloth.

Yeah fresh sugar cane is very good. We sold our cane to two different companies...one was for sugar and the other was for cachaca (brasillian tequila). The sugar company would always bring me several 5kilo bags of fresh brown sugar. I am a little biased but it is the best sugar I have ever had.

There is NOTHING (sugar wise) better than fresh made sugar, brown or white.

Thanks Jeff.

I got the idea of stripping it when I saw some pics of one at Nates website, that he stripped and polished. It was the regular regulator, and it looks like it might cut someone just looking at it.

I'm going to take a stab in the dark here. I gather that you are from the states and that you stay down in Brazil for lengthy periods of time. How long do you or can you stay without coming back to the states? Not Trying to be nosy, just curious as I THOUGHT that U.S. Citizens had to come back every so many years to maintain their citizenship if they lived overseas.

No worries Skunk. Yes I am from the states but I do have dual citizenship, once you buy property down there you are entitled to a permanent visa.

I try not to stay too long, a year or two at a time. As I cant go that long without a big cheeseburger and a Dr Pepper. Where my property is located it is predominantly german. So not the best food on earth. I end up missing Texas Bar-B-Que and Texmex cuisine.

When I was in the Philippines and the Aleutian Islands I craved Big Macs and Whoppers!

This is the first I've heard about them. I'm not a huge fan of the reverse-tanto shape, but it might grow on me in the future. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/2weeks.gif" alt="" />

Breeze, I'm not sure I understand what you mean by the "reverse tanto shape". It's just basically a Regulator with a different blade profile and reinforced tip.