The BMC GOLOCK

Intro - Ian Lowsley and British Machete Co. My Background Growing up in West Sussex, exploring the woods and building tree houses with a knife in my pocket was, looking back, an idyllic childhood. It is a childhood shared by many boys before the 1990’s, but is now sadly out of bounds for many kids. Work took me to Asia where for over a decade I was heavily involved in production hand tool manufacturing and product development. I returned to the UK in 2020 wanting to promote British manufacturing and having found my garden a wild mess of hawthorn, blackthorn, hazel and holly, there was only one tool for the job. I began voraciously collecting machetes. Long, short, thick and thin. The long ones never quite seemed that long to me! I found decent length (over 25cm blade length) absolutely necessary for all of my land clearance tasks. My personal view is why not carry a blade that excels at high energy and detailed work alike? Why I started BMC As my machete collection grew, I immediately began to see certain features that would bother me and others that I would crave for in a blade. Grievances include: Sharp edges separating fingers in a handle? Blister maker! A handle butt that would not be rounded and would poke up into your palm? Awful for chopping! Extremely hard plastic scales with overly sculpted curves? Painful to hold! Hollow grind on a long machete? Ridiculous and completely unusable! And one big issue I have is the perceived necessity for a machete to be ‘cheap’. Cheap cost almost invariably means cheap quality. You’ll be getting a softer steel, a poorly designed or generic handle, poor fit and finish, a poor sheath and often all of these things combined. If I buy a hand tool, I want it to be well designed (to increase effectiveness and enjoyment when using), made of good materials (to last a long time) have good fit and finish (to do its job well and with confidence) and be fairly priced. This is the basis for BMC products. Our first blade was the completely UK made BMC Chopra Machete. A Parang / Cleaver blade; designed as a heavy-duty tree limber and camp blade. BMC Vanguard Golok Designed for the Outdoors The Vanguard Golok has been designed to meet the needs of modern explorers, game keepers, bushcrafters, and survivalists who demand a tool that’s tough, adaptable, and dependable in the field. This blade has been designed with both experienced outdoorsmen and novices in mind, making it easy to wield with an extremely comfortable grip and capable across a range of applications—from clearing brush, making camp to precision tasks like spear heads, hinges and pot holders. It comes with a custom 2mm Kydex sheath with shoulder sling strap and a belt D ring dangler set up. This keeps the blade by your side by free to swing out the way when kneeling down or traversing thick brush. It features an ‘out-the-back’ folded design to make drawing a breeze and minimal rivets to prevent premature failure. A drain channel keeps the moisture out. 3. Refining Classic Elements with New Techniques We took traditional elements of the Golok and combined them with modern materials and manufacturing techniques to improve durability, edge retention, and ergonomics. Grippy and impact resistant micarta handle scales have been 3D milled to offer a perfectly symmetrical grip which has a palm swell and rear swell to suit all grip styles. A generous fingerguard and thumb rise keep hands away from the cutting edge, and the extended unsharpened ricasso has been chamfered and redesigned from traditional styles to offer a more usable choked up grip closer to the cutting edge. The false edge spine (for weight saving) leads into a full thickness spine left unchamfered for fire lighting and scraping. The entire blade is distal tapered from 5mm down to 2.8mm at the tip. Strong where it’s required and lightened at the tip to help clearance and increase user endurance. 4. Craftsmanship and Quality BMC is dedicated to craftsmanship and quality control. The first Vanguard Golok prototypes underwent rigorous testing to ensure it can handle the typical usage expected of it – splitting, limbing, clearing, feathersticks, tip strength, batoning and more. We settled on D2 tool steel as a tried and tested steel with incredible toughness, wear resistance and solid edge retention characteristics perfect for a large blade. The steel is heat treated to 59 to 61 HRC. Available in Satin finish with Tan micarta and red G10 liners, or Black PVD stonewash, Olive Drab Micarta and Coyote liners. It is crafted for those who value performance and reliability in extreme conditions. 5. Functionality Driven As a primary user of large blades for general land management, we designed the Vanguard Golok by the demands of outdoor enthusiasts, making it a blade that’s designed to be functional, ergonomic and long lasting. Best Regards, Ian Lowsley BMC Designworks Ltd Website:BritishMacheteCo.com Email:info@britishmacheteco.com Instagram: @british_machete_co