- Joined
- Jun 9, 2013
- Messages
- 195
My friend Magical Trevor managed to break the bearing cage on my Manix 2.
I'm fairly certain he couldn't work out how to unlock it, so pried the plastic cage back with another knife.
The heavy handed nurk.
Him being on a fixed income and it being my own fault for not showing him how to work the lock, I didn't request a replacement from him- friends are worth more to me than the price of an M2, frankly.
For reference the result was thus:
While the replacement cage kindly supplied by fellow forumite is slowly travelling across the Atlantic in the tender embraces of the USPS and Royal Mail, I set to thinking if the cage was repairable: For geographically remote folks- unable or unwilling to send their knife back to Golden- and for people not fortunate enough to find a generous forumite with a cage spare, I thought there must be some way of getting their M2 back in the game.
This should work equally well on any knife with a polymer bearing cage- so M2, M2 XL, Pikal and so on.
Disclaimer
I would always recommend returning a damaged knife to Spyderco. Refer to your warranty sheet on this before considering undertaking the following.
I take precisely zero responsibility for any issues, problems, mental anguish, loss of livelihood, limb, life or knife that results from you following the information provided herewith. You are entirely responsible for your own actions and outcomes as a result.
Please assess your own personal safety concerns and relative clumsiness prior to attempting to emulate the below.
Ingredients:
A broken Manix 2 bearing cage
a 1mm drill
About 2-3" of 1mm brass rod
Industrial Superglue
Gorilla Glue (Essential!)
A small bench vice
A Dremel or similar rotary tool
A flat Swiss file- fine or diamond.
1200 grit emery paper for dressing out issues.
One or more glasses of chosen hand steadying concoction (I recommend Four Roses Single Barrel Bourbon but your mileage may vary
)
About an hour over the space of a couple of days.
Buyers notes
-I picked up the 1mm drill, brass rod and industrial superglue for £5.05 delivered from E-bay.... The rest was already in Casa Demoncase.
-The brass rod is used by model makers and model railway enthusiasts for axles and things- so is fairly stiff rather than the very soft annealed drawn wire you might find in a DIY store for picture hanging and the like....Ebay's model making section is the place to lurk. A 6" length cost me a whole £1 shipped.
-On Superglues: Cheap dimestore/Poundshop glue that comes in those tiny toothpaste tubes is watery rubbish and no good for this job. Buying proper industrial quality cyanoacrylate only cost £3 on Ebay, but you can tell the quality immediately as it 'grabs' and sets so much faster, as well as being stronger long term.
So:Step 1.
Wash the cage in water with a tiny amount of dish-soap/washing up liquid to degrease it. Chances are it's ended up coated with pocket fluff and oil when it failed.
Leave to dry somewhere warm for a full 24 hours.
Handle the cage a little a possible at this point- Keep finger prints, cat hairs, boogers, dust and so forth off the cracked area.
Step 2.
Carefully glue the cage back together using the superglue.
Take care to stick this back together precisely aligned. Do a couple of trial runs to be sure how it fits together correctly and that you can see from 3 angles how this will look when it's right.
Get it wrong and the ball will not sit right and the knife will not work correctly.
This needs to be a solidly completed join but with the minimum of glue leakage.
Let this set for a full 24 hours- Superglue gets to 80% strong in seconds, but the final 20% only develops over a full cure time.
Look it all over and check everything is lined up right- This is the critical step.
If it's shifted during setting, drop the cage in a pan of boiling water for about 10 seconds. The superglue will soften and peel off- you can then try again. The cage will suffer no ill effects.
Double check for any beads of glue that have escaped the joint on the bearing surfaces- dress them with a small file, lightly.
Step 3.
Carefully clamp the glued cage up in a small vice.
Don't go too hard as you may crack the glue.
Fit the 1mm drill in the Dremel
About now would be the time to take a stiff draft of your chosen hand steadying concoction
Set the Dremel to the slowest it will go and go as smoothly as you can: cutting will melt plastic and you want to use gentle pressure to avoid breaking the glue joint you did in step 2.
You want to be drilling in the fattest part of the 2 halves and NOT across the cup for the bearing- On the outside of the cage, this is along the 'centre line' at the very last serration on the cage as shown.
I reccomend working in a well lit area so you can see what you are doing- and check twice before starting the hole. Then check a third time.
Step 4
Cut off a small length of the 1mm brass rod.
Check it fits into the hole- it should do..
Smear a very light coating of Gorilla glue on the rod's surface.
The idea here is a 'composite joint'- the acrylic glue of the Gorilla glue supports the cyanoacrylate bond from the inside. The brass pin stiffens the cage and prevents the glued joint from 'peeling' apart from flexing under uneven pressure when unlocking the knife with your fingers.
You could do this just with superglue, but exposure to hot liquids or solvents may weaken this over time.
The acrylic glue (Gorilla glue) on the other hand is very resistant to these attacks BUT takes an age to set AND expands as it does so, meaning using it to fit the two halves back together is nearly impossible without ganking up the cup for the ball bearing.
(Note- I tried with just adhesive and no supporting drilled pin and the 'peel' failure on such a small surface meant it failed during assembly)
Step 5
Wait 24 hours after Step 4.
Take a needle file or emery paper and dress away any Gorilla glue that's squeezed out around the brass pin due to setting.
Rebuild your Manix 2.
Job- as they say- Done.
Working fine, smooth as ever, solid lock up....and barely noticeable.
I'm fairly certain he couldn't work out how to unlock it, so pried the plastic cage back with another knife.
The heavy handed nurk.
Him being on a fixed income and it being my own fault for not showing him how to work the lock, I didn't request a replacement from him- friends are worth more to me than the price of an M2, frankly.
For reference the result was thus:
While the replacement cage kindly supplied by fellow forumite is slowly travelling across the Atlantic in the tender embraces of the USPS and Royal Mail, I set to thinking if the cage was repairable: For geographically remote folks- unable or unwilling to send their knife back to Golden- and for people not fortunate enough to find a generous forumite with a cage spare, I thought there must be some way of getting their M2 back in the game.
This should work equally well on any knife with a polymer bearing cage- so M2, M2 XL, Pikal and so on.
Disclaimer
I would always recommend returning a damaged knife to Spyderco. Refer to your warranty sheet on this before considering undertaking the following.
I take precisely zero responsibility for any issues, problems, mental anguish, loss of livelihood, limb, life or knife that results from you following the information provided herewith. You are entirely responsible for your own actions and outcomes as a result.
Please assess your own personal safety concerns and relative clumsiness prior to attempting to emulate the below.
Ingredients:
A broken Manix 2 bearing cage
a 1mm drill
About 2-3" of 1mm brass rod
Industrial Superglue
Gorilla Glue (Essential!)
A small bench vice
A Dremel or similar rotary tool
A flat Swiss file- fine or diamond.
1200 grit emery paper for dressing out issues.
One or more glasses of chosen hand steadying concoction (I recommend Four Roses Single Barrel Bourbon but your mileage may vary
)About an hour over the space of a couple of days.
Buyers notes
-I picked up the 1mm drill, brass rod and industrial superglue for £5.05 delivered from E-bay.... The rest was already in Casa Demoncase.
-The brass rod is used by model makers and model railway enthusiasts for axles and things- so is fairly stiff rather than the very soft annealed drawn wire you might find in a DIY store for picture hanging and the like....Ebay's model making section is the place to lurk. A 6" length cost me a whole £1 shipped.
-On Superglues: Cheap dimestore/Poundshop glue that comes in those tiny toothpaste tubes is watery rubbish and no good for this job. Buying proper industrial quality cyanoacrylate only cost £3 on Ebay, but you can tell the quality immediately as it 'grabs' and sets so much faster, as well as being stronger long term.
So:Step 1.
Wash the cage in water with a tiny amount of dish-soap/washing up liquid to degrease it. Chances are it's ended up coated with pocket fluff and oil when it failed.
Leave to dry somewhere warm for a full 24 hours.
Handle the cage a little a possible at this point- Keep finger prints, cat hairs, boogers, dust and so forth off the cracked area.
Step 2.
Carefully glue the cage back together using the superglue.
Take care to stick this back together precisely aligned. Do a couple of trial runs to be sure how it fits together correctly and that you can see from 3 angles how this will look when it's right.
Get it wrong and the ball will not sit right and the knife will not work correctly.
This needs to be a solidly completed join but with the minimum of glue leakage.
Let this set for a full 24 hours- Superglue gets to 80% strong in seconds, but the final 20% only develops over a full cure time.
Look it all over and check everything is lined up right- This is the critical step.
If it's shifted during setting, drop the cage in a pan of boiling water for about 10 seconds. The superglue will soften and peel off- you can then try again. The cage will suffer no ill effects.
Double check for any beads of glue that have escaped the joint on the bearing surfaces- dress them with a small file, lightly.
Step 3.
Carefully clamp the glued cage up in a small vice.
Don't go too hard as you may crack the glue.
Fit the 1mm drill in the Dremel
About now would be the time to take a stiff draft of your chosen hand steadying concoction
Set the Dremel to the slowest it will go and go as smoothly as you can: cutting will melt plastic and you want to use gentle pressure to avoid breaking the glue joint you did in step 2.
You want to be drilling in the fattest part of the 2 halves and NOT across the cup for the bearing- On the outside of the cage, this is along the 'centre line' at the very last serration on the cage as shown.
I reccomend working in a well lit area so you can see what you are doing- and check twice before starting the hole. Then check a third time.
Step 4
Cut off a small length of the 1mm brass rod.
Check it fits into the hole- it should do..
Smear a very light coating of Gorilla glue on the rod's surface.
The idea here is a 'composite joint'- the acrylic glue of the Gorilla glue supports the cyanoacrylate bond from the inside. The brass pin stiffens the cage and prevents the glued joint from 'peeling' apart from flexing under uneven pressure when unlocking the knife with your fingers.
You could do this just with superglue, but exposure to hot liquids or solvents may weaken this over time.
The acrylic glue (Gorilla glue) on the other hand is very resistant to these attacks BUT takes an age to set AND expands as it does so, meaning using it to fit the two halves back together is nearly impossible without ganking up the cup for the ball bearing.
(Note- I tried with just adhesive and no supporting drilled pin and the 'peel' failure on such a small surface meant it failed during assembly)
Step 5
Wait 24 hours after Step 4.
Take a needle file or emery paper and dress away any Gorilla glue that's squeezed out around the brass pin due to setting.
Rebuild your Manix 2.
Job- as they say- Done.
Working fine, smooth as ever, solid lock up....and barely noticeable.
