Approximate date of manufacture - Camillus Mark 2 Combat Knife

C

Carolina72

Joined
Aug 10, 2014
Messages
17
Good afternoon all,
I know there are a lot of threads out there on old mk2 combat knives made by Camillus, both during and after WWII but I havent found any with the same markings as mine so far. I inherited a Camillus mk2 “style“ knife from my grandfather and was hoping on some information on it such as approximate age. It appears to be a very new knife, but I could anyone say how new? Is this knife of the same build or quality as the war time blades if it is a pretty new production? I know Camillus isnt what it used to be but I honestly know very little about them even though I am a big knife nut and have many different blades.
thanks for your help and pardon my ignorance!
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Very nice. I'm no expert, but what comes into my head is that it might be a commemorative replica, maybe manufactured in the last thirty years. Just guessing.

I'd love to see pictures of the sheath as well, if you're willing. :)
 
Thank you for the input. I haven’t seen any in my online searches with this specific stamping, however I have seen some of their folding knives that share the same stamp, but I have no idea how old those blades are.
Yes of course, here are a few of the sheath. Thanks!
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This is one that Camillus made AFTER they lost the government contract to make them circa 1988/1989.

This is the stamp they used for civilian sales from 1989 to 2006. Camillus filed for bankruptcy in February 2007 and made ZERO knives in 2007,

The sheath is NOT a Camillus original to this knife - even Camillus's post-contract MK2s were sold with pancake sheaths, black with no stamps like the contract sheaths and tan with an EGA/USMC stamp as an option. The 2005 and 2006 catalogs only show the pancake sheath as being sold with this knife.
 
Mister Coffee, that’s a nice blade!
zzyzzogeton - thank you for this information, I was not sure when or for how long they implemented this stamp. In fact, I didn’t realize until today that Camillus made the BK series, I’m guess prior to KaBar acquiring the line. You mentioned catalog, when prompted me to do a search on google for “1990 Camillus Catalog” I found a website that has almost all catalogs for Camillus by year. You may already know about this, but I did not and it has a lot of great information. See it here - http://www.collectors-of-camillus.us/Catalogs/Catalogs.htm.
in one of the catalogs, I believe it was 1979, I found a photo of a Trailblazer 1009, which I know mine is not because it does not have a bent guard and came in a standard cardboard box marked Camillus, however the catalog shows a sheath that appears to be identical to mine next to the 1009. I guess mine is a commercially made variant of the mk2 combat knife, made sometime in the last 30 years which I figured but I wish I knew the model number. I haven’t found one that matches mine exactly with the polished blade, pommel and straight guard. Thanks for talking knives with me folks!
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The model number for the brown handled commercial MK2 was 5685B.

The earliest catalog listing of the 1009 Trail Blazer is the 1967 catalog, and it remains in the catalogs through the 1992 catalog, a 25 year run. this really surprises me since the 1009 Trail Blazer almost NEVER shows up on fleabay. I think I've seen 3 in the last 10 years. So either Camillus has a single small run that took 25 years to sell out, or people who bought them really like them.

There are 4 possiblities, re: your 5685B and a 1009 sheath -
1- Factory mistake combination - someone flat put the wrong sheath in the box, accidently or on purpose
2- Deliberate factory pairing - either they were out of pancakes for the 5685B OR the 1009 sheath was used for a while as the default sheath for the 5868B.
3- replacement sheath order for the 5685B got a 1009 sheath
4- the original owner traded his 5685B sheath for a 1009 sheathwith someone willing to make the swap.

I lean towards #1.
 
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