Are these normal for a 301?

Sword and Shield said:
I just got a new 301 from Knifecenter, and had a few concerns...

First off, the spey blade sits proud of the liners, with the point about 2.5mm above. It can't cut me when using the other blades, but looks unusual. Is this just how Buck does theirs?

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Short answer:
It is indeed how Buck does theirs.

Long Answer:
This interested me when I first noticed it on mine and compared it to my old Camillus-made 303 that I bought ~1980. It comes from the orientation of the scales. The scales curve on a stockman. There is a high end and a low end. On the Camillus-made 301's and 303's, the high end of the scale is oriented such that it covers the spey blade. On the Buck-made 301, the high end of the scale is at the other end and the tip of the spey is exposed.

Longer answer, (or as we like to say in the Lean Biz: "Root Cause")
The Camillus 301's are a 2-spring design and the Buck 301s are a 3 spring design. (This is advantageous because, with a 3-spring design, you don't have to bend the blades, so you don't have to anneal the base of the blades to bend them. This removes several manufacturing steps and makes the Buck design less expensive to manufacture.:thumbup:) But, when Buck changed the design to the 3-spring, they put the Sheepsfoot at the opposite end of the knife from the main blade and put the spey at the same end as the clip. (With the Camillus 301 the spey is at the opposite end from the clip.) But they left the orientation of the scales the same in relation to the clip as with the Camillus. So, while the high end of the scales covers the end of the Spey on the Camillus 301, the end of the Spey on the Buck 301 is exposed. If they changed the orientation of the scales, I think the tip would be covered.

This probably won't make much sense unless you have both knives to look at. 300Bucks should be able to see it, though. He's got'em all.:D

But, at the end of the day, it just looks a bit odd. It works just fine. I've carried my 301 quite a fair bit and haven't caught myself on that exposed tip yet.
 
What knarfeng said, except for the "all" part..300

301spey2.jpg

Left 1990 last two spring; middle 2004 'Last Cali production; right 1998
 
Just a quick note that the 3 springs also gives better action to the blades and longer life to the springs since the shared spring can be a failure point.

The discussion on the blade orientation causing the high spey blade interests me and I have already posed that question to our engineers.
 
The Spey and Sheepsfoot blades being reversed in Buck stockman patterns since 1990, have always seemed funny to me. So far I have only found one other stockman that does it, and that's the recently imported (and already discontinued) NRA Outdoors series contracted through Benchmade.

NRA-12720-2.jpg


It does make Buck stockmen stand out among the other brands! (just one of the many reasons :D )
 
To All (since CJ is interested)

Well, the high spey situation in common sense terms is one of four things. 1. Leave it alone as is. 2. Change scale shape where handle swell covers tip, 3. Change spey tip shape. 4. Move Sheeps foot back to beside clip blade so it folds to center and is hidden.

Strictly as a visual thing the sharpened tip of the spey above the handle edge seems to be "odd" for a slipjoint stockmans historical image. Abeit it is not causing problems that way but the eye seeing in at high level sets off the brains "watch out" alarm. I would like it lowered slightly if only for my defense of my knife company to the 'other' knife companies supporters who constantly look for every preceived fault. Ok, that sounds petty, I just want it that way, period.

Moving blades back to the old orrientation is a concern if you listen to the discussions in slipjoint forums on uses and desires of knife owners concerning spey and sheepsfoot blades.

My opinion, is that the spey is generally considered a 'fine' work blade and is kept extra sharp, even to the point of most folks giving it a different sharpening angle. The sheepsfoot is used for 'rougher' work and tuff use such as twisting chips off of hardwood when carving. I think the sheepsfoot is employeed more often than the spey and is more convenient to open oppsite the clip rather than tucked in beside it. SO, although a historical Buck stockman collector, I vote to keep blades as they are now.

Change the spey blade shape, maybe but isn't the curve of the spey the real working point of the design. Grinding the end over will reduce the amount of curve and render out some of the desired blade shape.

Change handle shape, just seems to be too much cost and effort for that. Hey, I am willing to consider company issues.

So if the desire to change the visual lines to hide the tip is a company consideration supported by non-forum knife buyers and my fellow Buckmysterfullers, I would hope that tang engineering might cure the problem without causing a major issue.
Hope so. IIscents worth. 300Bucks
 
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CJ Buck said:
Just a quick note that the 3 springs also gives better action to the blades and longer life to the springs since the shared spring can be a failure point.
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I like the 3-spring design. It's a very clean design. I find that the center blade on some other makers stockman knives, because the base has to be bent to fit, sometimes the cutting edge of the blade is not quite straight. Makes it harder to sharpen. That can never be a problem on the 301. No blade has to be bent. COOL!


CJ Buck said:
The discussion on the blade orientation causing the high spey blade interests me and I have already posed that question to our engineers.
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I think that to change it would require a major change to the tooling. Not worth it. The design works as-is.

Edited to add:
I'm not certain how to word this correctly, but I will try.
The fact that you would ask your guys to even think about it says mountains about Buck's attention to detail.
 
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CJ Buck said:
Really hard to tell with the pictures if it just a surface discoloration or truly a mark from excessive heat. If it is a heat mark the knife needs to be replaced. usually we see heat marks along the edge where the blade is thinner. The shape in your photo does not look random enough, however if your blade was seriously overheated and then got cleaned up in the assembly process so that the little vertical stain was all that was left it definitely needs to be replaced.
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What do you think, Mr. Buck, sir? Send it in, or send it to work?
 
I didn't mind that the spay sat above the handle when closed, but I have to admit it looked a little odd, compared to the others in my collection. Oh well - things like that make Buck unique.

I buggered up the tip on the spay of my 301 (cleaning out gutters) and re-worked it into a semi-spear-point. I also filed & emery-clothed the kick, so the spay sits a little lower. I worked down the kicks on the other two blades, and gave my 301 a lower profile overall.

This is one great working knife. In my humble opinion, I wouldn't change anything. I think it works fine as is. :thumbup:

thx - cpr
 
Go to the Buck Website and it tells how you how to mail it in. It tells you not to use BUCK on the address but just initials for 'safety'....300
 
I noticed his Dymondwood 301 had similar scales to mine, the front one was fairly nice and darker, while the back one had blotchy gaps in the color. :(
 
You guys are making me feel really good about my lucky 301 Dymondwood scales....they are light colored and match prefect. 300

NewBucks2.jpg
 
300Bucks said:
You guys are making me feel really good about my lucky 301 Dymondwood scales....they are light colored and match prefect. 300

NewBucks2.jpg
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Take the dark scale from your 303 and put it one side of my 301 and leave the other side the light color, and you pretty much have mine.

Joe has it now and is gonna send me a new one! :thumbup:
 
Assuming ,the knife is "new" is it possible the heat treatment (do they "heat" treat there steel?) dis-coloration wasn't completely removed at finishing?. Nothing is obvious in that photo ,so I'm just wondering if the automated blade finishing system took a coffee break or had a hichup.
 
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You have to spring for a camera! They are so cheap now. My 10yr old ,used "her" money to replace the (silver) Nikon coolpix 4100( 4.0 megapixel/fantastic Macro) that I bought her for Christmas two yrs. ago ($259.00) she opted for the "cool" pink Kodak /with 8 megapixel and macro and longer movie action, for $ 102.00 her $$. I have her Nikon sitting in front of me now it's so much more handy than my bigger camera.
 
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skybone said:
Assuming ,the knife is "new" is it possible the heat treatment (do they "heat" treat there steel?) dis-coloration wasn't completely removed at finishing?. Nothing is obvious in that photo ,so I'm just wondering if the automated blade finishing system took a coffee break or had a hichup.
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Every knife is heat treated. Otherwise it would be so soft as to be useless.

As for coloration from that, I doubt it. I've made a few knives, and you don't get colors like that from heat treating.
 
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