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- Feb 3, 2001
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There's a lot of talk about quality of American made traditional style knives, the old timers, Case, Camillus, and the Old Timers(Schrade)
are apparently not up to par.
They like many American made products can't seem to match the quality of products made 30 and 40 years ago.
I have many examples of the cutlers art from the 20's through the early 50's produced by the above companies, these are production manufactured hand crafted examples of the finest American made products of their time.
Try to find the equivalent today and you would be hard pressed to locate many, on the other hand look across the Pacific and you'll see a flood of Asian
repros that supposedly parallel the excellence of the early American mass produced knives.
I was at a gun show yesterday and someone behind a table handed me a Canoe pattern with NS bolsters and Black Lip Scales, a nice looking piece to say the least, he volunteered the knife for inspection and proudly exclaimed, "Find anything wrong with this knife I dare you!"
"$20", he volunteered again,"Great deal".
As I rolled the knife around in my hand, open and closed blades he began to look about nervously at the crowd that started to gather at his table.
"Well" I said," This is a nice knife for $20 and that's about what it's worth, everyone standing behind me moved closer, "What's wrong with it?" he asked.
I reached into my pocket and pulled out a Camillus Equal End Pen with NS Tip Bolsters and Black Horn Scales and proceeded to point out the obvious differences, The back spring on his knife only sat flat when the knife was closed(The back spring was ground with the knife closed to make it look nice), on my knife it sat flat open or closed.
My rivets were finished smooth and flush, no gaps, his were raised, buffed to take off the edge, and were off center a little.
The Scales on his were nice but just didn't fit tight, voids were apparent and the quality of the Black Lip was a little better than what they discard as unacceptable.
Back spring tension on mine was consistent all the way through the arc, his got really hard and stiff at about 2 and 4 o'clock.
His blades rubbed the liners when open or closed, mine nestled closely together, he did point out one thing his had that mine didn't, stainless blades
As I put my 60 some year old knife back in my pocket, I said"ya got me there buddy, except my knife isn't stained it has a patina, old knives will eventually develop this."
While I walking away from his table I could still hear him trying to keep the crowd interested in his quality Chinese knives, but it was too late they all had seen and heard the differences and decided to buy elsewhere.
There's a lot of talk about quality of American made traditional style knives, the old timers, Case, Camillus, and the Old Timers(Schrade)
are apparently not up to par.They like many American made products can't seem to match the quality of products made 30 and 40 years ago.
I have many examples of the cutlers art from the 20's through the early 50's produced by the above companies, these are production manufactured hand crafted examples of the finest American made products of their time.
Try to find the equivalent today and you would be hard pressed to locate many, on the other hand look across the Pacific and you'll see a flood of Asian
repros that supposedly parallel the excellence of the early American mass produced knives.
I was at a gun show yesterday and someone behind a table handed me a Canoe pattern with NS bolsters and Black Lip Scales, a nice looking piece to say the least, he volunteered the knife for inspection and proudly exclaimed, "Find anything wrong with this knife I dare you!"
"$20", he volunteered again,"Great deal".
As I rolled the knife around in my hand, open and closed blades he began to look about nervously at the crowd that started to gather at his table.
"Well" I said," This is a nice knife for $20 and that's about what it's worth, everyone standing behind me moved closer, "What's wrong with it?" he asked.
I reached into my pocket and pulled out a Camillus Equal End Pen with NS Tip Bolsters and Black Horn Scales and proceeded to point out the obvious differences, The back spring on his knife only sat flat when the knife was closed(The back spring was ground with the knife closed to make it look nice), on my knife it sat flat open or closed.
My rivets were finished smooth and flush, no gaps, his were raised, buffed to take off the edge, and were off center a little.
The Scales on his were nice but just didn't fit tight, voids were apparent and the quality of the Black Lip was a little better than what they discard as unacceptable.
Back spring tension on mine was consistent all the way through the arc, his got really hard and stiff at about 2 and 4 o'clock.
His blades rubbed the liners when open or closed, mine nestled closely together, he did point out one thing his had that mine didn't, stainless blades
As I put my 60 some year old knife back in my pocket, I said"ya got me there buddy, except my knife isn't stained it has a patina, old knives will eventually develop this."
While I walking away from his table I could still hear him trying to keep the crowd interested in his quality Chinese knives, but it was too late they all had seen and heard the differences and decided to buy elsewhere.
