Bearings or Washers?

[RX-79G]

Washers can seal better. A bearing flipper can be made sealed as well. I know there are a lot of hypotheticals its just I have yet to see a single bearing equipped knife exhibit any of them. I mean think about it. More people have come to the forum to complain about the edge retention of the 0560 than they have to complain the bearings (in any knife) led to a failure in a knife. And we usually will tell that person with the 0560 that the claims of that knife not holding an edge are exaggerated. So i really dont know why people really worry about this issue when i cant think of a single report of a failure that surely could be blamed on bearings. And the few that i have seen where they claimed it was the bearings fault i think was actually the result of other issues.

People also talk a lot about preventing Ti framelock wear, yet in 27 years of Sebenza ownership - how much of that has happened?


I think bearings were a quick and dirty way to make a flipper flip even easier, and consumers like the idea because it sounds like "engineering". But real world bearings require hardened races and either labyrinth or rubber seals to keep grease on the balls and crud out so the bearings don't act like a grain mill.


What isn't sexy is a better thrust bearing. Annular grooves machined into the blade and liners would lower the bearing surface area and seal dirt out, oil in. Same thing with CRK's holes in their PB washer.

Sometimes progress isn't. But when you're spending $200+ on an EDC knife (letter opener), you'd like to feel that a lot went into making it. Hence - bearings.

Or even more redic - ceramic bearings. They're a really bad idea if you can't control lubrication.

 

[bigmark408]

It would be relatively easy to mention makers of the same caliber that use bearings. It will always be a choice based on personal preference

I didn't say Brg. Knives don't work well.

They do not work better than a well built flat (non roller) Brg. Knife and i used a couple of good makers as examples of how a flat Brg. Knife should operate.

I own/owned several custom roller Brg. knives and I say that the roller Brg. Is not the end all, although I do believe it is more forgiving than a flat Brg. And makes for an easier build of a flipper type knife that performs decent.

 

[flarp]

The other problem with bearings is how much damage foreign matter will do if it gets in between them. Washers are sealed better.

In my experience, washers and bearings both accumulate the same amount of crud during carry and use. The effect is also the same on both - a slightly less smooth feel when opening/closing the knife. It doesn't make the knife unusable by any means, and maintenance/cleaning is pretty much the same for both.

I'm not sure what damage that foreign matter would cause that would affect one but not the other. Both have moving parts, and both involve materials rubbing against each other. Assuming you get some very fine and highly abrasive material in there (diamond dust?), it's going to cause accelerated wear regardless of whether it's washers or bearings.

 

[bpeezer]

I will never understand why so many people think bearing knives are prone to failure. I work with many different machines, and all of them have bearings to IMPROVE longevity. Bearings can last for millions of cycles, I can not possibly imagine flipping a knife that many times.

 

[RX-79G]

In my experience, washers and bearings both accumulate the same amount of crud during carry and use. The effect is also the same on both - a slightly less smooth feel when opening/closing the knife. It doesn't make the knife unusable by any means, and maintenance/cleaning is pretty much the same for both.

I'm not sure what damage that foreign matter would cause that would affect one but not the other. Both have moving parts, and both involve materials rubbing against each other. Assuming you get some very fine and highly abrasive material in there (diamond dust?), it's going to cause accelerated wear regardless of whether it's washers or bearings.

Bearings move twice as much as a washer and under much greater pressure per square inch.

 

[Bludgeon]

Is a drop of oil the correct way to lube bearings on an assembled ZT0562? Should it be disassembled to lube when needed?

 

[K.O.D.]

I love my bearing flippers, but when it comes to my workhorse folders they are all pb washers. I have a hard time getting my bearing knives dirty, for fear of messing them up. It was a pita getting my brous bionic running smooth again.

 

[whitty]

Despite a little bit of bickering back and forth I have had a great time reading every single post so far, and have learned a few things. Most everyone has a good point and the truth of the matter is that people like and believe in what they like! I am definitely a KISS type person. That does not mean I am against bearings at all, I just want to see how they stand the test of time. Lets see if they are still running smooth and working in 5-10 years. Only time will tell. Between now and then I will continue to carry what I like and want. I have to believe everyone else who posted here will do the same!

 

[marthinus]

You get different type of bearing system approaches the same as you get different washers.

Normal IKBS:

Double-row roller bearing system

KVT:

Andre THorburn and Andre van Heerden Munlti row IKBS:

There are other I cannot seem to find such as GTC etc. IMO bearings done right is harder than washers and requires more attention to detail. YMMV just my 2 cents.

 

[K.O.D.]

When I get a chance I'll take a pic of the caged bearings on my Bionic. I never disassembled the Brian Tighe I have, so I don't know what his STBS is like. I'm nervous to take apart my Kizer, but I'm sure I'll have to eventually.

 

[Pittknife]

When I get a chance I'll take a pic of the caged bearings on my Bionic. I never disassembled the Brian Tighe I have, so I don't know what his STBS is like. I'm nervous to take apart my Kizer, but I'm sure I'll have to eventually.

The bionic is on washers isn't it? My friend had one and it was not a good flipper at all, I've heard the 2.0 are a lot better.

The best thing to do if you want to keep your bearings clean without taking apart a knife if to used compressed air and blast the dirt/debris out. Then use a needle applicator (i use nano oil) to drip some on the bearings (you don't need much). Also, the detent needs to be cleaned and lubricated (be careful not to get lube on the lockfaces). Most of the time, its not the bearings, but he detent that needs the lube.

 

[K.O.D.]

No, its on bearings, and I find it to flip very well. The main differences with the 2.0 is they removed the jimping from the handle and softened the shape of the flipper.

My Bionic 1.0:



Bionic 2.0:

 

[Scrim]

So many companies are trying to add more bearings, now MRBS...so if they keep shoving in more & more bearings, you're going to end up with so many points of contact in a tiny confined space around a pivot...it'll eventually turn into the effective equivalent of...a washer! Ain't that a kick in the head. Leave well enough alone, I say. When done right, a SRBS is phenomenal & strong enough for most people's use, for a lifetime I would guess (having lived only a portion of one thus far). Washers, can be very good. MRBS, perhaps just good marketing in reality. How else are these guys going to continue to raise their prices over time if they can't find new little bells & whistles to shove into a folding knife? A real upgrade to performance or not, at least it sounds like it's something "new".

 

[RX-79G]

So many companies are trying to add more bearings, now MRBS...so if they keep shoving in more & more bearings, you're going to end up with so many points of contact in a tiny confined space around a pivot...it'll eventually turn into the effective equivalent of...a washer! Ain't that a kick in the head. Leave well enough alone, I say. When done right, a SRBS is phenomenal & strong enough for most people's use, for a lifetime I would guess (having lived only a portion of one thus far). Washers, can be very good. MRBS, perhaps just good marketing in reality. How else are these guys going to continue to raise their prices over time if they can't find new little bells & whistles to shove into a folding knife? A real upgrade to performance or not, at least it sounds like it's something "new".

I'm waiting for servo motor assist.

 

[PURPLEDC]

People also talk a lot about preventing Ti framelock wear, yet in 27 years of Sebenza ownership - how much of that has happened?


I think bearings were a quick and dirty way to make a flipper flip even easier, and consumers like the idea because it sounds like "engineering". But real world bearings require hardened races and either labyrinth or rubber seals to keep grease on the balls and crud out so the bearings don't act like a grain mill.


What isn't sexy is a better thrust bearing. Annular grooves machined into the blade and liners would lower the bearing surface area and seal dirt out, oil in. Same thing with CRK's holes in their PB washer.

Sometimes progress isn't. But when you're spending $200+ on an EDC knife (letter opener), you'd like to feel that a lot went into making it. Hence - bearings.

Or even more redic - ceramic bearings. They're a really bad idea if you can't control lubrication.

Sorry man, i dont agree. As far as lock face wear? I have actually seen issues with that. Could have been a defective knife or abuse but i have seen lock face issues on many titanium knives. As for the bearings issue i think way too many people compare the bearings in a knife to bearings in a completely different environment and still think its relative which i cant disagree more. I might worry about ceramic bearings in a knife if the blade was continuously rotating at high speed. But we are talking about bearings that dont even see a full rotation when opening or closing. There is no heat nor is the bearing under load. The bearing assembly of the steering on a bicycle would be a more fair comparison as it rarely if ever makes a full rotation and i have yet to see one fail. I look at this issue like this. Is a pair of chop sticks made from bamboo weaker that chop sticks made from titanium? Sure. But does that mean bamboo chopsticks are inferior in any way at completing its intended purpose as a chopstick? No. I think people tend to get caugt up in these ideas of wear and failure in area where a problem has necer been known to occur so to me the argument of which is stronger or which is more failure prone is complete conjecture as there really have been no failures in which to have to worry about. And even in the instances with say a 0560 that has no hardened races the only thing that will happen is that a race will form, it will harden as it is formed and the wear will slow and all but cease. As for dirt debris and other things getting in the way of thhe bearings? If videos showing someone burying a non sealed ikbs knife in goop and sand and still working doesnt debunk the myth that bearings are prone to fail due to contaminants I do t think anything can. I guess i just dont worry about things being a problem unless they proce to be a problem.

The bionic is on washers isn't it? My friend had one and it was not a good flipper at all, I've heard the 2.0 are a lot better.

The best thing to do if you want to keep your bearings clean without taking apart a knife if to used compressed air and blast the dirt/debris out. Then use a needle applicator (i use nano oil) to drip some on the bearings (you don't need much). Also, the detent needs to be cleaned and lubricated (be careful not to get lube on the lockfaces). Most of the time, its not the bearings, but he detent that needs the lube.

All bionics are on caged bearings. The only one that might not is the auto version.

So many companies are trying to add more bearings, now MRBS...so if they keep shoving in more & more bearings, you're going to end up with so many points of contact in a tiny confined space around a pivot...it'll eventually turn into the effective equivalent of...a washer! Ain't that a kick in the head. Leave well enough alone, I say. When done right, a SRBS is phenomenal & strong enough for most people's use, for a lifetime I would guess (having lived only a portion of one thus far). Washers, can be very good. MRBS, perhaps just good marketing in reality. How else are these guys going to continue to raise their prices over time if they can't find new little bells & whistles to shove into a folding knife? A real upgrade to performance or not, at least it sounds like it's something "new".

I actually completely agree. At some point he amount of bearings gets to be so much you might as well have a washer. I guess to a degree i understand the desire to experiment, push boundaries and to have the best of what both washers and bearings have to offer. I just think its starting to get out of hand and that is from a bearing aficionado.

 

[Mitchell Knives]

I prefer caged bearings to washers. I've never seen either system fail.

 

[RX-79G]

Sorry man, i dont agree. As far as lock face wear? I have actually seen issues with that. Could have been a defective knife or abuse but i have seen lock face issues on many titanium knives. As for the bearings issue i think way too many people compare the bearings in a knife to bearings in a completely different environment and still think its relative which i cant disagree more. I might worry about ceramic bearings in a knife if the blade was continuously rotating at high speed. But we are talking about bearings that dont even see a full rotation when opening or closing. There is no heat nor is the bearing under load. The bearing assembly of the steering on a bicycle would be a more fair comparison as it rarely if ever makes a full rotation and i have yet to see one fail. I look at this issue like this. Is a pair of chop sticks made from bamboo weaker that chop sticks made from titanium? Sure. But does that mean bamboo chopsticks are inferior in any way at completing its intended purpose as a chopstick? No. I think people tend to get caugt up in these ideas of wear and failure in area where a problem has necer been known to occur so to me the argument of which is stronger or which is more failure prone is complete conjecture as there really have been no failures in which to have to worry about. And even in the instances with say a 0560 that has no hardened races the only thing that will happen is that a race will form, it will harden as it is formed and the wear will slow and all but cease. As for dirt debris and other things getting in the way of thhe bearings? If videos showing someone burying a non sealed ikbs knife in goop and sand and still working doesnt debunk the myth that bearings are prone to fail due to contaminants I do t think anything can. I guess i just dont worry about things being a problem unless they proce to be a problem.

.

I was a bike mechanic for many, many years. Headset bearing (which rotate very little, as you point out) went bad (pitted) by damaging their races very commonly. Weight, impacts, lubrication problems and incorrect bearing adjustment all lead to damage - and the damage is to the hardened steel races, not the balls.

Now take your $400 knife and figure out how you're going to replace the races that are machined right into a low Rc titanium scale because you twisted the blade a little hard, had the pivot a hair too tight or forgot to oil it.

As I said, no one is really playing around with better washers, but it is a better system because the loads are distributed much more evenly. And, more importantly, the highest wear item is the soft PB washer, not the expensive blade or scale. Having a bearing that is harder than what it rides on is terrible engineering.

 

[PURPLEDC]

I was a bike mechanic for many, many years. Headset bearing (which rotate very little, as you point out) went bad (pitted) by damaging their races very commonly. Weight, impacts, lubrication problems and incorrect bearing adjustment all lead to damage - and the damage is to the hardened steel races, not the balls.

Now take your $400 knife and figure out how you're going to replace the races that are machined right into a low Rc titanium scale because you twisted the blade a little hard, had the pivot a hair too tight or forgot to oil it.

As I said, no one is really playing around with better washers, but it is a better system because the loads are distributed much more evenly. And, more importantly, the highest wear item is the soft PB washer, not the expensive blade or scale. Having a bearing that is harder than what it rides on is terrible engineering.

Well as a bike mechanic i guess you would see more instances of failure than I. I was using it as an example because of all my years with my friends riding bmx the headset bearings were always the last thing we would have a problem with. So lets chalk that up to a bad example.

Lets not do any comparisons and just ask this. Have you ever seen an insstance where a knife with bearings failed or malfunctioned due to it having bearings instead of washers. And im not talking people on these forums speaking in hypotheticals. Im talking a situation where the bearings no doubt led to a failure? I know i havent. Have i seen wear? Sure have. But nothing that wouldnt be considered normal and it never went beyond a certain point. If there were reports every single day about guys not being able to open their knives or the liner and scale failed due to excessive removal of material i would say there is some merit to the discussion. But to me it kinda seems about as productive as trying to argue about the mating rituals of sasquatch. No one has ever even proved that they even exsist so who can say anything one way or another. To me bearing failures in knives is a sasquatch because no one has ever actually proved there is a problem.

 

[Shotgun]

Why do so many people say that bearing systems aren't as tough as washers? Washers are made of thin layers of nylatron/some sort of plastic, or copper, while bearings are made of steel.

Yea - I am not sure on that either. Lack of knowledge? Who knows. I like the "bearings will wear out faster" than washers. I have even seen people compare the washers to engine crank bearings, and then someone who knows what they are talking about starts educating the washer fan on things like oil-film and babbit etc.

Wheel bearings on cars routinely go 100,000+ miles, all while supporting the weight of a car or truck, with side loads etc. Yea, those are typically tapered rollers, but the concept is the same.

Bearings can be tough, and washers can be weak, and vice versa if the manufacturer does not know how to make what they are making.

Like I originally said, without disparaging either side of the equation, bearings are great, if you have had them and like them (like me) then thank heavens for technology and manufacturing advancement.

If you like washers and it's working for you, then go get you some washers, tiger! There's lots of options to choose.

I just love it when people have to "show you how right they are".

best

mqqn

In engineering school a professor will give the students a problem that they must design a machine to solve. They're students so it's usually a simple machine. Let's say the machine has 7 parts. A good professor will say "Good job. You solved it. Now do it again with 5 parts." And the lesson is pretty straightforward. More parts, more problems. It's just the way machines work. It's not that the MATERIALS used to make the bearings is weaker, it's the added complexity that makes it weaker.

That said I don't have any bearing knives so I can't speak to there longevity. I would imagine for the average user it's a non-issue but if you don't care about how smooth a knife is and just want something reliable, there's no reason to choose the more complicated machine.

 

[RX-79G]

Well as a bike mechanic i guess you would see more instances of failure than I. I was using it as an example because of all my years with my friends riding bmx the headset bearings were always the last thing we would have a problem with. So lets chalk that up to a bad example.

Lets not do any comparisons and just ask this. Have you ever seen an insstance where a knife with bearings failed or malfunctioned due to it having bearings instead of washers. And im not talking people on these forums speaking in hypotheticals. Im talking a situation where the bearings no doubt led to a failure? I know i havent. Have i seen wear? Sure have. But nothing that wouldnt be considered normal and it never went beyond a certain point. If there were reports every single day about guys not being able to open their knives or the liner and scale failed due to excessive removal of material i would say there is some merit to the discussion. But to me it kinda seems about as productive as trying to argue about the mating rituals of sasquatch. No one has ever even proved that they even exsist so who can say anything one way or another. To me bearing failures in knives is a sasquatch because no one has ever actually proved there is a problem.

I don't know of any problems with expensive knives and their bearing systems. I also don't know how long the clutch lasts on a Ferrari. The problem is that the majority of expensive guns, knives and other luxury hobby items is that almost none of them get a real workout because they get babied.

And maybe that's okay. Maybe expensive folders could have polished glass bearings for how little it matters. I'm always interested in how stuff works if you treat it like anything else, but clearly that doesn't represent the reality of the situation.


But I do know that putting hard bearings on a soft, machined-in race is not an idea anyone got from a mechanical engineering course. And I think the novelty of this idea has subverted development of the more sound washer system.