Benchmade Adamas realization

Quiet said:
If slipjoints weren't popular (remember, as you claim), then there wouldn't be so many companies making them, and custom makers making them, and millions of people buying them. As for them being useful, our grandfathers, great, great-great, etc. seemed to do alright with them. My own Grandfather worked for over 50 years as a Railroad man with a slipjoint in his pocket.

I swear, some folks act like there were no good knives before Andrew Demko's Triad lock came about.
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At this point slip joints are a novelty thing, really no point besides them being like able, maybe easier to handle with gloves
 
Yes, when I think slipjoints, I think easier to handle with gloves.

Slipjoints are by far my least collected style of knife if you lump all the SAKs I've accumulated into a single group as I generally get them as a tool and not as a dedicated knife. Therefore I'm not the be all end all of their worth.

That said, there is almost nothing I can think of that I generally use a locking knife for that a slip joint wouldn't handle when you take blade/handle size out of the equation. Truthfully, how my knife locks almost never comes into play and the reason I carry a blade that locks has more to do with the size of the knife and ease of access.

The irony is that if the Adamas blade is truly coming unlocked enough to cut someone's then they would have been safer with a slip joint as the Axis lock set up is all fidget/drop shutty or whatever. Once you slide the bar out, it's gonna drop fast. One of the reasons I might take the Auto version over the Mini is due to the fact that the spring of the Auto is so stout that even if the lock comes loose, the amount of pressure it takes to fold the blade shut is substantial. It's got about as much resistant as a good slip joint back spring.

Being that you usually have to close a slip joint to a bit past 90 degrees to get the spring to drive the blade back to nest in the liners, it takes a fair amount of work and mishandling for a the average slippie to close on ones fingers.
 
I went back to the first post:
First knife failed when used in a normal way --> most likely lemon --> returned and got credit.
Second knife was batoned with --> failed --> sent back for repair --> was fixed by BM and failed again (doing what?)
Third knife (a Mini Adamas) was used to pry open something --> failed --> Concluded that the knife is the worst knife ever --> Opinion reinforced by social media...
Well, if thats not a vicious circle...

There is one thing though: A folding knife (however "bulletproof") is actually built to fold and the locking mechanism is not there to create a fixed knife.
So batoning with the engaged lock is at least as ill advised as prying with a folder. (I'm guilty of both, but nothing happened)
I admit that the marketing departments of knife companies are indeed very colorful when describing the "toughness or heavy duty" characteristics of their knives.

However that does not mean that physics can be ignored.
The force that is exerted on the small pivot area during the prying movement is not something that any folder will tolerate for a long time, especially whith a lot of moving parts like the axis lock. The same goes for batoning.

I once had a benchmade 940 and while it never failed on me, I did not warm up to the thumbstud and the lock.
 
Wasty said:
I went back to the first post:
First knife failed when used in a normal way --> most likely lemon --> returned and got credit.
Second knife was batoned with --> failed --> sent back for repair --> was fixed by BM and failed again (doing what?)
Third knife (a Mini Adamas) was used to pry open something --> failed --> Concluded that the knife is the worst knife ever --> Opinion reinforced by social media...
Well, if thats not a vicious circle...

There is one thing though: A folding knife (however "bulletproof") is actually built to fold and the locking mechanism is not there to create a fixed knife.
So batoning with the engaged lock is at least as ill advised as prying with a folder. (I'm guilty of both, but nothing happened)
I admit that the marketing departments of knife companies are indeed very colorful when describing the "toughness or heavy duty" characteristics of their knives.

However that does not mean that physics can be ignored.
The force that is exerted on the small pivot area during the prying movement is not something that any folder will tolerate for a long time, especially whith a lot of moving parts like the axis lock. The same goes for batoning.

I once had a benchmade 940 and while it never failed on me, I did not warm up to the thumbstud and the lock.
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This probably makes too much sense for this thread :D

We can safely say that the few instances of Adamas lock failure can be ascribed to user error, mis-use and a rare QC failure. The testimonies within this very thread support this. Add in a dose of YouTube Pile-ON with an underlying taint of #BenchHate, and we get what we have.

So far in this thread we've learned that:
1. Gerber is the biggest knife company in the world and the average weight of their fixed blades, folders and multi-tools is 3 ounces.
2. Slipjoints are an irrelevant and minor part of the knife world and are only good to use with a glove.
3. A "hard use" folder should be able to baton fire wood.
4. "I saw it on the internet, it must be true".

If we're hitting this high on a Tuesday, Friday night should be awesome!
 
kafolarbear said:
To answer your other comment, I own two benchmades, a mini adamas and a partially serrated turret. Though I've also worked with, sharpened or otherwise handled and had some time with a Bugout, a full sized Adamas D2, a 940 Osborne, the Nimravus, the Puukko and the Anonimus. And I'd say out of all those, the mini-adamas is my favorite, but just because I like the knife doesn't mean I can't criticize it or it's marketing when it clearly fails at a basic test of lock strength that most folding knives have no problems with. Does that mean it's a bad knife? No. But a hard use knife's lock should not be failing easier than the lock of something like a bugout, especially when they have the same locking mechanism. I think it's perfectly fair for consumers to ask why the supposedly hard use knife's lock is failing where other knives with the same lock aren't and to more importantly, get whatever the design issue or factory defect is fixed. Me and OP are not the only ones who have noticed this, and I'm very happy that you and most people commenting on this thread have nothing but good things to say about the knife. I'm in the same boat as you for the most part, I do like the general design, shape and size of the mini adamas, but you shouldn't discount other's experiences with baseless hypotheticals like "oh maybe he just disengaged the lock" when multiple people, from forum members to online knife reviewers have noticed that the lock on the mini-adamas is weaker than it's other axis lock counterparts.
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I am not discounting peoples' experience. I am discounting the folks who come in here, see posts like OP's and are immediately like "BM IS TRASH!". Their poor critical thinking skills are what's wrong with this picture, not that one person (or the like, several on YouBoob) had issues. You're entirely free to criticize whatever you'd like, but as in all things, just be ready when people give pushback because the criticism is poorly thought out, or being used as some arbitrary metric to damn an entire product line, one that has served countless others quite well. Also, it IS perfectly fair for consumers to ask questions, however, as a consumer myself, it's also perfectly fair for me to question the consumers who are complaining. I will say this, my response concerning the OP possibly disengaging the lock accidentally wasn't some idle notion. It is absolutely possible to do, because I HAVE done that before. But when the knife unlocked (In this particular case it was one of my fullsize Griptilians), I knew right away what I'd done to disengage the lock. I didn't come in here and post about how Benchmade's Griptilians are crap and blame the knife for my own misuse of the tool.
 
K.O.D. said:
I had a single omega spring break in my minigrip, and it was noticable. I also had other issues with BM, plus I've come to dislike thumbstuds.

However, it would never occur to me to baton with a folding knife. Just seems like abuse, as well as a disaster waiting to happen. A lock, after all, is to hold the knife open, not prevent it from closing due to impact.

I've heard a lot of people having omega springs break over the past 8 years or so. I carried, used, repeatedly flicked my SOG X-ray Vision mini for 14 years without a failure, so I don't think it's necessarily a design issue. I've heard Hogue uses more robust omega springs in their able lock.
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I too have had numerous Benchmades over the years, and never broken an omega spring. Buuuuuut I have never owned a Bugout, the model broken omega springs seem to plague the most for some strange reason.

Ironic, since I should be able to baton with a Bugout if the information I received here is correct.
 
kafolarbear said:
You're not wrong, too many people taking this way too personally. You'd think you were criticizing their mother's cooking from how they defend Benchmade and invalidate those with a negative experience.
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I think you misunderstood me. I was questioning your use of the term "Dishonest Marketing". That's an over the top accusation based on the evidence presented here.

There's big difference between "hard use" and abuse and I don't think Benchmade ever claimed their knives would hold up to abuse.
 
PenguinsRcool2 said:
At this point slip joints are a novelty thing, really no point besides them being like able, maybe easier to handle with gloves
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lol, you realize that there's a total subforum essentially dedicated to users who prefer slipjoints? (and there's a lot of us)

Back on topic- if BM certifies that their stuff is batonable, then it's a fault of the product.
I don't think BM would say that, however.

If this was an ESEE product, I would blame the product after 2-3 failures.
ESEE makes a point of declaring exactly the abuse their knives should be able to take.
 
EngrSorenson said:
lol, you realize that there's a total subforum essentially dedicated to users who prefer slipjoints? (and there's a lot of us)

Back on topic- if BM certifies that their stuff is batonable, then it's a fault of the product.
I don't think BM would say that, however.

If this was an ESEE product, I would blame the product after 2-3 failures.
ESEE makes a point of declaring exactly the abuse their knives should be able to take.
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Yes and we consider you guys weirdos who collect oddly shaped pieces of plastic metal and bone that have no practical value :)
 
Sibyrnes said:
I think you misunderstood me. I was questioning your use of the term "Dishonest Marketing". That's an over the top accusation based on the evidence presented here.

There's big difference between "hard use" and abuse and I don't think Benchmade ever claimed their knives would hold up to abuse.
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No, I'm aware you were leveling your comment at me, but I was agreeing that the discussion had gone way off course to the point we were arguing about which company makes more knives, which is so far besides the point of the thread.

I guess "abuse" versus "hard use" is very subjective, or maybe even there's some overlap. I don't think it's too far fetched in a market where folders are increasingly evaluated by their lock strength. Whether you agree that it's a useful metric is not important, because objectively speaking you have companies like Cold Steel boasting about their lock strength, hanging weights off their folders or batonning and setting a standard for "hard use" in the industry. Then one of their competitors comes along and makes a knife for the same market niche of "tough, overbuilt" you know all the marketing speak, that in fact performs worse in this metric than their more standard line of products (ie. the bugout, the 940). I don't think it's unfair to say in the knife industry, when it comes to these knives marketed as "overbuilt" or "tanks", there is an expectation of a very sturdy lock amongst other things.

Now please don't mistake this as me arguing that a knife that can't hang a 45 pound weight off its spine is trash, I'm merely talking about what the consumer expects when a company uses certain marketing terms for a knife, I don't think this would be as much of a controversy if the adamas line wasn't marketed the way it is and consumers weren't buying it expecting a certain standard of performance based off that marketing.

Quiet said:
I am not discounting peoples' experience. I am discounting the folks who come in here, see posts like OP's and are immediately like "BM IS TRASH!". Their poor critical thinking skills are what's wrong with this picture, not that one person (or the like, several on YouBoob) had issues. You're entirely free to criticize whatever you'd like, but as in all things, just be ready when people give pushback because the criticism is poorly thought out, or being used as some arbitrary metric to damn an entire product line, one that has served countless others quite well. Also, it IS perfectly fair for consumers to ask questions, however, as a consumer myself, it's also perfectly fair for me to question the consumers who are complaining. I will say this, my response concerning the OP possibly disengaging the lock accidentally wasn't some idle notion. It is absolutely possible to do, because I HAVE done that before. But when the knife unlocked (In this particular case it was one of my fullsize Griptilians), I knew right away what I'd done to disengage the lock. I didn't come in here and post about how Benchmade's Griptilians are crap and blame the knife for my own misuse of the tool.
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I don't think anyone is really here calling benchmade trash, and the only person who can tell us if it's possible they were disengaging the lock is OP, and without his/her input, you can only really speculate about it. But given the fact I have personally seen that the lock on my mini adamas to be weaker than other axis locks leads me to be inclined to believe OP. I don't think it's ridiculous nor do I think lock strength in this case is an arbitrary metric. If nothing else, even if you don't think lock strength is that important, even to a knife labeled "hard use", surely you can question why the lock on the mini adamas seems to suffer more failures than other axis locks, even if whatever caused the failures you quantify as abuse.
 
You can do what i saw in the comments of one of that pud Joe x's videos; base all your knife buying based on his"tests" 😅 🤣
 
Enzo’s Woodshop said:
I’m referencing the number that pops up when you search “How many employees does gerber knives have?” on Google
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I don't really mind if they are not. Just curious.

I am not sure if a knife design is necessarily validated by its popularity in this way though.

If you wanted a knife to do something and it doesn't. A million people who wanted a knife to do something else isn't really relevant.

I keep thinking of how to shoe horn in the spyderco salt.

If one of those rusted. It doesn't matter how many people say they never take their becker in to the ocean.
 
kafolarbear said:
I don't think anyone is really here calling benchmade trash
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PenguinsRcool2 said:
Morale of the story this knife series is the worst knife series of all time, perhaps the worst folding knife ever made.
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Correct- he didn't say Benchmade was trash.
... Just that a product they made is the worst knife series of all time, or perhaps ever made.

This guy really puts the "hyper" in "hyperbole".
 
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