Benchmade Sibert 755 MPR

Seanski said:
I re-opened this thread to ask a question. I really like this knife and would
like to buy one. I played around with one in store.
I have one concern though. The lock stop. The one I handled seemed to
have the lock stop resting right up against the side of the blade. What is
going to happen to this knife as the years go on with respect to wear and
no more room for the frame lock to move over to compensate? Will it
develop blade play? I understand with the design it will never move over to
the opposite scale/frame but does it really fix the possibility of wear once
it hits the stop?
Also, does someone have a picture of this knife opened in hand? I'm curious
as to if you can get 4 digits around it or is it more of a 3 and a half finger
size? Thanks again. :)
Click to expand...

Eventually yeah, it'll hit the stop and prevent further wear, and hence, further self-adjustment, and then it would develop play. So in 10-20 years of use, you'd have to adjust the lockbar. This will happen eventually with any liner/framelock though, given enough time. The only advantage I can think of for having that stop on the tang is to prevent a liner from getting wedged between the scale and the tang...but that's only a problem on very thin liner locks like CRKT M16s etc..for obvious size reasons, that's impossible here.

But frame locks still have a lot of voodoo in them that resists concurrence among their users...seems like everyone has a different take on what makes them have problems, what makes them work...
 
Artfully Martial said:
Eventually yeah, it'll hit the stop and prevent further wear, and hence, further self-adjustment, and then it would develop play. So in 10-20 years of use, you'd have to adjust the lockbar.
Click to expand...

Nope.
You just rotate the stop-pin to a flat which gives the engagement you want.:thumbup:
 
I've only handled one in a store, but the framelock seemed weak compared to, say, a Sebenza or even the liner-lock on the Spyderco Military. Are they all like this, or did I just happen to fondle a weird one?
 
Cynic2701 said:
I've only handled one in a store, but the framelock seemed weak compared to, say, a Sebenza or even the liner-lock on the Spyderco Military. Are they all like this, or did I just happen to fondle a weird one?
Click to expand...

Can you define weak for us? Like, too thin or that it had little resistance to being pushed back to the unlocked position?
 
Artfully Martial said:
Can you define weak for us? Like, too thin or that it had little resistance to being pushed back to the unlocked position?
Click to expand...

Resistance to being pushed back to unlocked position. In my opinion, having G-10 over the lock-bar cutout makes the lock stronger compared to having only a bare frame.
 
I've had one since the end of last Oct,I like it a lot and for an all-around knife I think it fits very well,it also doesn't look "scary" it just looks like a Buck knife on steroids.

I have it on the right side pocket now and a Benchmade VEX on the left,been carrying a lot of their stuff of late :D
 
Cynic2701 said:
Resistance to being pushed back to unlocked position. In my opinion, having G-10 over the lock-bar cutout makes the lock stronger compared to having only a bare frame.
Click to expand...

I'd say that's a good feature though. I don't want to have to work to unlock it. Since the energy that's transferred to the lockbar is not in an unlocking direction, resistance to being unlocked by your finger (when applying lateral force) should have little or no effect on the integrity of the lock.

I was really surprised about the 0300s for the same thing though. I figured it'd have this unnecessarily beefy framelock that required a lot of strength to unlock, but it's actually the easiest ti framelock I've had.
 
Artfully Martial said:
I'd say that's a good feature though. I don't want to have to work to unlock it. Since the energy that's transferred to the lockbar is not in an unlocking direction, resistance to being unlocked by your finger (when applying lateral force) should have little or no effect on the integrity of the lock.

I was really surprised about the 0300s for the same thing though. I figured it'd have this unnecessarily beefy framelock that required a lot of strength to unlock, but it's actually the easiest ti framelock I've had.
Click to expand...

The energy is transferred laterally, because the tang of the blade is either radiused or slanted.

The slant or radius is probably less than 12 degrees, but that means that force is indeed being transferred laterally, however much of the force is being transferred down the lockbar.

The stronger the frame-lock is to disengage, the more force there is opposing energy attempting to fold the knife. On the other hand, the stronger the frame-lock is to disengage, the more wear it is going to experience in the same number of opening/closing cycles.

My Umnumzaan has the stiffest frame-lock I've ever held, and though it probably should be painful, I have a massive callus on my left thumb, so I don't really feel it.
 
Cynic2701 said:
The energy is transferred laterally, because the tang of the blade is either radiused or slanted.

The slant or radius is probably less than 12 degrees, but that means that force is indeed being transferred laterally, however much of the force is being transferred down the lockbar.

The stronger the frame-lock is to disengage, the more force there is opposing energy attempting to fold the knife. On the other hand, the stronger the frame-lock is to disengage, the more wear it is going to experience in the same number of opening/closing cycles.

My Umnumzaan has the stiffest frame-lock I've ever held, and though it probably should be painful, I have a massive callus on my left thumb, so I don't really feel it.
Click to expand...

Well, I suppose I should say, virtually all energy is transferred down the lockbar. I have never heard of a lockbar "sliding" off of the tang with pressure on the spine, and while I concede the possibility, I rather doubt it would happen prior to other points of failure in a nice knife like your umnumzaan or the 755. The more energy imparted to the lockbar/tang interface, the more resistance should be generated to sliding off...

but yeah, I'd like to reduce the wear on the interface more than I'd like some added security, since I feel a well made framelock is so far beyond any real strength requirement that it's somewhat of a moot point.
 
Artfully Martial said:
Well, I suppose I should say, virtually all energy is transferred down the lockbar. I have never heard of a lockbar "sliding" off of the tang with pressure on the spine, and while I concede the possibility, I rather doubt it would happen prior to other points of failure in a nice knife like your umnumzaan or the 755. The more energy imparted to the lockbar/tang interface, the more resistance should be generated to sliding off...

but yeah, I'd like to reduce the wear on the interface more than I'd like some added security, since I feel a well made framelock is so far beyond any real strength requirement that it's somewhat of a moot point.
Click to expand...

Go for an Umnumzaan or Sebenza then! The Umnumzaan has a ceramic ball that contacts the tang, which virtually eliminates the possibility of wear, and the Sebenza has a heat-treated lock-bar face (a feature that few frame-locks, other than some customs, have).

Which isn't to say that the Umnumzaan is infallible. There was a thread a while back about some Polish videos on an Umnumzaan failing. After much uproar, Chris Reeve showed that the lock-bar on the Polish Umnumzaan had been purposely bent out, and that it was only weakly contacting the blade tang. If the lock bar's stiffness is compromised (by bending it outwards for example) then any frame-lock can fail gentle spine wacks. Which is why I'm mildly concerned with how easily the 755 seemed to disengage.

I want to get either a 755 or a Bradlely Alias for my dad for father's day, and lock-bar stiffness will influence my decision.
 
I have the 755 its a great little tank of a kniofe. Actually i haven;t used it yet...its super sharp right out of the box...titanium frame is superlight, love the G10 grean handle...best thing i paid 127 bucks new in the box on ebay..
 
I traded a rifle for my 755.
No regrets at all.:)
As for tang slippage, when you hold the knife in a regular forward grip, your index finger prevents said slippage.
I've done the hard stabs to prove the point.
Just use it!!!
 
I haven't really had any trouble with framelock wear on my nicer Kershaws. They seem to last forever...over hte years I don't see any change...
 
thanks for all the interesting replies guys. :) I'll maybe check out and see
if someone is selling a good used one out there.
 
Good review and pics. I love my MPR even though I've only had it about a month. Stout little bugger and the action is smooth as greased glass.

Here's mine..
BM755001.jpg
 
I wanted one but it is ridiculously thick...I'd rather carry just about anything.
 
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