Best way to store assisted openers?

Converge said:
........ I keep some firearm mags loaded 24/7, but most empty until needed. I store my striker fired pistols with the trigger pressed and gun un-cocked, so the striker spring doesn't remain under tension. Just my preference.
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Good analogy for this. I store mine fired as well.
 
EChoil said:
You're right. As I said, it's such a minor thing...that it's almost theoretical. Far more deadly things to worry about. Like lint......
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Theoretically and scientifically, work hardening by plastic deformation is what causes them to wear out. every time it changes its shape, the metal reorients its structure to a more crystalline structure, which is harder and more brittle. Try bending a paperclip back and forth several times, it gets harder and harder to bend and eventually breaks. Springs do the same thing, although they can do this for far more cycles than paperclips.
 
Just one data point: I have a couple switchblades that have been stored closed for over 40 years. As near as I can tell they still function as they did when they were new. Again, just one data point.
 
EChoil said:
On most of em closed is tension, not resting.
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The point is that springs whether compressed or not it has no effect. And that a resting spring is not whether it is compressed or not but that it isnt actively moving. A spring will break if its going to break regardless of how you store it. There is no precaution you can take to reduce your chances sans not opening and closing the knife period. The only real way to reduce the expected life of a spring is to open and close the knife repeatedly in a short span of time as that builds up heat. Properly made springs stay properly made and require no special care.
 
wayben said:
Just one data point: I have a couple switchblades that have been stored closed for over 40 years. As near as I can tell they still function as they did when they were new. Again, just one data point.
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Thus the question becomes will their springs last as long with regained use as ones which have been stored relaxed for 40 years? I know which one I'd pick.....
 
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EChoil said:
Thus the question becomes will their springs last as long with regained use as ones which have been stored relaxed for 40 years?
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There is no difference. It simply doesnt work that way. Springs are made to have a specific spring tempered memory and it cant be removed by the way you store it.
 
PURPLEDC said:
There is no difference. It simply doesnt work that way. Springs are made to have a specific spring tempered memory and it cant be removed by the way you store it.
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Absolute zero change? After 10-40 years?? I wanna hear that from a metallurgist.

Again, if I were buying a knife and one had been stored closed for forty years, the other one relaxed for 40 years, I know which one I'd take. How about you? :)
 
EChoil said:
Absolute zero change? After 10-40 years?? I wanna hear that from a metallurgist.

Again, if I were buying a knife and one had been stored closed for forty years, the other one relaxed for 40 years, I know which one I'd take. How about you? :)
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I would take whichever knife looked to be in better condition regardless of how it was stored because it doesnt matter. If a spring is going to break it was either abused or defective. Springs made properly dont lose power or become weaker because you store them compressed. They are springs and are designed to be so and they dont care how many years pass.
 
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wayben said:
Just one data point: I have a couple switchblades that have been stored closed for over 40 years. As near as I can tell they still function as they did when they were new. Again, just one data point.
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Same here, and some of them aren't considered high quality either.
 
Yeah, I remember that thread. I read DeShivs (and notice each time he posts that he includes the disclaimer, "properly designed and manufactured springs")....and a lot of others there feel differently who I could pull-quote too. An engineer there contends that, "keeping any type of spring in a constantly loaded condition lessens it's lifetime whether it is a compression, torsion or leaf spring, and that goes especially the leaf design." I agree with him. The thread reads much like this one opinion-wise--split.

This discussion has come down to such picayunish technicality that it benefits no one. My thoughts on the whole subject have been submitted in, what, five posts now? Suddenly we're talking springs stored under load for 40 years....and it has ZERO effect on a knife spring? C'mon.

I believe springs are affected by both cyclical AND static loading and the more technical and micro circumspect one becomes the more it applies. Period. NASA grade springs maybe not quite so much.

A spring static loaded for 40 years and you'd buy it over the same knife that that was relaxed over that period? I think we have no more to discuss. We just disagree.
 
Yup, I have a crappy switchblade that's about 40 years old, it has a torsion bar type spring. It stays closed all the time and still fires hard.
 
crom said:
Yup, I have a crappy switchblade that's about 40 years old, it has a torsion bar type spring. It stays closed all the time and still fires hard.
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For now.... :)

Whether it will work again isn't the discussion here. It's whether the spring is affected/weakened at all by such a long period under static stress.
 
I don't recall reading multiple posts of broken springs in folding knives on the forum. Me thinks this may be a clue.
 
I may be in the minority, but I'm not worried about what will happen to my knives in 40 years. If the doing works, great. If not, I'll just manually open it.

Heck, I don't think I've even carried the same knife for more than a few years...
 
Bludgeon said:
I don't recall reading multiple posts of broken springs in folding knives on the forum. Me thinks this may be a clue.
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Just a reminder....the knives these guys are talking about are over 40 years old. Run your numbers again..... :)
 
I store them relaxed and turn them over every month to avoid any effects gravity might have. Can't imagine gravitational pull in only one direction for 40 years wouldn't harm a spring.
Just pulling your spring ;)
 
Jens Schuetz said:
I store them relaxed and turn them over every month to avoid any effects gravity might have. Can't imagine gravitational pull in only one direction for 40 years wouldn't harm a spring.
Just pulling your spring ;)
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When you bend that gravity to 10x normal and hold it there it just might.

Some knife nut from Los Alamos will come along now and prove that it would... :rolleyes:
 
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