Blade Rub

[Guyon]

Normal or not? I did a little searching and found a few different opinions. Just thought I'd see what others thought.

Got a Queen Cattle King stockman in the mail today. Beautiful knife. The only fault I can find is that the spey blade rubs the sheepsfoot blade upon opening. I bought it as a user, so I'm not all that worried about it. Still, thought I'd get some opinions about how common this is. Doesn't seem to occur with any of my Schrade stockman knives.

 

[rev_jch]

Rubbing will happen with some knives, and some knife designs. Whenever you have a knife with multiple blades it can happen, such as a congress, or some stockmans. Especially with a sow pattern as the blades tend to be thicker and the handles more "stubby" than other patterns. The blades on many knives are usually bent, or angled to accomodate one another. The case owbellys are good examples of this, also the large case stockmans. Sometimes its a design flaw and sometimes its just unavoidable. Ultimately it can be corrected on most any design, but when you are talking production knives, its common place. Some designs are notorious for this, and some seem to slip by. Unless its causing some really hard wear, I would not be too worried about it.

 

[Guyon]

Well, I revisited the three Schrade stockman knives I have as well. I think all three of them rub to some extent. You can feel it if you're paying close attention. Same blades, same place. It's just that the Queen rubs show up more because of the highly polished blades. The Schrade blades don't have that mirror finish on them.

 

[MarkPinTx]

One thing to watch is how you close the blades. Sometimes, you can exert pressure on a blade while you close it that makes the rub worse. Another note, don't let blades snap shut most of the time. Close them carefully to avoid rub and the edge bouncing off the spring. A G Russell recommends this kind of care.

 

[Guyon]

Mark, my rub seems to occur the most when I'm opening the spey (on all the knives I've looked at). Pushing my nail into the nail catch (better name for this?) exerts lateral pressure and causes the rub.

 

[Cliffr]

Nail nick...not that I'm a know-it-all or anything

 

[rev_jch]

Some things are unavoidable, unfortunately this will happen with the tolerances on mutli-blade slipjoints. Sometimes this can be avoided when they are made, but some designs are harder to "fine tune" and so because of mass production not as much attention is taken to detail.

 

[dsvirsky]

Another note, don't let blades snap shut most of the time. Close them carefully to avoid rub and the edge bouncing off the spring. A G Russell recommends this kind of care.

I've too have read that and tried to respect it. However, at last year's Blade Show, Bailey Bradshaw told me that on his multiblades, the tolerances are so tight that trying to guide the blade in softly is more likely to cause the blades to rub. I imagine that this would be true with other makers' knives, as well.