Broke my BK2

Yep,ethan becker is a stand up guy...this why i m getting more and more beckers...!
 
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Ethan you are the MAN? If it wasn't for Ethan I wonder how Ka-Bar would keep its customers happy. Thanks for being a stand up guy Ethan!!!
 
FWIW I've hammered my BK9 into a solid dried out chunk of tree trunk with a hard rubber mallet all the way through (talking a good 15" diameter and 15" tall). The blade was bending in multiple directions while it was passing down into the wood. One of the toughest knives I've ever used, had 3 of them at one point. Sold two of them to friends because I realized one is plenty and wanted to share the experience.

Ethan, you and your partners at KaBar make outstanding knives. Thank you for the opportunity to have such a great knife at a very low cost (ya hear that Busse and ESEE?), plus the fact that you personally are willing to back up your products gives me that warm fuzzy feeling inside. Keep up the good work!

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I also feel that the BK-2 should be able to "take it". So, Mr. Becker came through for you. I don't use mine much and if I used it to "baton" my way through a log, I would expect it not to break. If it did, they I would have learned something in the process about knives.
 
I spoke with Mr. Becker on the phone earlier tonight. He sure is a great person and was very interesting in trying to figure out why the knife broke. I can't say enough good things about him after our discussion. It looks like I am one of the few people who has broken a BK2. I guess this is some type of honor given the reputation for this knife.
 
Fritz said:
I spoke with Mr. Becker on the phone earlier tonight. He sure is a great person and was very interesting in trying to figure out why the knife broke. I can't say enough good things about him after our discussion. It looks like I am one of the few people who has broken a BK2. I guess this is some type of honor given the reputation for this knife.
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If there's anything you should learn from this, is that when you buy good gear that's backed up by a good company, you really feel free to use it. I know you get a lot of people calling what you did "abuse", but there's a reason why the BK2 is so beefy. It's not like you were using a tweener BK or something.
 
Well, Now I've seen two broken BK-2's............. You the man!! Haha.

But really, it's kinda unheard of. Must have been a little something wrong with the blade maybe?

You are in great hands with Uncle Ethan. That gentlemen has my utmost respect for how he treats his customers and stands behind his products.


I am curious as to why it snapped and didn't just bend like the recent Tweener?
 
Ethan Becker said:
Hey Fritz......

First off....You get a new knife.......

What follows, as I do not have the knife in hand, is speculation not science........ It appears to me that the break occurred at the transition zone between the hardened area of the blade and the softer handle area.....Sooooooo, I speculate that there was a problem with the heat treat........ We sell many thousands of Twos every year and we get maybe one or two back......

The only way to find flaws in metal other than visually checking for surface flaws that might be crack propagators is XRay and or magnafluxing..........This is prohibitively expensive.......

When I manufactured mountain climbing equipment finding potentially life threatening flaws was a bit of an obsession with me as I climbed on the equipment I sold......... I came up with a rule of thumb for perfection in manufacturing......90% of perfection costs very little more than 50% of perfection......past the 90% mark the cost curve starts an exponential climb until the last percent and even Uncle Sugar can not afford the last half percent ........Assuming a low 5,000 number per year and a bad showing of two per year not perfect gives us a .004 error rate....... Not as good as I would like but..........

Fritz.......

May I prevail upon you to give me a call at 423 295 2500....... I will be in this evening and tomorrow evening.....I want to make sure that all goes smoothly........ Thanks........

Ethan
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I read this and my jaw dropped to the floor.
Simply amazing...
This is why it will be a long time before I buy another knife that is not a Becker.
Showed the post to my wife and I think she finally gets it.
Still doesn't understand why I need "so many" knives, but at least she's cool with Beckers.
 
Mrknot said:
I read this and my jaw dropped to the floor.
Simply amazing...
This is why it will be a long time before I buy another knife that is not a Becker.
Showed the post to my wife and I think she finally gets it.
Still doesn't understand why I need "so many" knives, but at least she's cool with Beckers.
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Show your wife : "the all new joy of cooking" cookbook by ethan becker...soon enough she will be buying your knives...!
 
I've spent the last 20+ years in professional kitchens...sufficeth to say, I do most of the cooking at the Knot house...
She does whip up a mean Mac and Cheese though :-)
I'll have to find Mr Beckers book!
One more way I can show my support for an awesome guy!
 
The "Joy of Cooking" is quite easy to find and it is essentially a required cook book. It has changed over the years since in was published by Ethan's grandmother.

I'm also pretty impressed with the knife replacement decision.
 
One of the reasons I can be so "hands on" when a blade goes bad is that KA-BAR makes so few defective knives...... I gotta emphasize to you all how happy I am to be working with them........ They try REAL hard......... Yay !.....

Ethan
 
Knives are tools and tools break... Some are better then others but still at some point you expect a tool to break.... Given the fact that there are countless stories with photo's to back them up of people using their beckers in some very hard applications it is actually quite surpising there are not more broken blades out there.... This is a testiment to Mr Becker for great designs and in conjunction with Kabar great application of skills in manufacturing. The jewel on top is the warranty and the nature of Mr Becker to stand honestly behind his product even when we as customers may stretch the boundaries in using these tools.

I hold the belief that I have put my knives through some hard use and will continue to do so and at such a time a blade fails I will not for a second doubt that I will replace it with another becker as I am confident in their abilities.

Thank you Mr Becker and thank you Kabar and thank you Beckerheads for sharing your experiences
 
^^^^^^^^ what wildnewfie said, I agree wholeheartedly!
Thank you Ka-bar and Mr. Becker for excellent customer service and making a superb product.
 
Ethan Becker said:
Hey Fritz......

First off....You get a new knife.......

What follows, as I do not have the knife in hand, is speculation not science........ It appears to me that the break occurred at the transition zone between the hardened area of the blade and the softer handle area.....Sooooooo, I speculate that there was a problem with the heat treat........ We sell many thousands of Twos every year and we get maybe one or two back......

The only way to find flaws in metal other than visually checking for surface flaws that might be crack propagators is XRay and or magnafluxing..........This is prohibitively expensive.......

When I manufactured mountain climbing equipment finding potentially life threatening flaws was a bit of an obsession with me as I climbed on the equipment I sold......... I came up with a rule of thumb for perfection in manufacturing......90% of perfection costs very little more than 50% of perfection......past the 90% mark the cost curve starts an exponential climb until the last percent and even Uncle Sugar can not afford the last half percent ........Assuming a low 5,000 number per year and a bad showing of two per year not perfect gives us a .004 error rate....... Not as good as I would like but..........

Fritz.......

May I prevail upon you to give me a call at 423 295 2500....... I will be in this evening and tomorrow evening.....I want to make sure that all goes smoothly........ Thanks........

Ethan
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Ethan Becker said:
One of the reasons I can be so "hands on" when a blade goes bad is that KA-BAR makes so few defective knives...... I gotta emphasize to you all how happy I am to be working with them........ They try REAL hard......... Yay !.....

Ethan
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^^^ THIS is why I LOVE BK&T & KaBar !!! ^^^ THIS is also why i would not hesitate buying more, ( even though my wife says i don't need any more). ^^^ THIS is why I always steer new knife-thusiests to BK&T & KaBar. Made in America. Heavy Duty. Available at a working persons wages. Backed by an outstanding warranty & outstanding people. :thumbup::thumbup: :D
 
TwinStick said:
^^^ THIS is why I LOVE BK&T & KaBar !!! ^^^ THIS is also why i would not hesitate buying more, ( even though my wife says i don't need any more). ^^^ THIS is why I always steer new knife-thusiests to BK&T & KaBar. Made in America. Heavy Duty. Available at a working persons wages. Backed by an outstanding warranty & outstanding people. :thumbup::thumbup: :D
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Well said!
 
Silverthorn said:
Well the Original was solid, but thinner. If I am not mistaken.
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daizee said:
That sucks.
BTW, it's a fairly substantial weight reduction - I've got the gen-1 and it's a beast.
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True, I have a Camillus made BK2 and it is thinner, and also heavier.
Le Fermier said:
I'm glad I saw this thread. I've been using my BK2 for roots, and lifting with side pressure and such while metal detecting. Nothing but bends and twists in a hole. I'll need to quit this. I bought the knife for this purpose and now I see I made a poor choice in knives. (Please people, I said 'I' made a poor choice; not denigrating the knife at all). It is reviewed as a beast. Well then it's a beast with a weak spot. A skeletal tang is as strong a a full tang????? Never let empirical evedence get in the way of a good theory! Any suggestions for a replacement for my purposes?
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It's not really a theory. The solid tang 9's break more often than the skeletonized 9's because there is a spot from the roll stamping that allows for stress risers. And .004% is not "empirical" by any stretch. The BK2 is a beast in any configuration, and I would say that Fritz was just unlucky, but he's not: he purchased a Becker. Which means that instead of breaking his knife and being SOL, he just has to wait a bit for the replacement. What other company/designer offers that sort of guarantee at the high value price point of the BK2? That's why I'll continue to buy (and use the hell out of) BK&T. Thank you, Ethan.
 
Ethan Becker said:
One of the reasons I can be so "hands on" when a blade goes bad is that KA-BAR makes so few defective knives...... I gotta emphasize to you all how happy I am to be working with them........ They try REAL hard......... Yay !.....

Ethan
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Ethan,

I assume you can't replace broken beckers everytime one breaks. my question is will ka-bar replace these these types of damage from batoning? I know they don't warrant broken knives that has been batoned but what if the knife a is a lemon and breaks from batoning? is ka-bar going to test the knife for a bad heat treat and replace it?
 
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