Case quality control?

[GasMan1]

That's a fine looking group Harry. :thumbup: That Seahorse Whittler is captivating.

 

[Wowbagger]

I'm basically VERY happy with the quality of my case knives.

I think about the only problem I have with Case and it is a pretty significant thing is the color of the scales in their on line catalog are some times WILDLY different from what shows up at my door.

This was supposed to be a very deep blue. The photo makes it look a little darker than it really is.
Still a seriously NICE knife. So much so I kept it inspire of the color disappointment.


And I am just ecstatic over this knife. I am re-rediscovering how much I enjoy using it.
I made a little modification recently. Kind of a Copper lock but without the Copper or the lock. :thumbup: :thumbup: :thumbup:




The fit and finish and pleasing action / tension of the blade springs on my Case knives is pretty consistently miles better than Boker for very similar knives . . . for example on my full size trappers and on several medium stockmans of both brands.

I will keep buying Case . . . for sure.

 

[Wowbagger]

You can do this with some dealers too if you find one willing to inspect the knife.

I have had really good results doing this. Definitely worth the time.

 

[Wowbagger]

I heard from a Case employee at a knife show that many of their knife images shown on white backgrounds are not photographed knives, but 3D rendered models of knives from a computer. That may be why the actual product colors aren't as nice looking as what it looks like on the computer screen.

. . . some one should hand some of those 3D renderings to the dudes doing the dye work. They have obviously never seen them. ha, ha, ha . . . sob, sob, sob (some of them are gorgeous).

To be fair Boker has the same problem THE SMOOTH DARK RED BONE.

I worked my self into a frenzy trying to get one of those that looked like the photo. I ordered a few, sent 'em back, talked to more vendors (once I discovered the impossible dream I was involved in) . . . ebay . . . nada.

 

[meako]

I have a penchant for the Russlocks. They're kinda quirky in oldy worldy way that I find appealing.
I recently had to decide between the harvest orange bone stainless drop point and the pocket worn whiskey bone cv clip point.
The harvest orange won because I wanted to bolster(snicker) my drop point contingent with a second one.
I'd been working hard so as Xmas approached I purchased a "Toxxin"acrylic pocket hunter for my son ( his first proper American pocketknife replacing a RR "venom" acrylic trapper which has gone missing) and the whiskey bone Russlock for myself .
That brings my tally up to 6. No question about quality with any of them -better than good for mine including the exchange rate.
So tell me!

Are they any different in colour? Nothing wrong with either but seriously to me they are too alike to be known as different colours.
Obviously slight difference with the jigging.
My only real whinge with case dye jobs was the saddlehorn trapper TB production run with "new black" jigged bone scales. Appalling colour. A more accurate descripition of that colour would have been "dead mans gut juice" but who'd buy that?
not to worry I dyed it black and it came out lovely.
Go case I say. I think they are nailing the collector demographic on a number of levels as well as the user market at a price that includes variety and quality.
Cheers.

 

[Wowbagger]

Oh and Harry, that's a great set of the Rogers jigged walnut models---love the bone and love the bolsters.

While I was trying to find a Trapper to cut the spay blade off of instead of do it to my Case Stag Trapper, I had like . . . I don't know but a whole bunch of Trappers and especially Case Trappers in my shopping cart "save for latter". Just tons of them. Sod busters too. Once I bought a Boker, modded it . . . thought about it . . . tried to stop my self; then finally did what I really wanted to do and modded the Case Stag Trapper . . .

I dumped all of the knives from the "save for latter" . . . except . . . the Jigged Walnut Trapper . . . I couldn't dump it. I don't need it . . . probably won't buy it for a while . . . but JUST COULD NOT dump it out of the queue. It is a seriously classic knife. Good stuff.

 

[Jack Black]

I've had better luck with Case than I have with GEC :thumbup:

 

[leghog]

. . . some one should hand some of those 3D renderings to the dudes doing the dye work. They have obviously never seen them. ha, ha, ha . . . sob, sob, sob (some of them are gorgeous).

To be fair Boker has the same problem THE SMOOTH DARK RED BONE.

I worked my self into a frenzy trying to get one of those that looked like the photo. I ordered a few, sent 'em back, talked to more vendors (once I discovered the impossible dream I was involved in) . . . ebay . . . nada.

Here's my one Boker. Red bone. Dark and even with matching scales. I remember having to touch my front teeth to the scales to assure myself it was bone when I bought it new. I'm pleased with it.

Dye problems aren't a new thing with Case. This is a '65-'69 knife.

 

[Wurrwulf]

I have a penchant for the Russlocks. They're kinda quirky in oldy worldy way that I find appealing.
I recently had to decide between the harvest orange bone stainless drop point and the pocket worn whiskey bone cv clip point.
The harvest orange won because I wanted to bolster(snicker) my drop point contingent with a second one.
I'd been working hard so as Xmas approached I purchased a "Toxxin"acrylic pocket hunter for my son ( his first proper American pocketknife replacing a RR "venom" acrylic trapper which has gone missing) and the whiskey bone Russlock for myself .
That brings my tally up to 6. No question about quality with any of them -better than good for mine including the exchange rate.
So tell me!

Are they any different in colour? Nothing wrong with either but seriously to me they are too alike to be known as different colours.
Obviously slight difference with the jigging.
My only real whinge with case dye jobs was the saddlehorn trapper TB production run with "new black" jigged bone scales. Appalling colour. A more accurate descripition of that colour would have been "dead mans gut juice" but who'd buy that?
not to worry I dyed it black and it came out lovely.
Go case I say. I think they are nailing the collector demographic on a number of levels as well as the user market at a price that includes variety and quality.
Cheers.

The problem is that this is how that knife is advertised:

It's a deep, even "rusty" orange-red. I just don't think it's close to what you purchased. I understand that the nature of the beast will create variances between any two pieces of bone, but a QC departments' job is to minimize the differences.

I own more Case knives than any other brand, like many here. I'll continue to buy Case knives, as well, but to excuse their poor dye jobs and QC department because "they're users" is a bit unacceptable to me, especially as they are branded as "The World's Most Collected Knife".

 

[bt93]

I have 3 Case knives in their 'surgical steel' and found they can get wicked sharp. I'm sure the edge holds up at least as well as my Victorinox. I prefer stainless so I stay away from CV.
Anyway the only complaint I ever had with Case is the back springs can be very stiff. My backpocket model was really hard to open and close, so I sat back watching a game and openned and closed it over and over. Now it's much easier, but still pretty strong. That large of blade for a slippie should have a strong spring.

 

[Old Engineer]

While I was trying to find a Trapper to cut the spay blade off of instead of do it to my Case Stag Trapper, I had like . . . I don't know but a whole bunch of Trappers and especially Case Trappers in my shopping cart "save for latter". Just tons of them. Sod busters too. Once I bought a Boker, modded it . . . thought about it . . . tried to stop my self; then finally did what I really wanted to do and modded the Case Stag Trapper . . .

I dumped all of the knives from the "save for latter" . . . except . . . the Jigged Walnut Trapper . . . I couldn't dump it. I don't need it . . . probably won't buy it for a while . . . but JUST COULD NOT dump it out of the queue. It is a seriously classic knife. Good stuff.

The possible problem I see that you may run into by not going ahead and getting the Rogers Jigged Walnut Bone Trapper now is : THEY ARE STARTING TO BE BOUGHT UP .

Harry

 

[ISKRA]

Actually no, that one was bought sight-unseen over the Internet. However, I would not have sent you a poor quality knife as a gift, so from that perspective it was hand picked. If it had been a piece of crap I just wouldn't have sent it to you. I agree that it was a flawless knife except for the slight difference in scale colors, but that's not unusual with Case knives and I didn't think it would decrease your enjoyment of the knife.

Well look at that. I would have guessed the oposite. Sure turned out great though and you're right, the difference in scale colour is only slight and it doesn't bother me at all. I actually like it. The pile side is darker and looks beautiful. The mark side is a bit lighter and under certain light it reminds a bit of those old delrin handles Camillus and other companies used back in the day, it's interesting. It's a great knife, I hadit with me just the other day in the vineyard when I helped my dad cutting the vines.

 

[AShearer]

Dye problems aren't a new thing with Case. This is a '65-'69 knife.

Wow! Excellent way to make that point leghog. It is kind of hard to imagine that got out of the factory.

 

[AShearer]

Notice that the Tang Date Stamp shows a blade made in 2015 even though the knife was supposedly made in 2016 . All others are date stamped 2016.

I Will Not be sending it back . It has a story to tell . I just wish that I knew all of it.
Over all , I am quite happy with the Series of 8 .
Harry

We see this so much. I have a thought about how and why this happens. The died slabs have to be some uniform size and thickness when they come from jigging and dying. It wouldn't make sense in a production environment to produce custom sizes in the jigging and dying part of the process. So, various lengths of covers and shapes of knives have high spots where the cover meets to bolster(s). This high area gets buffed down flush and takes out either the jigging pattern and/or the color.

Maybe this is obvious?

 

[AShearer]

Speaking of color variation? These photos are from GEC website. The images of the Smooth Orange Bone on the DLT #74. IN FAIRNESS; I don't know if these are done/done and if any will be culled as seconds?

 

[Wurrwulf]

GEC did the same with the Violet 72s and the recent Smooth Brown Camel Bone knives. They don't seem to be terribly consistent with dyed smooth bone.

 

[Old Engineer]

I don't know enough about the materials or the manufacturing processes to explain what really caused the big Color Variation . I can only guess that there is a large variation in the density of the Bone . With the main blade showing that it was made in 2015 , does that indicate that they took a complete knife of another color ( red ) and put it in the Walnut dye ????
With the very real probability of color variation , Case should know their customers well enough to know that we are not real happy with much variation . When a large variation occurs , and it does , the company should have an Upper and Lower Limit color chart for someone to make the Accept or Reject decision .
The Red Shades that are so obvious in this picture is also noticeable in all 7 of the others , just not to this extent .
Had I been handling these at a dealership , I would have looked for a different one , but since I have it now , I will keep it and enjoy the well made knife and the 2015 Blade in a 2016 Knife .

Harry

 

[Will Power]

Shawn I believe Camel Bone is more resistant to dye, my Smooth Bone 38 is quite marbled but I find it attractive and it works well on smooth bone, not so much on jigged.

Harry My Walnut EE Stockman shows very dark uniform colour on the mark side, the pile is more like yours, streaky and pale near the bolsters. But, it's not annoying, looks sun bleached in a way. what does concern me a little bit on this knife is the extreme thinness of the bone scales themselves. I'd prefer thicker slabs.

My last post of 2016, only 4 mins to go here!

Will

 

[meako]

The problem is that this is how that knife is advertised:

It's a deep, even "rusty" orange-red. I just don't think it's close to what you purchased. I understand that the nature of the beast will create variances between any two pieces of bone, but a QC departments' job is to minimize the differences.

I own more Case knives than any other brand, like many here. I'll continue to buy Case knives, as well, but to excuse their poor dye jobs and QC department because "they're users" is a bit unacceptable to me, especially as they are branded as "The World's Most Collected Knife".

The dealer I use is non BF so I can't mention their name -just don't walk under any non living trees- has a pic that is different again although resembles the actual colour more accurately than the one you showed.

 

[heday60]

I use to like Case until they "lost" my great grandfathers knife, which had the 25cent tang stamp, then replaced it with a new one!

That happened to one of dad's bone handled knifes. I was more upset than he was. He was upset, but said at least he got a new knife out of it.

I still love Case.

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