Cattaraugus 22929 question about notches on small blade

[failbot]

I recently bought one, this one, photo here and made a short video

My photo comes before the video, the photo from eBay comes after the video (and it has wooden handles, mine has some kind of micarta)

Cattsss 22929

Explore this photo album by Desert Snake on Flickr!

www.flickr.com

As you can see, the small blade has a notch. I've never seen such notches before on sunfish/elephant toenail, so I assumed the previous owner had chipped the blade and created this notch to repair the damage, or wanted to make a notch for stripping wires, like on electrician's knives, but didn't have time to sharpen it

A couple of days ago, I was browsing eBay and spotted another 22929 that I'd missed (otherwise I would have bid on it!), and it has the same notch. I looked at the photo, and it looks like it was done at the factory. I can't find any old Cattaraugus catalogs online or buy them to examine them closely. Has anyone else seen these notches on these beautiful old knives in person or in catalogs?

And there's always the possibility that both knives once belonged to the same person, who modified them for some purpose ::tounge::


I added a link to the file storage, because for some reason the uploaded photos look like colored stripes

 

[ea42]

That's a broken blade. Most likely someone tried to use it to twist something like a screw head and the blade snapped. Seen that on quite a number of blades. Even did it to a blade myself when trying to crink it and missed the mark. They always break that way under those conditions as the break gets stopped by the thicker steel and backtracks to a thinner area.

Eric

 

[afishhunter]

As you can see, the small blade has a notch. I've never seen such notches before on sunfish/elephant toenail, so I assumed the previous owner had chipped the blade and created this notch to repair the damage, or wanted to make a notch for stripping wires, like on electrician's knives, but didn't have time to sharpen it

That's a broken blade. Most likely someone tried to use it to twist something like a screw head and the blade snapped. Seen that on quite a number of blades. Even did it to a blade myself when trying to crink it and missed the mark. They always break that way under those conditions as the break gets stopped by the thicker steel and backtracks to a thinner area.

Eric

At least it is the secondary that was damaged.
(my most used blade on my sunfish is the primary.)
Do you have a round stone or file you can use to sharpen the divot to a wire stripper?

 

[failbot]

At least it is the secondary that was damaged.
(my most used blade on my sunfish is the primary.)
Do you have a round stone or file you can use to sharpen the divot to a wire stripper?

I used to have a round diamond file somewhere. There's a set of round synthetic ruby rods, but they're more for the final sharpening stage

 

[failbot]

Although I never figured out how to effectively use a rounded notch for stripping wires, I and all my friends, some of whom have been professional electricians for 50-60 years, use regular blades. For me, the ones with a slightly curved cutting edge (three left) are the most comfortable, although drop point blades are sometimes also useful (one right).