Cleaning an Axis Lock knife? Not that scary.

[Blade and Flame]

A while ago, I bought a Mini Ritter Grip off the Exchange with some nice jade green G11. Beautiful knife, but the action was always pretty sticky compared to my other Mini Grips. The pivot always felt sluggish — difficult to flick and generally not the silky smoothness we know and love from our Axis Benchmades.

I've always been a bit hesitant to break down Axis lock knives due to the assumption that it would involve disassembling the whole locking mechanism.

So I did a little research. These two posts were invaluable:
Benchmade Griptilian Strip and Reassembly
How to disassemble and re-assemble a Benchmade Griptilian

The takeaway that the blade and washers could be removed without disassembling the whole Axis assembly and messing with the omega springs changed everything. Needless to say, cleaning the pivot was super easy. With a little cleaning and Tuf-Glide, the action on the Mini Grip is great now.

Anyway, point being: Cleaning an Axis Lock knife? Not that scary!

Thanks for all the great info here on the forums.

 

[Honed_Edge]

Grips are VERY easy to fully disassemble. I'm far from an expert but w/o reading a how-to I took my wife's pink mini apart to lube/protect it. We went to the ocean and I wanted them for beach walks. Disassembling, lubing and assembly took 15-20 minutes. The blade centered itself afterwards too!

I see lot's of people saying they are scared to do it... other than the warranty thing its nothing to worry about.

 

[RevDevil]

I usually just wash the folder in soapy water, blast the water out and it's squeaky clean.

 

[T. Erdelyi]

I bought one of the first Axis locks when they first came out, I didn't have it a week before I had to take it apart to see how it worked, somewhere here there's a how to on disassembling a 730 Ares I did with a lot of pics, it's not that hard at all if you've got even the least mechanical aptitude.

 

[P_Meticulous]

I usually just wash the folder in soapy water, blast the water out and it's squeaky clean.

Ditto,

I usually rinse my whole knife in hot soapy water, wash, get the insides with Q-tips, use compressed air to blow out remaining water, and call it good.

Sometimes I'll re-oil the pivot/axis area, and throw some cleanser on the blade, and that's it. Keeps them squeaky clean

 

[Bigfattyt]

I usually just wash the folder in soapy water, blast the water out and it's squeaky clean.

This.

13 years and I have never had to take one apart.

I don't even blast out the water! Just blow and shake. I have even gone so far as to add a tiny drop of oil.

 

[pbcg]

Soap & water if really dirty followed by or just flushing with WD-40 with the applicator straw always did it for me.

I do like to add Break-Free CLP afterwards to the blade and caming surfaces for function enhancement and corrosion prevention.

 

[jkarp_53]

Agreed. Hot soapy water, an old toothbrush and pipe cleaners (still around) work wonders for the innards followed by a hair dryer set to low. I'll add a drop of Tuf-Glide to the pivots and that's it.

 

[Jastab]

They are super easy to take fully apart. I can break down and re assemble my 300sn in like 5 mins.

 

[yoz's friend]

when mine gets sluggish i just spray it with brake cleaner, and its back like new. someone here suggested a little lubricant afterwords so i will do that in the future

 

[supercoup]

I usually do the full tear down when I clean them. I like to be thorough.

Interestingly enough, it's never been the axis mechanism that gives me trouble. Every single time I have a difficulty it is with replacing the pivot female piece. Getting the SOB in there always takes more patience than I have.