Cold steel ti lite

[jencarlos]

had a question about the old school titanium ti lites. As I understand, the blue ones always came with a mirror polished blade, and I’ve only ever seen them that way. Did the gray ones ever come from the factory with mirror polished blades? I wondered because I’ve seen both polished and satin blades on gray ones and so I wondered if maybe they could both have come from the factory that way (and thus just be of different vintages). Or is a polished blade gray ti lite necessarily a knife polished after purchase?

Thnx

 

[jlauffer]

The old catalogs don't mention mirror-polished for the Ti-Lites, which they typically would for knives that have it (like the Black Sable and Spectre). I don't have a lot of experience with them, but I do have a regular titanium one (non-anodized), and the blade is kind of in between satin and mirror...it looks more polished than typical satin, but not quite mirror-polished. I also had an anodized one for a bit that I ended up selling. Looking back at the pics I took when selling it, it also appears to be more polished than typical satin, but not actually mirror-polished. I have not seen any of the non-titanium versions in person, so not sure if they have less polished blades, but would kind of make sense since they're supposed to be cheaper. Guess what I'm getting at is that maybe they are all technically considered satin, but to varying degrees, and if so, could understand it causing confusion. Sorry, not sure if any of this helps. Hopefully someone with more experience with them chimes in.

 

[nephron]

All my Titanium's are highly polished(6 at one time now 3-4), both gray and blue. Not an expert, but all I have seen are highly polished in titanium.

 

[jencarlos]

Alright cool. Thanks for the help. Yeah my gray one that I call satin is definitely more polished than other satin knives but not quite mirror. However, I’ve only seen the blue one in pictures and it is very obvious in the pictures that it is mirror

 

[nephron]

Glad I didn't claim to be an expert. I dug through the safe to find them and lo and behold I think they might have done a polish on the Blue Model. There is not much difference to my old eyes and I can't seem to catch it well in pictures, but it would make sense being that the Blue Anodize is very shiny, so I am changing my tune to the Blue is polished. I only have two titanium's now but they are both VG-1 so the steels are the same.

 

[KenHash]

I've had Titanium Ti-Lites and agree with everyone else. They are highly polished but not full mirror polish. If you see one that is full mirror polish I think it was likely done by an owner.