Coleman/Western steel?

zakjak221

zakjak221

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So when Coleman took over Western knives 1984-1991,did they continue to use the same steel as Western did ( 1095 CEO van)...specifically "M" labeled model W39...thanks for any help on this.
 
good question, and i dont know. when coleman owned it did they use the western longmont location and tooling to make the knives? if so I'd think maybe it would be the same steel...... but that's guessing......
 
I'd tend to agree with jb. I don't see them changing the steel at that point. Coleman didn't change the plant. According to Wiki, the plant etc were spun off by Coleman to an investor group in 1990, who later sold the whole kit and caboodle to Camillus in 1991. So I'd guesstimate that the blade steel remained the same.

Let's try this in the Traditional Forum. Likely somebody there knows more than I do about it.
 
knarfeng said:
I'd tend to agree with jb. I don't see them changing the steel at that point. Coleman didn't change the plant. According to Wiki, the plant etc were spun off by Coleman to an investor group in 1990, who later sold the whole kit and caboodle to Camillus in 1991. So I'd guesstimate that the blade steel remained the same.

Let's try this in the Traditional Forum. Likely somebody there knows more than I do about it.
Click to expand...
These were my thoughts as well,but Camillus did change the steel to stainless after their purchase of company, right?
 
I doubt they changed anything, they didn't change anything when they owned Crosman airguns so I don't see why they'd go changing anything with western knives aside from offering a line of Crosman branded pocket knives at one time.
They didn't know anything about knives or about airguns, they were just trying to diversify and expand into other areas of the outdoors recreation space they were in.
 
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No the steel did not change. Stainless was available before Coleman or Camillus acquired Western.
Love my western knives. Have some pics on rimfire central. The Platts family were the original Western
Owners/Makers. I even have some that were never completed, a lot of old employees have original stock
Still today.
 
zakjak221 said:
specifically "M" labeled model W39...
Click to expand...
The "M" is the date code for 1989.
(started with "A" in 1977. I have a "D" (1980) L66 fixed blade and 062 two blade slipjoint folding hunter.)
I am not sure, but I "think" Coleman dropped the date codes in 1990 or 1991.
 
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