CRK fixies - why coat a magnacut blade?

Brummie

Brummie

Joined
Jan 13, 2007
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I've always liked the Green Beret and Pacific. Who doesn't like a Bill Harsey design?

I've never been overly excited by the choice of steel in the past, but 4V and Magnacut have me more interested. And compared to the prices of other high-quality production fixed blades, CRKs are starting to look fairly reasonable.

My question, though, is if you're shifting production over to Magnacut, then why keep Cerakoating the blades? I can't see that it serves any practical purpose. If the concern is low reflectivity, then a heavy stonewash or bead-blast would serve the same result. I also doubt it's a cost-saving measure (like Busse using a thick crinkle-coat to hide a bunch of machining and chatter marks).

On the other hand, the coating has real downsides - it reduces cutting performance and makes wear a lot more visible. In some cases, blade coatings can also interfere with the heat treat (not saying that is the case here, but Magnacut does seem to be fussy).

I don't know if anyone from CRK drops into these forums and can explain the logic, or say whether uncoated options may be available in future. If they do start offering them naked, I'd be tempted to order a Green Beret.
 
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I'd really be interested to see this myself. I used to prefer the black blade simply on aesthetics, but I recently got my first naked fixed blade, a CPK DEK1 in D3V, and damn is that thing a looker. I'm actually wearing it on my hip with gym shorts as I type this.
 
I would guess it’s to make it more tactical/less shiny as that is the market for those particular fixed blades.
 
Actual CRK folk stopped participating on here years ago. In my opinion Tim and co thought: hey why change what’s been doing? Personally I wish they’d stopped doing it. No one is using a fixed crk in any situation where reflective blade comes into concern. Cut out that entire process and let the steel develop character.
 
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loon#r said:
Actual CRK folk stopped participating on here years ago. In my opinion Tim and co thought: hey why change what’s been doing? Personally I wish they’d stopped doing it. No one is using a fixed crk in any situation where reflective blade comes into concern. Cut out that entire process and let the steel develop character.
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You don’t need to coat a blade to make it non-reflective. And I have no problem with them coating knives, if some people want that, but offer a non-coated version as well for those who want their knives to be knives.

It seems that, under Tim, CRK is becoming more responsive to customer demands (e.g. newer steels run harder), but it’s still a slow process, particularly if you don’t interact with customers.
 
Both are designed to be combat knives. Dark coating helps in some cqc situations. Both models can be used as outdoor knives, but… it was never the intention of neither Chris nor Bill.

Honestly I’d rather see a new big camp knife in the lineup. Something like 6” blade Impofu variant… just imagine that!
 
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