cut off tang ?

[rprocter]

here is a plastic ? handled 3 5/8" jack. the walk & talk is very smooth, v. strong spring, 1/2 stop and very tight lock-up. however the tang is very shallow and only "ostfrei' in arch and tops of Kissing Crane heads is present. the tang is cut off right below the "i" in rostfrei, taking the "R" off as well.
the blade is spotless and looks newer than the knife, but as i mentioned, fit is perfect and who would re-work a plastic handle knife ? so maybe it came from the factory like this ? has anyone else got similar examples and what could be the explanation ? thanks, roland

 

[Blues]

Some people grind the kick on the tang to get the blade to fit better (lower) in the handle of the knife.

 

[rprocter]

in 2nd pic you can see kick, i don't think it has been ground and notice how shallow the tang is on the spine side. that's what's odd. roland

 

[zerogee]

I think it's just a "new" blade that's been retrofitted however they can. One thing that doesn't make much sense to me: it's a swayback jack with a normal clip blade. Old swaybacks were almost always made with either a pruner/hookbill blade or a sheepsfoot/lambsfoot/sorta-wharncliffe type blade (because the swayback lets the spring get out of the way so the blade can sit down into the handle). The scales look to be molded hard rubber, which I normally associate with knives made during and a bit after WWII (though that's not definite). I also don't normally associate heavy rattail bolsters (are they iron?) with stainless blades.

 

[rprocter]

thanks zerogee, i agree the clip blade seems wrong here. the bolsters have no rust so i assume they are stainless. why would anyone put a new blade (and do an excellent job) for a cheapo handle, so that i can buy it on ebay for $20 ? doesn't make sense to me. roland

 

[puukkoman]

Somebody probably put it together from parts for their own use, and then it wound up in the hands of someone else (who sold it to you).

 

[zerogee]

It wouldn't be too hard a job to replace the blade really -- if you have a replacement of sufficient size and the correct thickness to begin with. You take the old blade out, line up the pivot holes (hope they're the same size), then (carefully) grind away the tang of the new blade to match the old, pin the new one and you're golden. Well, sort of - there are still a lot of ways to screw it up, but if you know what you're about, and had the proper spare parts, it wouldn't take long to do. But I don't see selling it to you on ebay for $20 as a big motivation. It probably was done either for themselves or just to bring a junker back.