Do all Tenacious knives have a sudden downward grind on top of blade tip?

B

badman400

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Aug 11, 2013
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This may sound like a crazy question, but I am now on my 2nd Tenacious from Amazon. I had just sent back the day before for a replacement of another knife ordered in the same order as the Tenacious. Then I opened the Tenacious (my first one), and saw that it had a noticeable dive on the top of the blade right at the tip. After just having sent the other knife for a replacement I kept the Tenacious another day and tried to make my peace with the defect. That's when I noticed the blade was off centered enough so that adjustment made it impossible to flip out quickly. A must for my ADD. :rolleyes:

Thinking it might be a "second" I finally sent in for a replacement of the Tenacious. As usual Amazon was fast and I had the new one in hand even before UPS had picked up the defective one. With much anticipation I opened the new replacement Tenacious only to find it too had as much if not more of a downward dive ground into the top of the blade tip. The replacement however, did have a centered blade and deployed much more nicely than the first. As I looked it over, once again trying to make peace with the ground down tip, I noticed a faint but 1.5" scratch on the left side of the blade. No amount of polishing with a clean cloth would wipe it away. Also though sharp, the edge grind was awful. Damn. Can't catch a break. :mad:

Am I just too picky? Is this a usual thing with the Tenacious blade tip? Or should I return it again and expect a good blade tip, centered and without scratches? I don't want to ride a good horse to death, but I was expecting better after all the reviews and research. Will I have better luck going through Spyderco? Will they pay for pickup of the defective knife? Thanks in advance to those with more Tenacious experience. :cool:
 
Well the tenacious is a budget blade so things like centering issues and possibly scratches are just the nature of the beast. As for the tip, what do you mean a dive? How severe does it slope down? With spyderco like most customer service you pay to send it to them and pay for them to send it back. Pictures would help but unfortunately a 35 dollar knife is just most subject to defects than a 100, 200, 400 dollar knife
 
I have some of the higher end 300-400 custom knives as well. This was my first Spyderco, and though it was a budget knife, I expected more. I like the knife overall and I can live with the imperfections if that's as good as it gets, but I'd really like to hear from some others who actually own the Tenacious. Maybe some who've purchase theirs from Amazon. Here are some pics. In the first you can see the scratch. I didn't see the second scratch until I saw the pic. In the third picture you can see the uneven edge grind and the "dive" at the tip in the fourth is obvious to me.

Perhaps you're partially correct in believing that budget knives are "subject" to defects. But I have many other lower end and budget knives from China, Taiwan, Japan and elsewhere that have much better attention to detail, grinds and lines than the two examples of Tenacious I received so far. Otherwise I like the overall design of the Tenacious. I guess I just want to to know if this really is the best they usually do with this line. Again, thanks in advance for any/all replies. Pictures of other Tenacious blade tips might be helpful as well. :cool:





 
Your question made me pull my EDC Tenacious from my pocket.
The tip looks exactly like yours. My centering is good and mine has way more scratches than yours, but mine gets used frequently.
I did choose to clean up the edge and regrind the plunge when it was new, but I put that down to my compulsive nature.
It looks like a fair bit of steel was removed when it was factory sharpened so either the blank needed to be ground quite a bit to remove defects or the person doing the sharpening was kind of heavy handed.
The knife was sharp and would cut when I received it and I've sharpened it many times since then. I don't expect to wear it out for many years.
 
Blade tip on mine also looks just like yours. Many liner lock knives, regardless of price, have less than perfect blade centering when closed. Scratches would definitely bother me on a knife I'd purchased for display in my collection, but they'd be somewhat less likely to bother me on a nice one I intended to use, and not at all on a cheap beater. That said, opinions on what's acceptable in terms of fit and finish on any given knife are going to vary. Short of total OCD, there's no "right" or "wrong" here.
 
OK, Thanks for all the replies guys! As for OCD? Guilty. I'm a little overly picky when it comes to new purchases, but the Tenacious will get used.

Still, even my "beaters" or used knives get taken care of, cleaned, oiled and keep an edge that will cut well enough for the particular use they were made. So, I'll just right this one off to a machinist/OCD mind applied to a budget knife and get on with it.

I do more reading here than posting, but it means a lot to have a place I can come to and get the straight dope from those who know and have owned the item in question.

Thanks again!
Wade :cool:
 
I don't really see a problem in your pictures, thus for a $45 knife it looks fine to me.
 
So as I went thru the Spyderco knives that I have.. The Delica2, Tenacious, Sprint Nishijin Glass Fiber Spin all have the sharp drop at the blade tip.. The Spin is the most abrupt.. John
 
Thanks. I feel better about it now after hearing from others that own the knife.

It just looked at first almost like the person doing the grinding was maybe covering a mistake with the dive at the tip/top of the blade.

I realize I was probably expecting a little bit much out of a budget knife.

It's just that I have bought some pretty nice "budget" blades with excellent grinds, centering and polishing.

Never having handled a Tenacious in person, I didn't know totally what to expect other than what I'd seen in the YT videos I've watched.

I do like everything else about the Tenacious. I'll straighten the edge a bit and use the fire out of it.

Again, thanks for the replies. :cool:
 
If it were my knife, I'd probably straighten out and blend the spine curvature because I'm a little OCD about how the lines flow on a knife. I have an older Tenacious, but don't remember if the tip was like yours when I got it.

Enjoy your knife!

Ric
 
Phydeaux said:
If it were my knife, I'd probably straighten out and blend the spine curvature because I'm a little OCD about how the lines flow on a knife. I have an older Tenacious, but don't remember if the tip was like yours when I got it.

Enjoy your knife!

Ric
Click to expand...

You too, huh?

It's just a perfectionist thing, OCD, just plain picky, or maybe all of the above with me. :o

And since I wasn't sure after receiving two the same way, I figured I ask before going for a third replacement, seeing as how everything else about this one, ie, centering, etc was great.

When it comes time to do a good sharpening, I'll be taking the wrinkles out of the grind, smoothing up the edge and will probably smooth out the spine as you suggest.

Until then, I'm just gonna use it. I say that about every new knife, then end up babying it at least for a while anyway. :rolleyes:

I have so many to choose from. At present, my main EDC is a SOG Aegis, black/satin, a small Gerber multitool and the Tenacious.

So, it will probably get at least some use. The older I get, the more they do but the better they're cared for.

Most people would think that even my users are never used.

But I enjoy my collection of sharp and pointy things. :cool:

BPK (Bullet Proof Knife), by Ben Tendick
 
I keep my knives and guns pretty clean. ;)

But the Tenacious is brand new. :D

I do admit I let the AK-47 slide sometimes. :cool:
 
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badman400 said:
Thanks. I feel better about it now after hearing from others that own the knife.

It just looked at first almost like the person doing the grinding was maybe covering a mistake with the dive at the tip/top of the blade.

I realize I was probably expecting a little bit much out of a budget knife.

It's just that I have bought some pretty nice "budget" blades with excellent grinds, centering and polishing.

Never having handled a Tenacious in person, I didn't know totally what to expect other than what I'd seen in the YT videos I've watched.

I do like everything else about the Tenacious. I'll straighten the edge a bit and use the fire out of it.

Again, thanks for the replies. :cool:
Click to expand...

my ZDP189 Delica does the same thing at the tip. I don't think it's sloppy machining or even poor design, I think it was a conscious design decision to minimize weakness in the knife tip. I don't mind it, brings to mind the somewhat avian look that runs through lots of spyderco knives. I personally can't stand the idea of shaving off a bunch of metal from the strongest part of the blade, just to clean up the blade's lines.
 
Exactly, the tip grind isn't a mistake or error it is part of the design. Older Spydercos had typical very pointy tips, but now many models (especially knives that are likely to be used hard with thinner grinds) have the cropped tip to lessen the odds of a broken tip. Looking at the Delica models over the years makes this quite plain. It seems like you're being bothered by something like the hole in the blade, its supposed to be there and has a purpose too. I'm most definitely also a perfectionist but that does not bother me at all, but then neither do scratched up users.
 
Well now that I know it was intentional, it doesn't bother me either.

With the first one I thought it was a mistake, then I noticed the off centered blade that wouldn't adjust out.

Then when the second one came I noticed the scratches.

Taken individually none of these things except for the off centered blade might've bothered me so much, but it was the proverbial opening of the can of worms, syndrome.

With the help of the knowledge base here, (thanks again to all who contributed), I feel good about my little Tenacious.

I think my next Spyderco purchase will be the Manix 2, unless an incredible deal on a Para 2 jumps out in front of me.

Just not sure whether I want the original, the XL, the blue translucent or the lightweight black, satin or black blade...?

Decisions, decisions. :rolleyes:
 
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