Do you use your knife for opening letters, and if so, which blade?

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Knowing how abrasive and blade-dulling paper actually is, how many of you use your traditional to open your envelopes? And if you carry a multi-bladed knife, do you have dedicated mail-opening blade?
Just curious.
 
I have a GEC Executive Whittler with a long Wharncliffe blade that is perfect for opening letters. It sits on my desk and that is essentially all I use it for.
 
Generally spoken - the secondary blade as this is my working blade. This blade is mostly shorter than the mainblade, so I can work more accurate with it. And sometimes I also use to open my letters with the secondary blade of my knife. There I prefer straight edge blades like wharnies, coping and sheepfoot blades. The main blade on my knife it usually for food preperation.

But for opening that taped packages I don´t use any traditionals. I use to have a SAK near in my reach and the short blade on them is predestinated for that work.
 
I picked up this Utica in a "lot" of knives that I purchased on the bay. I keep it at my desk for opening letters and it works well. Being that the handles are celluloid, if it starts to "out-gas", it far away from my good knives and close to the trash can. :)


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Most of the knives I carry have Clip main blades - that's the one I use. I also have this IKCO advertising knife/letter opener - if I'm at my desk that's the one I use. OH

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Yes, I generally use the clip master blade to open letters with a push cut when carrying a stockman or jackknife. The sheepfoot on a stockman is used for opening boxes and packages (cardboard or plastic) with a draw cut. Pen or spey secondary blades are usually kept razor sharp for finer detail work, so don't get used too often.
 
I do use my traditionals to open mail, usually use the main blade of whatever knife I am carrying that day. Sadly opening mail is the only action my knives see many days.
 
In general I don't use a knife to open letters. If I do it's pretty much whatever's in my pocket that day. If I stop to think about it I'll use a pen blade if the knife has one.
 
I use whatever I happen to be carrying that day. If a multi-blade I'll usually use a secondary blade, though I'm not that picky.
 
I sure do. No better letter opener than a sharp knife. It doesn't matter how abrasive paper is, that's what a strop and stones are for. Besides, I doubt that I'll ever wear out a knife, and even if I do I have a others in reserve.
 
I've tried to train myself to use a knife to open letters, but I'm having a hard time overcoming a 50 year old habit of opening mail with the side of my thumb. It's not pretty, but for me that's far faster and more efficient than a knife, at least so far.

- GT
 
black mamba said:
Yes, I generally use the clip master blade to open letters with a push cut when carrying a stockman or jackknife. The sheepfoot on a stockman is used for opening boxes and packages (cardboard or plastic) with a draw cut.
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Same here.

I have to be careful, though. On a few occasions I've managed to also cut the letter in half when opening an envelope. Depending on how it's folded in there, the blade can catch the contents as well.
 
Same here about cutting the letter in half. I used to have a plastic letter opener that had a little razor blade at an angle at the end of a slot. But sometimes it would end up cutting the contents as well as the envelope. So I usually just use my thumb and rip it along. The envelope normally gets tossed out anyway, no need for it to be pretty when done opening it.
 
I usually use the smaller blade on either my Victorinox Spartan or Executive. They're perfect for that. I have to say, though, I haven't found that opening envelopes has dulled the blades at all. I could understand that if you're slicing a lot of paper all day, that would dull a blade. I simply don't find that opening mail is enough to wear down the blade edges.

Jim
 
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