Industry not listening?

Thanks for all the responses and I know the difference between abuse and use and or misuse for that matter. I'm getting at this on a completely different angle as stated Titanium is NOTCH sensitive from what I've been told by more than one engineer including one which was a materials engineer with some experience under his belt. These guys say Ti doesn't like to be notched short or deep, well that rules out just about the way every maker does it.

I don't have the time to go back and sort through the threads, but Florida Moutain Biker was one that posted on a recent thread here where Ankerson was beating on a Cold Steel Lawman where this kinda thing came up. I've also recently seen posted on this site pictures of "high end" Titanium frame lock crumpled.

I wasn't trying to start an argument I was just noting from an engineering stand point that most of what is being done is in contrast to what I have been told by engineers concerning Titanium's notch sensitivity. My apologies to forumites for any misunderstanding of my framing of the question.
 
i think the industry is listening, listening to the majority who buy up ti framelocks regardless of cutout thickness. i cant really think of any unpopular ti framelock, and certainly in the custom world its ti frames aplenty.

whenever i see a photo of a "lock failure" im pretty sure it happened under extreme use, if not abuse. if not, its possibly a factory mistake. i mean, is a solid, well manufactured framelock going to fail willy nilly?

now im not saying framelocks are the be all end all, and certainly some very good points have been brought up, but, if this problem really was a big problem, the industry would adapt. maybe we will see a change, maybe we wont.
 
To me, what I would consider the issue, if there really is one, is that Ti framelocks have a reputation or notion of being hard use, tough folders. If you want a beefy, no compromise folding blade (of course folding itself is a compromise) then lots of Ti framelock suggestions appear. If people are buying Ti framelocks because they like Ti framelocks, then no prob. But, if people are buying Ti framelocks because they think Ti framelocks are one of the toughest options out there, and this turns out to not be the case, then we're just wasting a lot of Ti on locks that don't do what the owner wants.

The lock might not ever be pushed to do what the owner wants, but many knives owned by many people are never pushed to their limits in any regard. Get what you want, for whatever reason you want it, just try to make sure you got what you are looking for.
 
MikeC said:
Thanks for all the responses and I know the difference between abuse and use and or misuse for that matter. I'm getting at this on a completely different angle as stated Titanium is NOTCH sensitive from what I've been told by more than one engineer including one which was a materials engineer with some experience under his belt. These guys say Ti doesn't like to be notched short or deep, well that rules out just about the way every maker does it.

I don't have the time to go back and sort through the threads, but Florida Moutain Biker was one that posted on a recent thread here where Ankerson was beating on a Cold Steel Lawman where this kinda thing came up. I've also recently seen posted on this site pictures of "high end" Titanium frame lock crumpled.

I wasn't trying to start an argument I was just noting from an engineering stand point that most of what is being done is in contrast to what I have been told by engineers concerning Titanium's notch sensitivity. My apologies to forumites for any misunderstanding of my framing of the question.
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Chris Reeve and Mick Strider may beg to differ.:cool:
 
I think a lot of people who buy Titanium framelocks are not all that concerned about how much pounds of pressure it takes to bend the lock at the cutout. There are probably millions of framelocks out there, but only couple of cases of such failure. And those cases are not really from the usual use, but from extreme abuse (usually "testing").

I know I surely don't posses such strength in my hands to crush the frame at the cutout, even if it is fairly thin.
I also think that Strong and Secure are not the same. When it comes to framelocks, I'm more concerned about the lockbar slipping, disengaging the lock. This doesn't take all that much force on a faulty knife. That kind of failure can easily happen of other types of locks as well.

On hard use knives, I'm more concerned about the strength of the tip, and the blade overall, because the most common abuse of such knives is prying with the blade, where the force is applied sideways, not at the back of the blade. Only few will ever try to baton with a folding knife.

I agree with Hardheart. If people buy framelocks, because they think they have the strongest lock, then there might be a problem. But framelocks have other features that attract people. There are so many framelock designs with a blade that is 2-3" long. I can barely imagine using a 2.5" knife hard enough to crush the frame. People still buy them, due to other features. And industry is listening.
 
Interesting how manufacturers defend the Ti framelocks weakness design stating that failures are results of abuse....but then say you shoudn´t trust and neither buy perfectly sounds linerlocks.... what kind of abuse do they do to linerlocks?...
 
Titanium is super strong. Of metals it has the highest strength to weight ratio. The cut out has to be deep so you can unlock the knife. If you squeeze the handle of a frame-lock there is little to no flex. If the lock bar was as thick as the rest if the scale you couldn't bend it. The cut-outs on my RIL knives are as thick or thicker than most liner locks.

I disassembled my Benchmade LFTi to bend the lock bar a little to increase the detent. It was a bitch to bend and that is one of the knives that has been criticized for having a too big of a cut-out. I think titanium frame-lock knives are strong and reliable.
 
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for being so wrong they're all making a LOT of $$

Ti framelocks nowadays are about as strong as one could possibly need. need to dismantle a car? get a fixed blade.

i understand the desire to have a hard-use folder and yea materials like Ti are attractive too (bother performance and "coolness")

to push a folder to the point of catastrophic failure like a lockbar bending at the relief cut takes a LOT of force, when it gets to the point where you need to exert that much force on a knife you probably need a fixed blade or an entirely different tool.
 
Another factor that mitigates against a thicker cutout, is that Titanium has a tendency to spall. The increased pressure against the lock face would make spalling increase and render the lock very hard to release.
 
ikiddp9 said:
Interesting how manufacturers defend the Ti framelocks weakness design stating that failures are results of abuse....but then say you shoudn´t trust and neither buy perfectly sounds linerlocks.... what kind of abuse do they do to linerlocks?...
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Which manufacturers that defend Ti framelocks say you shouldn't trust liner locks?
 
A.P.F do you mean gall, I have never heard the term spall. If it is spall could you please list a definition.

Again, all I use is Ti framelocks have had a bunch of em and have three now, what I'm saying is the relief cuts could be left thicker and the cut itself made longer. I had one titanium frame lock I ordered direct from a manf. the relief cut was so thin that when I disengaged the lock for the first time it overextend and stayed bent in the overextended position. I don't care what anyone says that is not abuse nor is that knife made for hard use. I sent it back and never purchased from them again as without question eventually that lock would have broke from just the act of engaging and disengaging as part of ever day normal use.
 
MikeC said:
A.P.F do you mean gall, I have never heard the term spall. If it is spall could you please list a definition.

Again, all I use is Ti framelocks have had a bunch of em and have three now, what I'm saying is the relief cuts could be left thicker and the cut itself made longer. I had one titanium frame lock I ordered direct from a manf. the relief cut was so thin that when I disengaged the lock for the first time it overextend and stayed bent in the overextended position. I don't care what anyone says that is not abuse nor is that knife made for hard use. I sent it back and never purchased from them again as without question eventually that lock would have broke from just the act of engaging and disengaging as part of ever day normal use.
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"Spalling" is chipping of a fragment of metal. I know because at the power plant I work in, coal pulverizers have metal balls and when they chip it is called spalling.
 
There are some excellent framelocks on the market, and hard use ones at that. :)

The framelock isn't the strongest though, but it's strong enough for most users.
 
Titanium or at least what I know about it is one the ultimate bend don't break materials meaning it is very tough. It is selected for use in places where chipping or fragmenting is not acceptable or is an issue. Due to its softness which provides it toughness if you will Titanium does have a tendency to gall which means it wants to stick to other metals it comes into contact with like the tang of a knife blade at the lock bar interface. That makes sense in the way that APF was suggesting.
 
I wish we had some MFG reps and/or knifemakers here in this discussion . . .
 
I understand what you're trying to say. In theory the deep and narrow cut on titanium weakens it more than a shallow and wide cut. However, the industry must have done enough tests to determine that the remaining strength is acceptable for most knife applications.

Everything in life is about compromise. If you increase the cutout strength you run the risk of making the mechanism too hard to operate with one hand. If you decrease it, then of course it runs higher risk of failure. There is a sweet spot somewhere, but you can't have it all.

If I'm looking for a knife to take beyond what's considered "normal use" for a folder, then I will go with axis lock or back lock (or its cousin triad lock). But, in doing so I sacrifice the lightweight, simple, and clean characteristics of a titanium framelock.
 
Here is a little something to chew on.

No lock will magically transform a folding knife into a fixed blade knife, not even a titanium framelock. Any lock will fail under sufficient load. By using the deeper relief cut, the engineers who are designing these safety devices are able to control 1) where the failure will occur, 2) what manner of failure will occur and 3) the amount of load required to cause the failure to occur. Would they really be making the lock "better" by changing the cutout to cause it to fail elsewhere, especially since that elsewhere may not be consistent? Is it better to know that the lock will fracture evenly at the relief cut under X number of pounds of load, or is it better to discover the lockface of the bar will shear first as it happens to you?

I'm not even going to get into the whole "cut with the edge, not with the spine" bit. I've carried and used slipjoints way to long to believe that locks are a necessary part of a folding knife.
 
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