Is my Emerson's blade centered?

H

High King

Joined
Jan 4, 2013
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235
I know this seems like an odd question to be asking, because after all it's my knife, it should depend on whether I'm happy with it or not. I don't want to return this knife, and frankly everything else seems fine to me.

The weird thing here, is that when the knife is semi-opened, the blade is centered to my satisfaction. But the moment it closes fully, there's a slight shift to the right and I'm not sure why.

Here are some pics when it's not completely closed (don't look at the body of the blade itself, but rather the tip. I tried to take a picture from as straight up as possible but there's bound to be a slight perspective bias one way or the other).
http://imageshack.us/a/img199/5919/picture14c.jpg

See, nearly perfectly centered.

However, once it's fully closed, it shifts to the right.
http://img152.imageshack.us/img152/6206/picture11m.jpg

I should mention that I have rather severe OCD. Is the centering of the blade normal, or can it be fixed?
 
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More pictures of it when fully closed:
picture15dy.jpg

picture16f.jpg

picture17w.jpg
 
I think only two of my seven Emersons are dead centered when closed.
The others are pretty much as close as your blade... which I think works just fine ;)
None of them even come close to touching the liners.
 
My Emersons all tend to "lean" a bit to the right, just like yours does. I find it's the pressure that the lock bar puts on it. I wouldn't bend it back, just use it and see if it decreases the tension allowing it to move back over. The way Emersons come from the factory, they keep that pivot tight! If you tighten the pivot to just a bit looser from unusably tight, it should center right up.
 
dcmartin said:
My Emersons all tend to "lean" a bit to the right, just like yours does. I find it's the pressure that the lock bar puts on it. I wouldn't bend it back, just use it and see if it decreases the tension allowing it to move back over. The way Emersons come from the factory, they keep that pivot tight! If you tighten the pivot to just a bit looser from unusably tight, it should center right up.
Click to expand...

Ironically, that's what happened. My Emerson was nearly centered (I would say 95%) but it was unusably tight -- wave would only deploy 25% of the way, and I needed to use two hands to even make it budge. I had to loosen the pivot a bit (say, 45 degrees), and that's when it became slightly off centered as described.

DagaOculta said:
I think only two of my seven Emersons are dead centered when closed.
The others are pretty much as close as your blade... which I think works just fine ;)
None of them even come close to touching the liners.
Click to expand...

Good to know that this isn't something out of the ordinary. It still bothers me due to OCD and whatnot, but I can sleep in peace now knowing that it's not an "issue" with my Emerson per se.
 
Good man. Get control of the ocd... I did.
It's a tool man. No worries.
 
I have 2 Emersons, they both favor the right.
I just chalk it up to an optical illusion.
I keep the pivot screws fairly snug as I don't care much for lightning fast deployment, and the blades stay pretty centered.
 
dcmartin said:
My Emersons all tend to "lean" a bit to the right, just like yours does. I find it's the pressure that the lock bar puts on it. I wouldn't bend it back, just use it and see if it decreases the tension allowing it to move back over. The way Emersons come from the factory, they keep that pivot tight! If you tighten the pivot to just a bit looser from unusably tight, it should center right up.
Click to expand...
My CQC7 was spot on with a nice pivot, right out of the box.

My Commander and Journeyman were centered out of the box but with a really tight pivot. After loosening the pivot slightly for a faster deployment, the blades moved off-center to the right but it's no big deal as it's nowhere near the liner. I have a Super Commander due to arrive within a couple days and am looking forward to seeing if that will be spot on or not. Either way, the slightly off-center blade doesn't bother me as long as the knives live up to their hard-use reputation.
 
In case anyone wanted an update, I managed to fix it and get it centered. Took a swiss knife, and 5 minutes.

Credit where credit is due, this was the post that helped me:
EricV said:
One thing worth trying then is to loosen all the screws on the knife including the pivot but don't remove them. Then once everything is loose, tighten down the pivot, and place cardboard shims on either side of the blade to center it, then tighten down all the screws and set your pivot tension back to where you want it.

If that doesn't work I'd suggest calling Emerson, their customer service is really quite good and will take care of you I'm sure.
Click to expand...

I followed the exact steps described in that post, and voila. It's not 50/50, but probably 45/55.
 
I agree as long as theres no blade interference with the liners its no biggie. But I also like to see them centered. I usually fix it by loosing the pivot screw and holding the blade centered and then retightening...if that doesn't work I usually break it down for a cleaning and once reassembled mine have always returned to perfect.
 
Glad it's good for you now. Here's a couple of things about Emersons that I've found over the years of having them. First, the liner lock is substantial (at least on the models I've had) and it's pressure will sometimes either shift the blade slightly when fully closed (I have a Sebenza that does this, too), or the liner itself will not fit flush against the G10 scale, making it look like the blade is off center when it isn't. Second, if you're looking just at the tip of an Emerson, it will look odd and maybe off a bit compared to the more common double-V ground and beveled knife tip.

I've carried my current mini-15 for some months now and the blade tip and lockbar are still in the same place they were when I took it out of the box in the store the first time, so I don't think you have anything to worry about. Your blade in the first two pictures looks exactly like mine does. Your tip in the last two pix looks like it's almost dead center to me. You're good to go.
 
Good to know that this isn't something out of the ordinary. It still bothers me due to OCD and whatnot, but I can sleep in peace now knowing that it's not an "issue" with my Emerson per se.
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Oh boy, if you have OCD then you need to skip production knives and move straight to custom. You will find something wrong with many folders.
 
RevDevil said:
Oh boy, if you have OCD then you need to skip production knives and move straight to custom. You will find something wrong with many folders.
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Yeah, but not many custom knife makers ship internationally. Some do, but a good number don't.
 
I'm very OCD about blade centering. Based on experience with many knives, I've learned to accept the off center nature of some that I have. Centering largely has no impact on functionality.

I've really been into Emersons and have accepted the imperfections I see. I'm not afraid to use them and their customer service rocks.

I'm glad you're satisfied now with your knife. Every brand has its advantages and disadvantages. I hope you'll use and appreciate your Emerson for a long time. I've settled on my Commander as my favorite, but there are many nice designs from Mr. Emerson.
 
hondahirny said:
I'm very OCD about blade centering. Based on experience with many knives, I've learned to accept the off center nature of some that I have. Centering largely has no impact on functionality.

I've really been into Emersons and have accepted the imperfections I see. I'm not afraid to use them and their customer service rocks.

I'm glad you're satisfied now with your knife. Every brand has its advantages and disadvantages. I hope you'll use and appreciate your Emerson for a long time. I've settled on my Commander as my favorite, but there are many nice designs from Mr. Emerson.
Click to expand...

I wanted a Stonewashed Super Commander as well, but I couldn't find one anywhere.
 
RevDevil said:
The ones worth buying from do. ;)

:D


Look for the UBR Commander, that will definitely get you smiling bigtime!
Click to expand...

What does UBR stand for?

And is this what you're talking about? Isn't it just a larger Super Commander?
UBR-Com-Lg.jpg
 
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I thought the UBR was a short for the German "uber" which translates "super." I'm not 100% on that, but that's what I thought.
 
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