Is this normal for Opinels?

D

dogstar

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Jan 23, 2011
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yn1q.jpg


This is a No. 7. I realize the focus is fuzzy (don't have a camera for super close-up). Here is another one with a magnifying glass:
idgw.jpg


Suffice it to say, there is not much contact between the bolster ring and the spine of the blade. I'm not going to baton with this knife, so it won't be a problem, but is this common among Opinels?
 
Comparing to three of mine (one 'carbone' and two 'INOX' No. 08s), it looks as if your example is missing a bit of steel there, on the spine. Almost as if it'd been chipped away. Mine have full & flush contact, meeting squarely at the junction between them.


David
 
Does the blade point down a bit, when viewed from the side.

I've had a few recently in which there was too much metal on the vertical face of the blade - the surface that directly contacts the inner ring. This forced the blade to pitch down a bit and the contact to not be full right there where you show.

I've carefully filed that surface on some of them, allowing the blade to swing up more. It also improves the contact, just a bit.

I suspect it doesn't take the holes to be very far out of alignment in production for this to happen and suspect they err to this side. It's also not uncommon to see this surface wear down a bit under heavy use.
 
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