knife store story

I agree. I even flick my swap-meet junk knives, and it doesn't hurt them.

I compare flicking to slamming a car door.

Does slamming a car door hurt it? Not really. Does it break the door? No.

But if you slammed a car door 30 times a minute for 30 years, you can bet the door and latch will be more worn and less "like new" than if it hadn't been used at all, or had been used in a more "normal" way.

So excessive flicking can loosen the pivot faster, and even wear parts faster. But it is negligable.

Let's say a car designer designed and builds a very strong car. It can take door slamming as well as any other car. But maybe that designer isn't a fan of door slamming. He feels it is loud, uneeded, and will technically wear parts faster, even if the extra wear is virtually zero. Them coming out and saying that door slamming is abuse doesn't mean their car isn't as strong.
 
db said:
LOL I think I'm seeing another Benza owner getting mad. :)
Honestly, no.

I am not mad, but I can understand that it may look that way.

Why would a Sebenza owner have anything Sebenza-related to get mad about anyways?

I like my Sebenza very much, and anyone else's opinion doesn't change that or anger me.

But I am a chronic corrector. I would have reacted the same way if untrue things were said about a knife I hate.

I hate Cold Steel knives. I think they are ugly, feel cheap, and I think their ads and claims are idiotic.

But if someone said that Cold Steel knives aren't very strong just because Cold Steel won't cover stabbing through a car hood, I would disagree with them. Cold Steel has to tell people not to do those things.

I see the comedy in releasing a DVD full of hood-stabbings and such, and then telling people not to do it at home and that they will not be covered if they do. But that disclaimer does not reduce the strength of their knives, nor mean they can't do those things.

And that is not another Cold Steel owner getting mad.

My point is that the claims (good or bad) of the knife maker do not determine what the can and cannot do. The knife itself determines that, not words. This is true or any knife, and any product. Not just ones I own.
 
i'm lost if the wear is virtually zero what are we argueing about lol.

from what i'm hearing chris thinks the wear is more than negligible or does he just have a "thing" about flicking?

imho "waving" a knife is as hard or harder on one than flicking it yet thousands upon thousands of EKIs perform this abusive behaviour every day with no probs..........

now if ya are obssesive/compulsive and do it a thousand times a day i still dont think it would hurt an axis/compression in the individuals lifetime.

probaly take 30 yrs to hurt a seb lol.
 
oh and i am not seb bashing, i have had several of them and though they arent my fav i think they are certainly "ok" and offer some of the best F&F anywhere, custom or not.

its just that i dont think flicking hurts all knives, thats a pretty broad statement.
 
Because virtually zero is not zero. See car door analogy.

Flicking doesn't really "hurt" any knife. But it does cause more wear than opening genty. On all knives. That's a fact.

Flicking puts more force upon the pivot and back pin.

I never said flicking hurts the knife. If they were true, just using the knife or opening it normally would hurt it too.

The different is between normal, needed use, and doing something that causes more wear and isn't needed.

I don't see flicking as abuse, but that arguement can be made because it is not needed and does wear the parts more (no matter how insignifigant the difference may be).

Whether or not flicking does cause more wear is not open for debate. It does. The question is "how much more?"
 
ok then i'll bite, i dont think flicking hurts a compression or an axis lock imho, even when done compulsivly lol. not even a little bit.

but evidently cris thinks its hell on a seb lol.
 
lol, not meaning to be a jerk hair, i see what ya are saying, just first thing in the AM, i must say i dont necc agree with chris on this but what do i know.

also must say some folks really love those sebs...........like i say have 1 and have had a couple others and they just dont grab me, not that they are bad though. my son loves them though FWIW.

have a good 1 bud,
 
Well the cool thing about Axis locks is that they flick so easy that you can flick them open without the blade actually moving with more force than a normal thumb-stud opening. So little resistance means you can flick them gently.

But when the blade is hitting the stop pin with more force, there is more wear. No material is immune to increased force.

The question is whether flicking can actually wear the parts faster than time itself. For example, knocking on a door wears it faster than ringing the bell. But if you knocked on a door for centuries, it would rot due to time before the knocking did anything. Hitting it with a baseball bat, however, might beat time.

And that's the heart of the debate about whether flicking is abuse or not. Is flicking more like knocking on a door, or more like taking a bat to it? Most would say knocking on a door isn't abuse. Then again, the doorbell is right there! I don't think Chris Reeve would say knocking on a door is abuse, but like you questioned above, yes, I do think he says flicking is abuse because he is against flicking in general. I think this because he has also said (or so I hear) that he isn't into AOs and switchblades. I think he feels they are too flashy. I know this may be a bit of a leap for me, but I think it makes more sense than him saying flicking is abuse because he doesn't think his knife can take it.

How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Pop? How many flicks does it take to get a stop pin to fail? The world never know.

And you aren't being a jerk at all. If anything, I am being more of a jerk.

We both like knives, and talking about them is fun. It may get heated, but that's only because we care. And this goes for everyone in this thread (and others) that I have been a smartass to.
 
I don't know or care if flicking is abuse or not. I will forget that part and do like you said look at the knife itself. It is a piece of hollow ground stainless steel held between to pieces of TI by 3 small screws. One of the strongest folders? Not in my opinion. Yes its a good folder just not one of the stronger ones. Btw I don't think the stronger folders are very good knives anyways.
 
"One of the strongest" can mean top 3, or top 1000.

In addition to disagreeing where the Sebenza falls in the heirarchy of tough folders, we may also disagree on how low a knife can be on that list and still be "one of the strongest".

We just disagree, and that's fine.

But I want to point out that I do not think the Sebenza is stronger than the SMF, MPC, Tripwire, Skirmish, and likely other tough knives that I cannot think of right now. I was mainly just saying that the Sebenza is a tough, strong production folder, definitly in the same company as knives like the SMF and Skirmish. Top 5, top 10, top 50? I don't know. But I feel it is up there.

In the context of the original post, if someone sees a Sebenza and says they want something stronger, they either don't know crap about knives, or are a very demanding knife-user that doesn't have very many choices (as I feel the list of production folding knives stronger than the Sebenza isn't very long).
 
SIFU1A said:
imho "waving" a knife is as hard or harder on one than flicking it yet thousands upon thousands of EKIs perform this abusive behaviour every day with no probs..........
I think this is an excellent point and it puts the brakes on Hair's "all knives" general lumping statement. I would also add assisted opening knives to this illustration. Some of the AO knives from Kershaw, for example, are in the twenty dollar price bracket and available at Walmart. Obviously they are designed (and built) to withstand "flick" openings or they wouldn't have spring assisted opening devices that literally slap the knife open. And let's not forget autos. They too were designed and built for repeated "flick" openings. They certainly don't come with nail nicks. :)

So the point remains. A Sebenza is a beautiful work of art who's creator, designer, and manufacturer considers "flick" openings OF THIS PARTICULAR KNIFE to be abusive and does not recommend the practice.
 
I guess thats the bad thing about too much information. The constant arguments about what is stronger or what is more tough, some may have the fantasy of needing a folder to chop your way out of a burning car. Lets not forget what a knife is truly for, and it's not chopping, prying or climbing the face of a mountain ..... oh and never argue with a mall ninja;)
 
Damn, not again.

CretorAntGoldRush6oz.jpg
 
Harry, you are confused.

I am saying that flicking a knife open (and yes, that can include AOs, waves and switchblades) wears it more than opening it gently. i.e. opening a knife with MORE FORCE puts more stress on it than opening it with LESS FORCE.

This is 100% true and you are very wrong if you think otherwise. AND YES, THIS APPLIES TO ALL KNIVES (that can open).

Opening a knife with greater force puts more stress on the moving parts and the parts that make contact to stop the motion. Period. What don't you get? Yes this added stress is very slight and will not lead to any failures in the near future, but there is additional wear. How much is not an issue- it is there. How many flicks does it take to hurt the knife? A billion? Ten trillion? It depends on the specific knife (not just the model but the knife itself).

Many knives are designed to be opened quickly, such as knives with waves, AO devices, or switchblades. But they still incure more wear when opened that way than if they had been opened gently, even if that is not a practical option.

Again... WHAT DON'T YOU GET?

The Sebenza is very diffilcult to flick open, but if we pretend it can be flicked open, YES, IT CAN WITHSTAND IT JUST AS WELL AS ANY AO, WAVED KNIFE, OR SWITCHBLADE! THEY ALL INCURE EXTRA WEAR WHEN OPENED WITH MORE FORCE VERSUS LESS FORCE! THE FACT THAT SOME KNIVES DON'T GIVE YOU THE "GENTLE" OPTION IS PART OF THE REASON THE PEOPLE LIKE CHRIS REEVE DO NOT LIKE THEM! You may feel his reasoning is not sound since even junk knives can withstand insane amounts of flicking. But his reasoning does not make the Sebenza less able to withstand flicking than a knife than can be opened quickly, or even *has* to be opened quickly.

Sorry to get so frustrated, but you seem to keep trying to correct me when I am not wrong. Maybe seeing it in all caps will help youm "get it".

Yes, PHYSICS APPLY TO ALL KNIVES!

Say that to yourself over and over.

PHYSICS APPLY TO ALL KNIVES!

I am "lumping" them all together because they obey the same laws of physics. Yes, some can take flicking better than others, but that is dependant upon the materials and construction of the relevant parts, NOT BASED ON WHAT THE MAKER SUGGESTS YOU DO OR NOT DO, AND NOT BASED UPON WHETHER THE KNIFE HAS A QUICK-OPEN OPTION SUCH AS A WAVE OR AO MECHANISM. A wave doesn't make the stop pin stronger. Does Emerson make sure his knives can take the "abuse"? Of course. But the Sebenza can take it as well. Absense of a wave does not mean absense of strength. My Leek has AO, but my Sebenza is a hell of a lot stronger.

Chris Reeve does not recommend flicking, but that does not mean the Sebenza cannot take flicking. To draw that conclusion is folly.
 
tim8557 said:
Never argue with a fool, they'll just bring you down to their level.

... and thereby win through experience. That's really kind of funny though.
 
FWIW, I understand and support what Hair is saying.

But the bottom line is, it doesn't matter. People will think what they want anyway.
 
I had a guy at a chesapeake store a year back trying to give me a long runaround on why i wanted one knife over another. He was obviously trying to move stock from one totally absurd brand, which i wont mention, and was basically lying to my face about steel properties, heat treating, etc....all of which was insanely incorrect and most likely made up on the spot. I let him do his whole big long lecture, let him think he was an expert, then just left....but before i did, i gave him my business card....i think he lost about 5 shades of color before the door closed and I hope he thought twice the next time....i was going in to see if they'd ever stock consignment customs that I wanted to sell through them....but it never got to that point....

Regarding the flicking argument.....

A car can go from zero to sixty in 6 seconds. That doesnt mean that if every time you hit the gas, you can floor it and not wear out the car. Some knives can be baton'd through logs, but if you use them solely to split firewood, you are asking for trouble. Im sure chris is talking about wear and tear. If you handle something rough, you are going to eventually wear it out faster. Take it to extremes and you will see the point. One knife, you never open. Another knife, every time you open it, you flick it as hard as you possibly can. Which will wear out faster? If you can answer that, you shouldnt have any problem seeing his point. If a maker considers this abuse, its most likely for warranty reasons rather than a lack of overall strength.
 
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