Loose blade...wabble...normal?

P

PlayboyPenguin

Joined
Dec 25, 2005
Messages
91
I just got an SOG Twitch II tonight and I must say that I really like the simple design and the assisted opening mechanism as well as the the way the release and safety are set up. The size is great also...but I nothiced that when closed the blade has alot of side to side movement. It can move from center completely to one side and back with very little pressure placed on it. I notice that my other knives do not do this but their designs are different. Is this something that some blades do? Is it necessary for the blade to be loose for the assisted open? Is it normal or a sign of a defective or improperly tightened blade? Should I return it?
 
Is there only play when the blade is closed? If so, then you're ok. All folding knives will have a little play in the closed position under pressure. As long as there's no play when the blade is open, and the the lock isn't compromised, it's fine.

If, however, it's an annoyance, then you should do something about it. Return it to the dealer for replacement, or send it to SOG for warranty work.

If it locks up solid with no play, then I'd keep it and not worry too much about it, especially if it's intended to be a user. But like I said, there's no point in letting it bother you.
 
SOGs assisted openers tend to get blade play. I have a Flash and a Twitch and both developed slight vertical and noticable horizontal blade play pretty quickly. I need to send them back to SOG because it's unacceptable.
 
If you look at the design of the twitch II you notice there are a lot of peices, especially concerning the locking mechanism. These peices are held together by screws of course. I believe that because of this desighn this knife will never be "solid" so to speak. There are too many parts. SOG could remedy this by using more solid peices. Also if you look at the pivot area of the blade you will notice a space on each side of the blade. You will not see a space like that on really tight knives like most spydercos for instance. This is another source of wobble. I think this is normal for this knife. The source of the wobble is the design. I was a little disappointed myself with this wobble, but what do you expect for a mass produced $40 knife? More than this, right.
 
Barker said:
The source of the wobble is the design. I was a little disappointed myself with this wobble, but what do you expect for a mass produced $40 knife? More than this, right.
Click to expand...

The bad part is, since I was too impatient to wait for shipping this time, I went ahead and paid the $70 retail tag.
 
If you haven't sharpened it the take it back, because you can easily get one from New Graham for a lot less even with the shipping and I promise it will wobble just as well as the one you have now.
 
Does anyone know if all assisted openers have this problem or just the SOG. I might trade it for a kershaw Scallion.
 
Or you can solve your problem in about 10 seconds with a 5/64 allen wrench, turn to the right until blade slows, then back off 1/16 and oil with light machine oil.

Result is very tight blade with no play, I've done this for years on all SOG assisted openers, works great. :D

Oh, almost all SOGs I have ever looked at or tested seem to have a certain amount of blade play, some more and some less, I spoke to someone at SOG about this and they said the blades were adjusted like this to allow for the assisted opening to perform smoothly.

The problem with me, and a lot of other knife nuts around here is most of us have a thing about blade play. There is really no problem with the knives, they are just adjusted or assembled like this. I am going to make a "guess" and say that in order for SOG to "fine tune" these knives to the point that I do, (no blade play) it would take quite a bit longer to do, especially overall for SOG when they must be doing thousands.

I have many of SOGs assisted openers and all are super tight, but yet open very fast and smoothly because of this simple procedure.

I also use a home depot torx driver bit (size ?) lots of times on SOGs 5/64 allen nut, seems to hold much better than a 5/64 allen, but either will work.





Robbie Roberson ;)
 
Thanks for all the advice...I returned the first one today and the replacement seems to be fine...no noticable blade play. If it ever loosens up I will tighten it I just felt that a new one out of the box should not already be loose.
 
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