My beloved BK16 is bent!!!

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Billu said:
I would try to bend it back. If it broke I would just call it my own bad luck....then get another. I really think it could be bent back if you went slow. Probably not good as new....but better than the way it looks now. I would build a wooden jig, 2x4 "t" post and a 10 ton hydraulic jack and push it up towards a solid object like a house beam in a garage. It would not take much to bend it.
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It won't bend back. There's a 'hump' where it's bent, and that hump is a stress point, I'm sure I'll brake it. If worse comes to worse though......
 
You are correct. Do not bend it back. Work / strain hardening is what GSOM was talking about. At this point you have tensile stress on "the hump" and compressive stress on the other side. I wouldn't baton with it anymore but normal everyday camp stuff shouldn't be an issue. I still vote for a mini-chax!
 
Tankerwolf said:
You are correct. Do not bend it back. Work / strain hardening is what GSOM was talking about. At this point you have tensile stress on "the hump" and compressive stress on the other side. I wouldn't baton with it anymore but normal everyday camp stuff shouldn't be an issue. I still vote for a mini-chax!
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If I replace it, I'll see if somebody *cough*DEX*cough* would be up to the challenge.....
 
If you get a new one...I would be up to trying my method of bending it back. I still think it would work. Telling me "you cant" or it "wont" work only motivates me. :D
 
worse comes to worse... If it snaps you could try your hand at making a folder ;)
 
At the end of the day , if you're gonna try and have it replaced , then I say go for it. If kabar replaces it , good. If they don't , seriously , a multi million dollar , if not billion dollar company can't replace the knife of one honest user? If not re grind it , if not , throw it in the bin and buy another one. It's up to you who decides what to do with it , and I honestly don't think you should be maligned for any of said choices.
 
mountainmist said:
If I replace it, I'll see if somebody *cough*DEX*cough* would be up to the challenge.....
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Yea man I would not recommend bending it back. It will probably be fine bent like that But I wouldn't do much batoning anymore.

And I'll pimp that knife for ya Kid, if you want. Might turn out to be a cool little blade.
 
What the heck, if you want to try bending it back...go for it. Anyway, nice topic for reading, mixing in with a few grins. Not sure if you are a poker player, but I'd venture to guess and even bet on the fact that the company turns a deaf ear to your request for replacement.
 
Dexwithers said:
Yea man I would not recommend bending it back. It will probably be fine bent like that But I wouldn't do much batoning anymore.

And I'll pimp that knife for ya Kid, if you want. Might turn out to be a cool little blade.
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OK forget about sending it to Kabar. I would jump on this! I want a Dex Becker.
 
Dexwithers said:
Yea man I would not recommend bending it back. It will probably be fine bent like that But I wouldn't do much batoning anymore.

And I'll pimp that knife for ya Kid, if you want. Might turn out to be a cool little blade.
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Hey Dex.... I'll send you a PM......
 
mountainmist said:
Good idea! I'll talk to dex.....:D
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There ya go. :thumbup: Chalk it up as a learning experience, play with it, mod it (just don't re-bend it), use it with a bit of care, and it'll probably outlast you :)

Ausseknifeknut said:
If they don't (replace it), seriously , a multi million dollar , if not billion dollar company can't replace the knife of one honest user?
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The point... you're missing it completely. The knife was clearly abused, directly in violation of the warranty.

That's the same kind of logic that says it's OK to shoplift from WalMart cuz hey, they're a huge company, they'll never miss one measly TV... :rolleyes:
 
Ka-Bar should really make this knife without the cutouts on the full tang. Just a solid full tang setup would be much preferred. The cutouts probably do not save but half an ounce and all you get for the slight weight savings is a weaker knife. I would like to see one like the old BK-2's that didn't have the cutouts. I want a 16 but might wait until they change that.
 
Bunch of silliness in here. The cutouts are there for a reason. It's more work and more expense to put them in. If they didn't need to be there for proper balance, I'd bet they wouldn't be. And the other methods of doing things take a lot of work (tapered tangs, for instance).

Most companies don't warranty batoning, and it was clearly done wrong with a blade that size. I've never seen the point. Batoning breaks more knives than virtually anything else, for precisely this sort of reason. If you get hung up, DONT KEEP BEATING ON IT.

Now, I'll grant MM that he may not want to use an axe after what happened to him the last time he used an axe.

But still, those of you thinking that Ka-bar clearly should replace it because of an instance of user abuse, which action they explicitly state they do not warranty, would do well to rethink your position. We love Ka-bar because they actually MIGHT replace the knife, despite the fact that it is CLEARLY out of warranty. But we see too many people taking advantage of their generosity, and that policy might well change. You're not just abusing the knife. When you submit a warranty claim for something that you did that voids the warranty as stated, you're abusing the good will of a good company as well.

The above isn't directed at Mountainmist. He only asked for advice, and got a lot of varied advice. But for those of you thinking it's foolish of the rest of us to think that Ka-bar shouldn't have to warranty something they specifically say they don't warranty, I just don't see how that makes any sense at all.

I also wouldn't try to bend it back. The strength of the steel comes from the alignment of the crystals within the steel. When you bend it, you introduce gaps and weakness within that structure, because you're displacing the structure. If you're going to bend it back, you need to manage the metallurgy as well (basically, you'd need to have it at the tempering temp). Simply bending it back cold will just further stress the metal in the opposite direction, and may make it more likely to fail catastrophically. By way of practical example, try bending a paperclip back and forth. After a while, it breaks. Why? Because you've displaced the crystal matrix to the point at which it's not connected. Bending things with repeated, forceful impacts only widens the gaps even more. If you are going to try to bend it back, make sure you get the tempering temp from Ka-bar, and heat the blade up in your oven to that point. Try to use something that will generate steady pressure (like clamping) rather than a hammer.

I do think you've got something ripe for an interesting mod, and I'll be interested to see what comes out of this. Do be careful with your batoning, especially with this blade, in future. When it binds, don't power through it, or you may well end up with a catastrophic failure, which for the accident-prone, might result in serious injury or death.
 
DerekH said:
There is nothing wrong with the heat treat. The handles on all the knives are softer so as to do exactly what that one did; bend instead of break. And no, to the best of my knowledge, Ka-Bar will not warranty a knife that has been batonned. Per them they view it as abuse. Still, never hurts to ask, and they might be interested in seeing it since it did bend instead of break. Although how did you not see this as it was happening? One whack with a stick will not bend it that far, at least not a stick that would be reasonably sized as a baton. A telephone pole would do it in one whack, but 1066vik or ThePointyEnd are the only people I know that could do that without a telephone pole.
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And this is why Derek is a mod...

-OKB
 
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