Neck knife dropping out

sturzi

sturzi

Joined
Dec 12, 2007
Messages
888
Hi everybody,
I carry my neck knife since a few months and it was always securely in the sheath. But today I jumped down from a wall about 1.5 meters high (well, about 5 feet for most of you guys :P ) and it dropped straight from under my shirt onto the cobble stone floor.
Of course I had a huge scare. The knife had two almost 1mm deep chips and a few smaller ones, plus a small scratch on the handle. I guess it fell right on the edge. Luckily the tip wasn't damaged and removing the chips didn't take too long.

To prevent it from happening again I tried to make some kind of locking mechanism. I made a small clip that clamps the bottom part of the sheath shut. It's rather convenient to operate with the thumb when you grab it.





It's only a first try out of some stainless steel sheet, but I think not much has to be changed (maybe remove the rivet and combine it into the same piece).

Has this happened to anyone of you too, or is my sheath just not strong enough?

So far the lock works quite well, but if anyone has a better idea I'd be glad to hear it. I definitely don't want it to happen again.
 
Good idea. You can also use something to heat the opening of the kydex and shape it to a smaller opening in the sheath. A heat gun works the best.
 
Very cool idea. That sheath doesn't have much room to tighten by heat, but you could add a an eyelet or chicago screw a little higher on the spine or edge side. Just use a small clamp to figure out where it needs to go to be more secure but not impossible to draw.
 
Great idea and workmanship ,much better than the movable chicago screw type retention adjusters.
 
I love it. simple, but efective. what gauge did you use
 
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I thought of adding a screw to tighten it as well, but was concerned that it would wear out over time and then I'd be back at square one. I don't have any experience with kydex, but I guess it does wear out slowly (especially if the blade isn't inserted correctly and small shavings of kydex are cut out).
Another idea would be to make a slit from the rivet down to where the clamp is, and insert a chicago screw (the words I learn here at bladeforums :) ) that drops down with gravity and locks it. Then when I want to remove the blade I slide the screw up with the thumb and pull. But I'm afraid that the sheath would be ruined if I don't like it.
 
sturzi said:
I thought of adding a screw to tighten it as well, but was concerned that it would wear out over time and then I'd be back at square one.
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Kydex is cheap and very abundant. Kiah could fix you up with a proper sheath if that one wore out. I'm not seeing the problem.
 
sturzi said:
I thought of adding a screw to tighten it as well, but was concerned that it would wear out over time and then I'd be back at square one. I don't have any experience with kydex, but I guess it does wear out slowly (especially if the blade isn't inserted correctly and small shavings of kydex are cut out).
Click to expand...

To a point. If the knife has a sharp or pointy drop to the grind then it'll wear at the kydex a bit until it settles in, but not too bad. The sheath is .060 it looks like, so it shouldn't be much due to the give.

Another idea would be to make a slit from the rivet down to where the clamp is, and insert a chicago screw (the words I learn here at bladeforums :) ) that drops down with gravity and locks it. Then when I want to remove the blade I slide the screw up with the thumb and pull. But I'm afraid that the sheath would be ruined if I don't like it.
Click to expand...

Blind Horse does this. It also allows you to adjust the tension for carry method if tightened down. I'd go with a just slightly long post and loctite it. That said, I think your original idea is better for this purpose.
 
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