Need Help Adjusting Detent And Smoothing Out My CQC 13 Please

Ares1307

Ares1307

Joined
Jun 14, 2012
Messages
545
Hello everybody. I have only owned one Emerson, and have only had it for around 6 months, but its one that I now EDC and really love. However, I have had some issues with it that I need some advice on. First of all, the knife I have is a CQC 13 with a backspacer, I eventually want to get my hands on the newer CQC 13 with standoffs but that's irrelevant. The first issue I had was with the knife is it not being very smooth or opening as easily as I'd like, I've adjusted the pivot (as much as possible without getting blade play), polished the contact points on the liners and the blade (where the washers and detent ride), and tried to adjust the detent (but that only backfired). The polishing helped a lot, now it glides open a easier, but still nowhere as smooth as the Zero Tolerances I've had and still have, so any help on getting it even smoother would be good (I know I need some good oil or grease, right now all I have is CLR for my pistols). But now I feel that I've made the detent too weak, the blade doesn't just fall free unless you shake it once while the spine is pointed to the ground when closed. When trying to open the blade via thumb disc it won't open all the way without some wrist involvement. So how can I adjust the detents (and which do I adjust, right now I've only adjusted the non locking side) to give it a stronger detent to make it glide open snappier?
 
Emerson actually has pretty good people in Customer Service, a telephone call, is a good place to start. Or PM EmersonRep, and alert em to your post for answer that everyone can learn from.
 
Sorry but I'll do my best as I am having a hard time figuring out what you did, what you want and why. It's hard to compare our knives to another manufacturer for the simple reason is that our knives are made differently. Before you loosened everything I would've told you to break it in first. Depending on if you have a stonewashed finish or if it's Black cerakote the detent balls in the liner need to wear a nice groove in the material for ultimate smoothness. Our knives weren't designed to just flick open, hence the thumb dish and wave feature. To get around knife laws in other states they need to have detents to hold it closed, not to mention it's just safer. When you loosen the pivot bolt to make it "smoother" you're changing the geometry of the knife and how everything works in harmony. Like when you lower a car. You need to get it realigned afterwards otherwise it'll track poorly and you'd have to add stiffer shocks so youb don't wear them out as fast.

You can loosen the pivot to where you like it but first you would need to take it out, add a drop of Blue Loctite, screw it back in to where you want it and let it sit for 30 min so it doesn't back out on it's own. EKI's knives come with copper grease because since their inception they were made to be used in the ocean. It's personal preference if you want to continue to use that grease. A lot of guys take the knife apart, clean it out and add a drop of their preferred oil.

Now to fix what you've already done. Like I said our knives weren't designed for what you want. You shouldn't be able to shake the blade loose at all when the spine is horizontal to the ground.

I can only tell you to try to get it tighter and centered and back to factory specs. Do the pivot bolt trick per your preference.

I'm glad that you like the CQC13. It's one hell of a knife! It won't let you down. Hope my information was somewhat helpful.

ER
 
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Option two is what I would do send it in to EKI,and let the experts bring your knife back to like new out of factory.

BTW when my CQC-7 was new I opened, and closed the new knife fully open to fully close, maybe 250 times, before like magic it smoothed out.
 
Yeah I've been breaking it in, and its gotten smoother over time, but it was still rough to open compared to what I'm used to. So I looked around at what other people did to smoothen out their Emersons, just like I did when I needed to fix the sticky lock that this knife came with, and I did what I thought would work best. The only issue I had left was that the detent was really weak, that's why it would shake open, which is not what I wanted. I like a strong detent and smooth opening action so deploying the blade is snappy and quick. Anyways, I noticed that my non lock side detent was further back than it was supposed to be, so with a small adjustment that issue was resolved. Now the knife is much better than before, it has a mildly strong detent (perfect for a non flipper) and the action is very smooth. I notice part of the problem was the Loctite, it was oozing out of the pivot and getting on one of the washers, and I was only using a drop. I cleaned that up and used much less than a drop (I wiped some off the screw before reassembling it) so hopefully that won't be a problem again.

Anyway, I believe its all fixed, I'll know for sure when the Loctite dries.

Thanks EmersonREP for trying to help out. Sorry I didn't do a great job explaining my issue. And I absolutely love my CQC 13, it kicked my previous dream knife out of my pocket (ZT 303). I can't wait to get my hands on the new model.
 
Awesome!! I'm glad you figured it out!! Sorry I had a brain fart and couldn't figure out what you wanted. It's been a long month!

ER
 
Thanks guys. It is working perfectly now. I can't believe that one drop of Loctite got all over the washer, the non locking liner, and the inside of the G10 scale. That is what was making the action real slow and tough, but now everything is exactly the way I like it, and I'm a happy man. Now I just gotta find a good oil for knives and I'll be all set. :thumbup:
 
Allz well.
But we might need a Sticky, ER. "PLEASE, give your Emerson knife time to Break-in."
 
Loctite is like kudzu (or poison ivy). It'll spread to places you never thought it could get. I know from experience. I don't use it anymore because none of my folders really need it, but if you're gonna use it... a little less is better than a little more.
 
Ares1307 said:
The polishing helped a lot, now it glides open a easier, but still nowhere as smooth as the Zero Tolerances I've had and still have, so any help on getting it even smoother would be good
Click to expand...

It will never be as smooth as a ZT, because ZT uses phosphor bronze washers in most of their knives, sometimes ball bearing systems. It's why ZTs glide open the way that they do. Emersons use nylatron washers, which are better for use around saltwater from what I understand. They were also pioneered by Bob Terzuola, who literally wrote 'the book' on the design and construction of tactical folding knives (titled Tactical Folding Knife) so I wouldn't worry about it.
 
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