Pivot screw on dragonfly 2 frn

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Kyle78

Joined
Sep 27, 2011
Messages
310
Hello,
Has anyone tried to adjust the pivot screw on their frn dragonfly? I just bought a brand new dragonfly and I wanted to loosen mine up a little and the non-torx side just spins when I try to adjust, so I can't loosen or tighten it. I really like this little knife but this seems like a design flaw, the non torx side is flat and there is no way to keep it from spinning.
 
Usually, the female side (flat, non-Torx side) has a "D" shaped milling that mates to the scales to prevent it from spinning. It's possible that yours doesn't have the "D" shaped area in the scale to prevent spinning.
 
Yup you are exactly right, the bolt is D shaped but the hole in the scale isnt. i was able to get it loose by holding the female side with a pair of pliers but scratched up the bolt a bit. i wonder if mine has a defect?
 
Kyle78 said:
Yup you are exactly right, the bolt is D shaped but the hole in the scale isnt. i was able to get it loose by holding the female side with a pair of pliers but scratched up the bolt a bit. i wonder if mine has a defect?
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It is possible that yours could be defective. I would try to get a hold of the.Spyder Crew and see what they have to say. Good luck!
 
FWIW, it's the holes in the liners, not the scales, that should be D shaped. Also, FWIW, Spyderco does not use screw construction to make pivots "adjustable", or to make knves "user serviceable", it does so for ease of assembly and ease of repair by their technicians.
 
The Deacon said:
FWIW, it's the holes in the liners, not the scales, that should be D shaped. Also, FWIW, Spyderco does not use screw construction to make pivots "adjustable", or to make knves "user serviceable", it does so for ease of assembly and ease of repair by their technicians.
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Normally, I would agree, Paul. But the Dragonfly doesn't have liners, so I would think that it the D-shaped hole would be molded into the handle itself.
 
The Deacon said:
FWIW, it's the holes in the liners, not the scales, that should be D shaped. Also, FWIW, Spyderco does not use screw construction to make pivots "adjustable", or to make knves "user serviceable", it does so for ease of assembly and ease of repair by their technicians.
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Spyderco advertises the screw together handle as an upgrade for the dragonfly 2. That seems missleading if it doesn't mean any benefit to the user. I like to be able to service and clean my knives occasionally.
 
The Deacon said:
FWIW, it's the holes in the liners, not the scales, that should be D shaped. Also, FWIW, Spyderco does not use screw construction to make pivots "adjustable", or to make knves "user serviceable", it does so for ease of assembly and ease of repair by their technicians.
Click to expand...

I had the pivot screw out of my Dragonfly salt today so I could loctite it. It was a D shaped bolt, so, since there are no liners, I'm assuming the holes in the FRN scales are D shaped as well. I never had a problem with the bolt spinning on me when I removed the pivot screw.
I usually avoid taking my knives apart except for extreme circumstances, but the dragonfly mentioned above was fairly tight from the factory, so I decided to loctite the 3 screws on the knife and adjust it (which I do with most all my carry blades). It works perfectly now, and I don't have to worry about any clip screws coming loose, or the pivot loosening up. I know dis-assembly voids the warranty, but I'm not going to send it all the way to CO so the spyderco techs can loosen the pivot of my dragonfly a few threads. I'd much rather take a few minutes and do a quick adjustment myself. Hopefully THAT doesn't void the warranty.....
 
I had the same problem with my DF-2 (one day old) and customer service told me to send it in for diagnosis and service. They said if I take the knife apart and any parts are damaged it voids the warranty. But as you can see from another comment, due to the difficulty in getting the pivot out, it is likely to at least scratch the knife. No thank you. I sent it back to amazon.

Now - whether the knife is actually defective, I don't know. It seems strange that the pivot would turn but do nothing. Why bother with it?
 
I have this issue with my salts. No liners and the frn hole is round so the pivot spins freely. I am able to tighten or loosen, but only by putting enough lateral or vertical pressure on the blade to keep the pivot from spinning. It's not that big of a deal but in a perfect world these knives would have a d shaped hole in the frn. Who knows, that might be a lot more actual work in production than popping out a d shaped hole in the liners. Whatever, the workaround is simple so it's not really an issue for me.
 
For most, if not all, of the Salts, making the hole in the FRN handle D shaped would require a change in the mold. Probably not considered cost effective by them since it's Spyderco's philosophy is that, with the obvious exception of those used to secure clips, screws are used to make assembly easier and disassembly possible for their personnel and NOT to make the knife "user serviceable".
 
Honestly when I get a new Spyderco if it's a little tight in the pivot,every single one has been spot on after some break in time. Never had to mess with the pivot screw.
 
I've had to loosen up my salts a couple of times in order to wash some tiny debris/fish gunk/scales out of pivot area. Almost never necessary, but there has been the odd time that I just couldn't get it clear without loosening a bit.
 
In Spyderco's linerless FRN knives with D-shaped bolts, the "D key" is indeed molded into the FRN scale. That is the case with the DFly2, Pingo, Squeak, UKPK, etc. This presents some issues for folks who mod their knives with new scales. My little trick is to take a pin punch, put a small drop of CA glue on the end and touch it to the non-Torx bolt head. This allows you to get a grip on that side so the bolt doesn't spin around while tightening/loosening. The pin punch pops right off when you are finished...

TedP
 
Well I just got my Superblue Dragonfly and swapped handles with my G10 'Fly ... that I had swapped to ZDP 189 from from a BR green FRN 'Fly... The BR Green FRN did not have the "D" shaped into the FRN pivot hole but the Grey FRN did. So I'm guessing some older Model 2 Dragonfly's may not have that and some later production ones do?
 
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