Questions about modifying Benchmade 940 Osborne

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corsascuderia

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Jun 14, 2013
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Hi, first post here. For the last couple of weeks, I've been trying to find the perfect EDC knife for me. I finally singled out the Benchmade 940 Osborne, but upon seeing that the knife only came with a green handle, I was rather disappointed. I attempted to resolve this by purchasing both a 940 with a green handle and a 943 with a black handle, swapping them, and then giving the now green-handled 943 to my brother, who digs the green. This way, I would end up with the reverse tanto blade of the 940, but with the black handle of the 943 that I wanted. I began to disassemble the 943 earlier today, and all went well. Trying to take apart the 940, however, was impossible. I was only able to get a few of the screws out of the handle, and discovered that Loctite or some other threadlocker had been applied to the threads. Thusly, I was unable to remove all but two of the screws. I torqued as hard as I could on the screws, but they just began to strip. Is using threadlocker a standard Benchmade practice? If so, why didn't the 943 have any? How can I go about removing the screws without stripping them? Also, since I wasn't able to complete the swap, is it even possible? Any downsides to doing this?
Many thanks.
 
I had no problems. Put the black reverse tanto from my 940BK into my 943. Love the green with the 943 blade and vice versa! I've disassembled BMs to the very last screw many times. Never had any problems. Some screws, however, show residue of some sort of thread locker.

For the blade swap I didn't disassemble the knives. Just removed the pivot pin and then took good care aligning the washers when assembling again.

PS: Stripped BM screws for other reasons in the past (when I lost my cool with blade centering issues). Write them an e-mail and they'll send you enough replacement screws for free.
(the messy grind on the BK blade is still factory... And I'm not really sure if the slight recurve is supposed to be there. Not 100% happy.)

L1040600_zpsc0e4e406.jpg
 
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Just curious, have you owned a reverse Tanto blade before? I'm not a fan and think the 943 is the way to go. Just an opinion. You could always just swap it back from your brother, though...
 
db_sharply said:
Just curious, have you owned a reverse Tanto blade before? I'm not a fan and think the 943 is the way to go. Just an opinion. You could always just swap it back from your brother, though...
Click to expand...

This is my first reverse tanto. I was drawn mainly to the heft of the reverse tanto over the 943's blade, which makes the 940 much easier to deploy than the 943 (at least the one I got, that is.) The 940 seems to have a stronger tip, and from a looks standpoint I prefer it to the 943. Any reasons why you functionally don't like the reverse tanto? I know virtually nothing about it.
 
It's hit/miss regards threadlock on factory screws (most have it in my exp), but some are just plain snugged too tight in the first place in add'n. Haven't had to do this myself but a buddy of mine touches the tip of a woodburner to the affected screws, to melt the goo first. Says it works great.
 
Agree with ryxlyx. Loctite factory recommendation is to apply heat to soften their threadlocker products when removing fasteners. Also make sure to use high quality torx drivers or bits such as wiha, wera, bondhus etc rather than the c--p cheap drivers and bits from the far east, some of which are terrible quality.
 
Charles Bronson said:
For the blade swap I didn't disassemble the knives. Just removed the pivot pin and then took good care aligning the washers when assembling again
Click to expand...

+1, I've done it the same way before. It usually works out fine but not always. You could also send it to Benchmade and ask them for a different blade, I have done that several times and they obliged.

And, a little bit of recurve is normal but that looks a little more recurved than normal to me.
 
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