Robbie Dalton, Man Myth do you even care....

[Mike Turber]

We have all seen Robbie Dalton's work. He makes autos, rips off others designs and the like and has some original stuff. His quality varies with each knife. I have seen the good, the bad and the down right UGLY.

I get at least one email a week asking me how to get in touch with him due to some kind of warranty work. When I was doing Gun Shows I thought it was kind of cool that this man remained such and enigma but now it irritates the hell out of me, and aparently Tom Kyle of Moonlight.

I respect a mans right to privacy, but not at the expense of customer service. He has the potential of making some really neat stuff. I have talked to him personally a few years ago but that phone number no longer works. He is reportedly working out of a motor home or other means.

Well you guys are buying his stuff so do you care if he stands behind his product or vail of secrecy?

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Best Regards,
Mike Turber
BladeForums Site Owner and Administrator
Do it! Do it right! Do it right NOW!
www.wowinc.com

 

[chrisJohn]

Ahh, I can think of more than a few knife makers/dealers who "barrow" designs from other folks. No one bad mouths makers for using the liner lock when it originally to the best of my knowledge was first used by Micheal Waklker. Anyway...

I agree totally that Daltons run the entire spectrum from great to pathetic. I guess I like them so much, because of their relative small series numbers, high variety, over all quality (need to look at individual specimen first), and best of all price. The only Daltons that usually run over 100 bucks at gun shows are his various OTF models. Mmm, they almost all have pocket clips too. Always a plus.

Anyway, he has come a long way and the M6 is a heck of a knife for the price. His new OTF, Scorpion, leaves me flat. Sort of like the gripper series. Well, can't blame him for not being afraid of new designs.

Never broken a Dalton blade or spring. I have two coil sprung folders of his that have been opened several thousand times, loaned to friends, and are still going strong.

Does it bother me that he doesn't have a warranty policy? Nope, his knives use allen screws, and take pretty standard coil springs, thus I can do most of the work myself. Dissambled several to lap the contact surfaces. I reccomend you do this, if you get board and feel like making your Dalton silky smooth. In most cases if you break a blade, you were doing something you shouldn't have been doing.

I am a Microtech freak, but most of mine are too valuable to remove them from their NIB state in the safety deposit box. Not to mention it too MT a long tome to finally get that clip moved higher on the SOCOM.

Anyway, Dalton's are great user knives.

 

[chrisJohn]

One more thing.

Tony M. has a right to be peeved at Dalton for making the Ranger, a mid to poor copy of Tony's Halo1.

This having been said, the friction between Dalton and MT and their various distributors can probably be attributed to the fact that they compete for basically the same market share. Mike, you would know much more about this than me. Before I get blamed for comparing the two, don't misunderstand and think that the knives are comparable, just a portion of their market share. MT is about to release a series of autos, the MUDT and the auti mini Socoms that will be in the sub two hundred dollar price range. As the price goes down, so does the profit margin, and thus volume is the key to making a buck.

Thus you have Benchmade, Microtech, Paragon, GT, and Dalton all seeking the sub two hundred dollar price range. Now if MT can keep the price low, and quality where it is, the other makers will be slaughtered. Seriously, who is going to by a Bencmade AFO, when a MUDT is selling for the same price?

I, for one, believe that competition is healthy. Just look at the overall quality increase of production knives in the past three years. In conclustion, I have made enough sweeping conjuctures for one evening.

 

[billc]

Mike,
As a collector, I'm not really too concerned about warranty, service, etc., as my autos stay in display cases (with one exception, a small Hubertus that I carry as my "pocket knife").
I see a lot of discussion and interest in Dalton knives, I think any general, non specialized auto collection has to include a few representitive pieces of his work.
My own collection includes an M6, Gripper, and Gypsy, all three are of good quality. Would I add the Scorpion?, hmm... it would depend on the price, if it's inline with his other knives, I probably would just because of the "novelty" factor. If I were looking for a "user" knife, I would probably pass on it as it doesn't look very practical for real world use.

Bill

 

[Jonathan]

I like the Dalton lines of knives, some more than others. Prefered his older folders mainly due to the open design, (easier to keep clean), and the thickness of the blades. Some of his folders are twice as thick as other production models and even tho we know that we should not use our knives in certain ways, it's nice to know that if we had to, it would more than likely survive. His OTF's are another story. The Ranger is a nicwe novelty piece, as is the new Scorpion. I don't like the handle shape on any of the Cupids but do however like the new M-6. A daily carry as a matter of fact. It's comfortable in the hand and the only OTF I have seen that can be open and closed with one hand, (aside from the Nato crap). As far as warranty, I have not seen a need yet. Quality is apparently holding up.

Jonathan

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Live every day as if it was your last, for some day it shall be.

 

[brian w edginton]

billc

Did I misread or misunderstand ?
You are REALLY not as fussy about your "collector" knives as you are of your "users" ?

I can understand someone's collecting cheap stuff that did not work all that well but was interesting. But highend stuff of doubtfull "user" quality ? I have, on rare occasions, paid (comparatively) big money for knives I did not intend to use.....but I expected "user" quality.

No intention to criticize.....just commenting on your post. And is that not why we post ?
Geez, I hate this tippy-toe stuff.

BTW, how many Franklin Mint pieces do you have ?.........

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Brian W E
ICQ #21525343

 

[billc]

Brian,

well, if Franklin Mint starting selling autos, and the quaility was halfway decent, ya, I'd probably try'n snag one for my collection

Seriously, I'm more into collecting knives than using knives. I'm putting togather a collection of autos that's representative of what's available today, ie, MT, Benchmade, Dalton, GT, Paragon, S&W, Boker, Hubertus, Bargeon, even a few KO's to display next to the originals for comparison. I haven't actually used any of them (with the exception of a small Hubertus), although I think all of them are high enough quality that they *could* be used (yes, some are better than others, but some are much more expensive too!).

I guess what I was trying to say about the Scorpion was that; while it's a unique piece that would fit into my collection of modern autos, I don't think the design lends itself to a practical user knife (for general use). I didn't mean to imply that it couldn't be used, in fact, having bought one over the weekend

I can say that it's very well made, and not as awkward as I first thought after looking at the pics posted here.

Brian, didn't take your post as criticism at all, I'm glad you read my post and responded, hope my response made sense (it's getting late here!)

Bill

 

[brian w edginton]

Bill

No worries......collecting is a very PERSONAL thing and should not need explaining to anyone. But it is nice for the rest of us to have some sort of understanding

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After all....we are all a bit weird. Damn....a bit ??




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Brian W E
ICQ #21525343
MONEY- spend it before it's gone.

 

Please clarify something for me. Are ther two people named "Dalton" making automatics? Admittedly, I know very little about automatics.

I was at a show over the weekend and saw some Dalton automatics. I didn't buy one (or more) of them because of what had been said on this forum. Things like warranty work and whether or not a company stands behind its product are extremely important to me, maybe even the most important thing when I buy something.

I talked to two of the dealers/sellers who had Daltons and asked them about the quality of Daltons and also about contacting him, warranty work, parts, etc. They both said that they were good quality knives, and the few times that they had to contact him for parts, warranty work, etc., they had no problems at all. They were both surprised when I told them that I had heard bad things about the company.

I know these guys were trying to sell me knives but, they are both pretty up-front people. So, I can't help but wonder, are there two people named Dalton making automatics or is there something else going on here?

Bernie

 

[RKnight]

They were just trying to sell you a knife.

We're not even sure if there's one robbie dalton.

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Regards,
Ron Knight

[This message has been edited by RKnight (edited 27 January 1999).]

 

[tom mayo]

not to start a controversy...and completely off the subject...but the liner lock dates back to the twenties......not a new thing. he just patented it.....i have seen old liner locks...mostly made with brass liners, sincerely tom mayo