Spyderco Paramilitary 2 Issue?

[Evolved]

Hey everyone, new to the forums, and semi-new to knives in general. So i've already seen a bunch of threads where people think there PM2 is hard to open...although I felt that I needed to make my own thread as well

So my first Spyderco was a Tenacious (only a few months old). I know some of these knives need a little break in period to smooth things out but today I got my PM2 and to me it's ridiculously stiff. Nothing like when I got my Tenacious. I put some Tuf-Glide in it and it's not helping at all. It's actually been getting stiffer since I've been opening/closing it. Now it's super stiff right before it fully opens.

I wanted to take a video showing a comparison of the 2 knives. You can clearly see how easily and smoothly the Tenacious opens (never touched it or put any oil/lubricant in it) and the PM2 is super stiff and near the end takes some force to even get it to open. Check out the video here: https://youtu.be/cigrp5Xc5kw

Like I said i'm fairly new to these knives so give me some insight here. On a $100+ knife I wouldn't expect that I need to make adjustments. Any idea what can be causing this? Thanks.

 

[DeadboxHero]

I'd loosen the pivot a hair

 

[EyeDog]

Try adjusting the pivot screw and or the screws that hold the scales on. I usually end up adjusting all of my Spyderco knives to suit my own preferences.

 

[Leftytwogunz]

Not falling closed or open, when you press the lock, just by gravity is very different from being "super stiff" and "hard to open".

Loosen up the pivot a tiny bit and see if that gets it to your liking. If you can't get it how you want it by adjusting the pivot I'd take the pivot out and clean it and the hole in the blade to make sure there is no gunk in there. Did you buy this second hand? If so there very well could be dirt or lint in the pivot area. If it's brand new from a dealer I would imagine that it is pretty clean and simply adjusting the pivot should work.
Best of luck.

 

[Jim85IROC]

Yeah, same comment here. My most recent Manix 2 was a hair tighter than I like, but an ever so slight tweak to the pivot screw fixed it completely. I've found that there's a sweet spot right where you can loosen it enough so that it falls freely, but doesn't have any blade wobble. Rather than just loosen it though, I chose to remove the screw, drop a small dab of blue loctite on it, then snug it until I reached the sweet spot. This way I don't have to worry about the pivot screw loosening back up.

 

[craytab]

Hey everyone, new to the forums, and semi-new to knives in general. So i've already seen a bunch of threads where people think there PM2 is hard to open...although I felt that I needed to make my own thread as well

So my first Spyderco was a Tenacious (only a few months old). I know some of these knives need a little break in period to smooth things out but today I got my PM2 and to me it's ridiculously stiff. Nothing like when I got my Tenacious. I put some Tuf-Glide in it and it's not helping at all. It's actually been getting stiffer since I've been opening/closing it. Now it's super stiff right before it fully opens.

I wanted to take a video showing a comparison of the 2 knives. You can clearly see how easily and smoothly the Tenacious opens (never touched it or put any oil/lubricant in it) and the PM2 is super stiff and near the end takes some force to even get it to open. Check out the video here: https://youtu.be/cigrp5Xc5kw

Like I said i'm fairly new to these knives so give me some insight here. On a $100+ knife I wouldn't expect that I need to make adjustments. Any idea what can be causing this? Thanks.

Where did you get it from? Can you post pictures of the jimping on the top of the blade and the lock cut out or make another video with close ups on these two spots)?

I have seen two fake PM2s and they were both super stiff. Not saying yours is fake but I would want to rule that out super quick.

 

[PURPLEDC]

Like I said i'm fairly new to these knives so give me some insight here. On a $100+ knife I wouldn't expect that I need to make adjustments. Any idea what can be causing this? Thanks.

Just remember man that production knives are made for the masses. Some like stiff action, some like a blade that will drop and guillotine your finger off if you arent careful. There really is no right or wrong to it. But since there is such a wide variety of preferences that is why the knives are made to be able to be adjusted. Put it this way. When I read your comment that for $100 you shouldnt have to make adjustments I think about it like a $60.000 bmw. Its a performance production car that costs a fair bit more than most cars on the road. But at the end of the day you still have to adjust the seat, mirrors and tune the radio to your desired station.

 

[grownstar]

Yeah, just back the pivot off a bit and see how it goes from there. Many brand new knives need a bit of a break in period. You just may need to keep cycling that blade.

 

[Skywalker31]

A note on the PM2 - the stop pin is also adjustable and its tension can also affect the action of the knife. I know mine tends to get vertical play if the stop pin is too loose and gets way too stiff if I crank it down too much.

When it's all dialed in it's as smooth as anything else I own.

 

[MatthewSB]

You can't just "adjust the pivot" on a Para2.

If you have the pivot adjusted perfectly, on the Para2, the action can still be terrible. You have to adjust BOTH the pivot and the blade stop pin screws perfectly, one or the other with too much or not enough tension can put uneven pressure on the blade.

The Para2 is crazy smooth when properly adjusted.

 

[Surfingringo]

Where is your clip? All of my paramilitaries have much tighter action with the clip positioned for tip down carry.

 

[Evolved]

Thanks everyone. I loosed the pivot a bit and it definitely helps. To be honest the reason why I didn't do that first was because on another knife I loosed the pivot and noticed that it made the blade way off centered as well. So I thought maybe there was more to it than just loosening the pivot. I'm still understanding all the technical aspects of a knife.

But for the PM2 I loosened it just a bit and now it does open and close a lot smoother. It now closes with ease...push in the compression lock and blade falls into place.

Opening is smooth when rotating the blade open with your thumb. Although flicking does not always get it open nearly as nicely as my Tenacious. My theory is the Tenacious has a harder detent which will allow me to put more force prior to it starting to open. So once once it gets passed the detent, it shoots open very nicely. The PM2 has barely any detent. So any small pressure will start opening the blade which in return doesn't allow me to put that extra force, so it won't snap open with as much authority. With my limited knowledge...does this sound correct?

 

[craytab]

Thanks everyone. I loosed the pivot a bit and it definitely helps. To be honest the reason why I didn't do that first was because on another knife I loosed the pivot and noticed that it made the blade way off centered as well. So I thought maybe there was more to it than just loosening the pivot. I'm still understanding all the technical aspects of a knife.

But for the PM2 I loosened it just a bit and now it does open and close a lot smoother. It now closes with ease...push in the compression lock and blade falls into place.

Opening is smooth when rotating the blade open with your thumb. Although flicking does not always get it open nearly as nicely as my Tenacious. My theory is the Tenacious has a harder detent which will allow me to put more force prior to it starting to open. So once once it gets passed the detent, it shoots open very nicely. The PM2 has barely any detent. So any small pressure will start opening the blade which in return doesn't allow me to put that extra force, so it won't snap open with as much authority. With my limited knowledge...does this sound correct?

Where did you get it from? Post pics of the lock cut out please.

 

[Converge]

Here's a quick video I just uploaded of my PM2. Shows how super loose the blade can be with still keeping 0 blade play. I mean 0.... there is literally no play, trying to move the blade feels like you're trying to move the blade on a fixed blade. It is awesome, and really fun.... of course. The amount that I loosen/tighten the pivot is realllly small. The way I have it now between it not dropping free at all is barely a movement. The pivot remains tight however and I don't ever have to tighten it.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4avOWsSVgc&feature=youtu.be

I agree that you should try to figure out for sure if your knife is a legit Spyderco knife or a counterfeit. There are plenty of fakes out there like everyone said. I've never used one so I can't say how they feel compared to a real one. But the real ones are known for being super smooth and if you can't get yours to that point I think that is certainly suspect, or just bad luck. I put a few drops of CLP down towards the pivot on my knife. Couldn't tell for sure if it made a difference though.

 

[Evolved]

I purchased it from Amazon. Was sold and shipped by Amazon and not a third party seller.

Here are some pics:

 

[Converge]

Definitely looks real to me.

 

[whp]

You can't just "adjust the pivot" on a Para2.

If you have the pivot adjusted perfectly, on the Para2, the action can still be terrible. You have to adjust BOTH the pivot and the blade stop pin screws perfectly, one or the other with too much or not enough tension can put uneven pressure on the blade.

The Para2 is crazy smooth when properly adjusted.

This is right. The stop pin tension and pivot screw tension must both be adjusted to get the proper function on a pm2.

 

[Evolved]

Here's a quick video I just uploaded of my PM2. Shows how super loose the blade can be with still keeping 0 blade play. I mean 0.... there is literally no play, trying to move the blade feels like you're trying to move the blade on a fixed blade. It is awesome, and really fun.... of course. The amount that I loosen/tighten the pivot is realllly small. The way I have it now between it not dropping free at all is barely a movement. The pivot remains tight however and I don't ever have to tighten it.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4avOWsSVgc&feature=youtu.be

I agree that you should try to figure out for sure if your knife is a legit Spyderco knife or a counterfeit. There are plenty of fakes out there like everyone said. I've never used one so I can't say how they feel compared to a real one. But the real ones are known for being super smooth and if you can't get yours to that point I think that is certainly suspect, or just bad luck. I put a few drops of CLP down towards the pivot on my knife. Couldn't tell for sure if it made a difference though.

Thanks for posting that :thumbup:

Since I loosened the pivot, it is a lot smoother in general. I actually noticed the PM2 is a ton smoother when just slowly rotating the blade open than the Tenacious. Which makes perfect sense since the PM2 is a higher quality knife. The only difference now is when flicking the Tenacious opens with more authority and the PM2 at times doesn't open all the way. I think it's because the Tenacious has a stronger detent. So the PM2 needs more flick/power in your hands where the Tenacious allows you to kind of build up the power since the detent is stronger.

 

[craytab]

I purchased it from Amazon. Was sold and shipped by Amazon and not a third party seller.

Here are some pics:

Yup, real as all get out. Great pics as well BTW.

The reason I ask is over the summer I was at cabela's looking at knives and I mentioned to the knife guy I carry a PM2. He said they just got two in and showed them to me. I could tell right away they were fake based on the not angled jimping and the sharpness of the lock cut out in the G10. The other thing was they were super stiff to open. Nothing like my real PM2. Turns out they were returns. Some one bought fakes elsewhere and returned them as real. This does also happen rarely with Amazon but I wouldn't worry about it much with them. Just know your product.

As others have said, the adjustment of the PM2 is a delicate balance between the stop pin and pivot, and possibly the body screws and pocket clip. Who knows. Just experiment until you get it right.

 

[Evolved]

Yup, real as all get out. Great pics as well BTW.

The reason I ask is over the summer I was at cabela's looking at knives and I mentioned to the knife guy I carry a PM2. He said they just got two in and showed them to me. I could tell right away they were fake based on the not angled jimping and the sharpness of the lock cut out in the G10. The other thing was they were super stiff to open. Nothing like my real PM2. Turns out they were returns. Some one bought fakes elsewhere and returned them as real. This does also happen rarely with Amazon but I wouldn't worry about it much with them. Just know your product.

As others have said, the adjustment of the PM2 is a delicate balance between the stop pin and pivot, and possibly the body screws and pocket clip. Who knows. Just experiment until you get it right.

Thanks. And yea that's why I joined here...to learn more and obviously get insight from people who are more educated than me in this field. So good to hear from multiple folks that it's real, and that it just needs a little tweaking.

With the minor adjustments I made it's already feeling better.

If it is a stronger detent that I'm looking for, is there a simple way to do that without effecting anything else or no?