Well, bumpin' up the stop pin can be done but its a bit more work than just sticking it in there in some bigger holes and sayin' its done. A bigger pin will likely change how high the blade tip sits when the blade closes. Let me explain some. The pin being bigger around in diameter means the blade is going to sit up higher when it comes to rest in the closed position so what happens is it no longer hits the detent ball in the same spot anymore since it can't drop far enough now due to that bigger diameter pin. Follow me? Ok, and the worst part is you now are the proud owner of a gravity knife with no retention to keep the point down when you carry it in your pocket. In other words you've created an accident waiting to happen unless you are skilled enough to also adjust the blade rest so it drops more to make up for what you bumped up in pin size. The math to do that is quite tricky and you can't miss or go too far or guess what. Its now still missing the detent ball by falling too low cause you took off more than needed. .
Its tricky business messing with the stop pin is what I'm saying. Yes I've done it, others have but its not for the faint at heart and you can really make matters worse right quick if you are not very careful. Also, if you own a black blade well adjusting the blade rest is obviously going to wipe that black right off there so you have a silver part now to stare at so if thats they case you have yet another issue to deal with. Again, not something you just jump right into.
BlazenGem one of the reasons I like frame locks is because they wear so much better and indent less overall in my own testings. Of course this is dependent on a few things like the actual physical foot print of lock contact actually touching the blade which on some models depending on who made it is just a tiny dot about 1mm x 1mm for total surface area. On these they typically do two things really well. They stick and bind terribly real well and they wear in real fast and the lock tends to move across the contact pretty quick. My Emerson CQC12 went from an early lock up new that stuck so bad that I kid you not on two occasions even I had to take it apart to close the dang thing but in four days time it broke in and now the lock traveled to where it is today which is all the way across and its basically stayed there. Its not sticking anymore, there is no vertical play but that is what it is.
My Striders have broken in similar to this as well and its mostly due to the foot print of actual lock contact at the blade where they mate up to engage each other. Compare this to a Sebenza for example and you see a stark contrast both in how they act because the Sebenza rarely binds or sticks so bad you would ever have to disassemble it to close it but as you will read and witness if you owned one the lock wears an incredibly long time between adjustments and certainly goes quite a while usually before its all the way across the thickness of the blade.
Its all about how much foot print is in physical contact with the blade from what I can tell but more specifically how that foot print of contact is spread out over the area of the lock deemed the 'safe zone' for what can still contact the blade and work with no blade roll. Let me explain some on that best I can. The books say you have to have your contact in a tripod with a center pivot, a stop and a lock with the contact far enough away from the mid-line of the pivot to keep it from developing blade roll which is where the blade can be made to move but its more a rolling on the lock contact than play. Many of the Buck Strider folders like the 881 were mailed to me for blade roll and it was always due to the lock contacting the blade at the wrong point that was too close or below the mid-line of the pivot. Once that was alleviated it was no longer anything but rock solid.
So how long is depending on many things. I can't say since its as varied as the four winds and really all of them no matter which way you see them are still done technically correct for build its just some have higher tolerances than others and there seems to be little rhyme or reason behind price point to determine what you get. If you want my opinion who makes longer wearing locks than anyone consistently in production folders I'd have to say look at the Sebenza and you can pretty much find the standard by which I judge my own lock contacts right there. Chris does an excellent job and when these other folks tell you they do their locks just like Chris Reeve well, I beg to differ. No they usually don't because no one that I've compared to usually stands up to the wear pattern size on one of Chris's locks and thats the difference. His foot print is bigger and thats his secret for a better easier to use longer wearing lock I think. I've seen others that come close at times but Chris does it consistently. There is a margin for tolerance or a window makers and companies can hit that can increase the foot print of actual lock contact from 1mm to say 4 to 7 mm and sometimes more depending on how its built and still be far enough away from the mid line of the pivot to allow a solid lock up with no roll. Its those I shoot for in my own collection. But hey, what do I know right? I'm just some loud mouth trouble maker country boy so listen to me at your own risk.
STR
