Take a crappy knife?

K

KennyB

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Jan 19, 2010
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So today a friend of mine dropped by. He owes me $20 for a rolotape I gave to him. So he shows up with a Frost Cutlery knock-off of a KaBar next-gen knife. He asks if I want it as "interest" and I declined, saying that I have too many fixed blade knives as it is. He replied with, "Oh, it's cheap Chinese junk then, huh?"

Now, if it had been a real KaBar I probably would have taken it, but the fact is it was a Frost Cutlery knock-off with a stick tang in it--and I don't mean the normal KaBar hidden tang, I mean the tang is actually just a steel bar probably only 1/8" in diameter. He pretty much knew instantly he had a load of crap in his hands by my reaction to it and I think I kind of pissed him off. I think he got over it though because he started talking about how he'll give it to his son and that the steel should be easy to sharpen.

Anyway, I kind of felt like I should have taken the knife, but I didn't really want it. I've already two two United Cutlery fixed blades I don't use for nothing, but I wonder if I should have just stopped at that instead of showing him the problems with the knife ( stick tang ).

I kind of feel like I should have just shut up and taken it now.
 
If your friend owes you 20 bucks, then he needs to man up and pay you what he owes you. If he's trying to weasle out of a mere 20 dollars, then it sounds like the kind of friend you can do without.
 
jackknife said:
If your friend owes you 20 bucks, then he needs to man up and pay you what he owes you. If he's trying to weasle out of a mere 20 dollars, then it sounds like the kind of friend you can do without.
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Oh, no, I told him to pay me when he can. I think he was calling it "interest" as an excuse to give it to me. Kind of why I think I pissed him off when I declined.
 
If your friend owes you 20 bucks, then he needs to man up and pay you what he owes you. If he's trying to weasle out of a mere 20 dollars, then it sounds like the kind of friend you can do without.
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That pretty well sums up my opinion as well.
 
It'd be interesting to see if the knock-off knife could be sharpened to a level that'd blow away what your friend could've done with it. Sometimes, people are inclined to get rid of 'junk' knives just because they haven't figured out how to properly sharpen them. If you put an edge on it that's shiny, attractive & reasonably sharp, all of a sudden, he might want it back.

That'd be the time to let him have it back. For $30.00.
 
I think that as long as you politely refused, he shouldn't feel slighted. You could always go back and offer to clean it up and sharpen it for him before he presents it to his son, if you feel the need.

If you *had* taken it though, maybe next time he'd bring over an old boxspring/mattress combo, junk furniture, and other bits of unwanted refuse sucking space in his basement or garage, and exclaim "Just thought you could use it, Neighbour!" :D
 
Most if not all of my friends know I am a knife nut, so they would be reluctant to give me a sub-par knife.

As far as loaning money - I never loan more than I am willing to give away - so if I don't get it back I'm not pissed about it.
 
I actually have one of those crappy next gen rip offs. The rubber handle had this strange smell for two years! I managed to get it pretty sharp oddly enough, but it dulls instantly. Im saving it as a saccrfice just in case. Better off you educated the man. Real kabars arent that much more and are way better.
I got my Kabar to whittle hair like a mofo! And its easy to do.
 
I just remembered, I was working on some kids guitars and he come by one day with this crappy bass with huge problems and is like "you take instruments as payment?" I did what you did and said not crappy ones! Poor kid is clueless.
 
tjiscooler said:
I actually have one of those crappy next gen rip offs. The rubber handle had this strange smell for two years! I managed to get it pretty sharp oddly enough, but it dulls instantly. Im saving it as a saccrfice just in case. Better off you educated the man. Real kabars arent that much more and are way better.
I got my Kabar to whittle hair like a mofo! And its easy to do.
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Heh, I just started sharpening it. This is the most obtuse factory grind I've ever seen.

I had a feeling it wouldn't hold an edge at all, but whatever, I don't have anything better to do.
 
I won a crappy Chinese knock-off Swiss Army Knife in a trivia contest once. Didn't even take it out of the clamshell before it went to Giidwill.
 
If a friend is a wine connoisseur then you don't offer him a bottle of Oak Leaf ($2.99 at Walmart) even if you think it's "pretty good".
 
KennyB said:
Heh, I just started sharpening it. This is the most obtuse factory grind I've ever seen.

I had a feeling it wouldn't hold an edge at all, but whatever, I don't have anything better to do.
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have you bothered to tell him the difference between the frost and a ka-bar?
 
jimnolimit said:
have you bothered to tell him the difference between the frost and a ka-bar?
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Well, I didn't want to seem like too much of a knife snob, so I showed him some of the old Frost knives I had bought in kind of a, "Yeah, they're crappy, but even I've bought a few," gesture and I made sure to make it clear that it wasn't a KaBar. I'm not even sure he knows what a KaBar is or that it's a knock-off, but I showed him the bar tang and where it was welded on really badly. He said he'd give it to his son for deer hunting... I don't know, I hope it can make it through the pelvis without breaking, I just told him not to use it like a hammer.
 
KennyB said:
Well, I didn't want to seem like too much of a knife snob, so I showed him some of the old Frost knives I had bought in kind of a, "Yeah, they're crappy, but even I've bought a few," gesture and I made sure to make it clear that it wasn't a KaBar. I'm not even sure he knows what a KaBar is or that it's a knock-off, but I showed him the bar tang and where it was welded on really badly. He said he'd give it to his son for deer hunting... I don't know, I hope it can make it through the pelvis without breaking, I just told him not to use it like a hammer.
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his son is going to need to learn how to sharpen the knife (if it even takes a decent usable edge). he'll be doing alot sharpening using that knife it out in the field.
 
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