Testing Knives
- Thread starter Silent01
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Ok , I will play, but the fan boys are going to flip out
Wife bought me a crk sabanza , for our anniversary
And it had some wonky soft spots in the blade and the edge would roll
I would sharpen and it would roll again, I sent it back to crk they were very rude and unprofessional! the owner impossible to deal with and admit There was a problem, $400 is expensive for a EDC , I returned it to the place wife ordered it from and was offered a replacement , I chose a store credit, and was very pleased with the replacements
But I truly believe CRK makes a wonderful knife with a arrogant owner! A el cheapo knife I bought from ganzo in “D2 “ has been in my cleaning room for a couple of years and never a problem, same with the moraknif’s we buy for $10-$15 and keep in the boat and ranch trucks
unwisefool
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Well no wonder, you got the sabenza instead of the sebenza!
I've never had a Sebenza, but I've used my Umnumzaan pretty hard and never had a problem, you must have gotten a lemon.
But to clarify, you've only encountered this issue on one higher priced knife, is that correct? What you said made it seem like this was a somewhat more common occurrence.
unwisefool
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First it was the way they chose to throw Lionsteel and CK under the bus and then second the way they scuttled away like roaches when the lights came on.
I'll agree that a broken clock is still right twice a day but I'm not buying one.
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IIRC the lionsteel knife they had performed like garbage and everyone said they were making things up, so I can't blame them for publicizing it. They don't owe Lionsteel or CK anything and I personally wouldn't buy one of those knives after seeing how badly they continue to perform.
They're still testing and publishing, though I've heard that there's a new guy doing hardness testing now. Again, nobody seems to be complaining about literally any of the other hardness or edge retention figures they are putting out. I, for one, appreciate what they're doing and like seeing how the OEMs (especially Spyderco) are handling their new releases and steels. They might have made an error or even several in the past but they've tested a ton of knives so I'd expect that at some point.
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Apart from Tops, which other manufacturers use differential heat treatment ?
Well in the end, I was hoping enough attention to the problem of knife manufactures claiming steel B is steel A, would some what limit them doing just that. For example, I bought a knife from Bear Ops once, only to have to return it. It wasn't CPM-S30V. But then again, I should have known, based on the price alone. https://www.bladehq.com/item--Bear-OPS-Rancor-II-Flipper-Liner--94471
Yes I've seen Ganzo steel tests, and they generally are the correct steel types. Whether it be D2 or stainless.
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Unfortunately, stuff happens. I've received knives a couple of times from top flight custom makers with impeccable credentials who did their own heat treats. While sharpening the blades I noticed anomalies where for one reason or another a small section of blade would not sharpen properly or exhibited other issues.
Sending the knives back they were returned with new blades, also heat treated by the same makers, with no further issues.
Sometimes, it can be an issue with the piece of steel, with the oven or any of the myriad things that go into the heat treat.
Even if the makers had tested the rockwell, which they may have done but I don't recall, what were the odds that they'd have caught the anomaly on that particular section of the edge as I did upon sharpening? Close to none, I'd say.
An accidental bad heat treat on a knife does not undermine the integrity of a maker or a company. Selling folks blades that they know are not up to snuff would. This goes for any maker or company, at any geographic location.
Sending the knives back they were returned with new blades, also heat treated by the same makers, with no further issues.
Sometimes, it can be an issue with the piece of steel, with the oven or any of the myriad things that go into the heat treat.
Even if the makers had tested the rockwell, which they may have done but I don't recall, what were the odds that they'd have caught the anomaly on that particular section of the edge as I did upon sharpening? Close to none, I'd say.
An accidental bad heat treat on a knife does not undermine the integrity of a maker or a company. Selling folks blades that they know are not up to snuff would. This goes for any maker or company, at any geographic location.
Ajack60
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When I go to a restaurant that I eat at often, I almost always order the same thing. That way I know I won't be disappointed. Or, if it's a new place to eat, I'll look for something on the menu that I'm familiar with and try it out. I do the same thing when I buy knives. There's a bunch of stuff that looks tempting, but I stick with what I know.
I guess I only heard the first half of that Kizer story. It is good to hear that Chinese makers are getting it right. That hasn’t always been true.
Wrong again, the knife they tested was fine; and they owe the truth to us. Instead of the truth they came up with a clickbait thread that they tried to turn viral but instead fell apart when other reliable testers debunked their results.
I would guess their flaky tester is just grabbing hardness numbers off the net and cutting and pasting into their chart. It would be a compliment to call that guy a broken clock.
To be clear in the original video that LTK later deleted they stated a Lionsteel slipjoint from CK had a HRC of 50-51 instead of the advertised 58-60 HRC. After other independent testing is was found that the actual hardness of the knife was 59 HRC. At that point LTK deleted their video and made a second apology video (that they also deleted) where he admitted not a single knife tested was out of spec.
Don't feel too bad though. You can still go to YouTube and like their videos there. Just if you come here and try to sell them as an authority both you and them will get dragged again.
unwisefool
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Who or what is CK?
Did the other independent testers test the actual same knife or another of that model? Every maker puts out a bad knife or batch occasionally.
Collector Knives. He's on here. He's a longtime site sponsor and stuck his neck way out last year to make sure the forum knife happened.
He noted that LTK's falsified claims damaged his reputation and business. If LTK was anything but a 2bit YouTube channel I would suspect they'd have been sued into bankruptcy; but as noted they retracted their claim and apologized. Of course a little while later they took their channel private and deleted the apology.
As they say "A leopard never changes it's spots".
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People make mistakes. Just as a bad knife can come out of a good factory, a bad test can come from a good tester.
Something to consider here is that the people doing the testing in question were volunteers. They were doing it because nobody else was. In the absence of a professional body that double-checks steel stamps, hardness, etc.; I applaud their efforts. Should they have handled things different in this particular case with Lionsteel? Sure. Hindsight is 20/20 though. This was a new endeavor and there is a learning curve. It's unfortunate but for this one issue, there have also been shady companies like Eafengrow who were exposed and honest upstarts like Petrified Fish who got both verification and exposure.
No, it isn’t irrelevant. If they tested an example with bad heat treat and the other people tested a different example with good heat treat, that would make sense.
people rescind statements all the time for a variety of reasons such as bad press, threat of lawsuits or simply being wrong. I am trying to figure out which. I am not bashing lionsteel in any way, my knives made by them were great.
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