The Evil Slipjoint

My first post was an introduction about my start in the knife world, and my second post (this one) is about my first bite from my slipjoint (I think its a slipjoint) lol. Anyways, I was just closing the thing sitting at my desk and decided to look away from it, not realizing my thumb was between the blade and body. Shaved off the tip of the finger. Nice little double band-aid work and Im back to the forum! haha.
 
This kind of ignorance makes one ill.

I cut myself once as a little kid, and never made that mistake again.

The only way a slip joint is going to bite you, is if you don't know proper knife handling techniques to start with. Even then, depending on a lock to keep you safe is an accident waiting to happen. I have witnessed this twice, or the aftermath of it.

Before I retired, I was a machinist by trade. In our shop we had this young wahoo, who didn't work there long. But he did work there long enough to amputate his right index finger by leaning on a Buck 110 to the degree that the older men in the shop gave him some harsh words over it. He snickered and said a Buck knife has a lock on the blade, unlike the old man slip joints we were carrying.

Just after lunch, there was a yell from the bench he was working at, and while leaning on the Buck, the lock disengaged, and with his weight on it, cut off his right finger at the second joint. The shop forman ran upstairs to the caffeteria while the EMT's were called, and by the time the ambulance got there the forman had the finger in a cup of ice. The got him to the local ER to stabilize, then on the John Hopkins hand clinic in Baltimore. His finger was reattached, and then he was fired for safety violations. He got injured because he was this younger generation that depends on safety devices rather than common sense. In this case, the locking blade gave him false sense of security to abuse a tool.

A couple of years ago, I needed an operation on my left thumb. I had it done at the Carrol County hospital hand clinic, and Doctor Stacy Berner was the orthopedic doctor. While waiting in the lobby for my turn to go for the outpatient surgery, there was a young guy, maybe late teens early 20's, waiting to be operated on. His right hand was bandaged up, and he was with his mother. We got to talking, and he had very seriously injured his right index finger and middle finger when a liner lock tactical knife folded up on him. He was, by his own telling, acting stupid, but he didn't hink the lock would fail. They were operating to try to get his nerve and tendon connections going again. He'd crippled himself pretty good with stupid behavior. All because he had faith in a lock held by a little piece of metal. And his father had left his mother years before, and I guess all the young man knew came from knife magazines and video games.

I was born in 1941, and growing up in the 40's and 50's, there was no locking blade knives around, with the exections of the James Dean switch blades. All the men I grew up around, ALL carried the pocket knife of the day; a two blade slip joint jackknife about 3 inches in length closed. They did everything that needed to be done with a knife, and yet cutting oneself didn't happen. I can only guess, that with a non locking pocket knife, stupid behavior didn't happen often because of the obvious result being such, that one did not have to be a rocket scientist too see it coming. If you needed a knife that you knew wouldn't fold on you, then you used a sheath knife. But then people got by with revolvers that only had 6 shots, and the simple bolt action rifle was the hunters choice.

Unfortunatly, your future father in law sounds like one of those 60's or 70's era men who grew up with little adult male supervision, but also no mentor to teach him the right way to do things. The fact that he's a so called outdoorsmen, but carries no knife says something. Your effort was well intentioned, but his type is almost a lost cause. We have some of them in our gun club, and they can be frustrating to deal with. You can't change him, so go buy him a Buck 55, and trade him the Northwoods for it. The Northwoods is too good a knife for him, he'll never appreciate it, so you may as well keep it yourself.

And next year buy him a gift card for someplace he shops.

Carl.
 
I had a Case peanut main blade close on my finger. I was pulling the blade out of a piece of wood it was stuck in - the blade, not the point.
It can happen.
I usually use locking knives because of this. I own slippy knives, but still prefer locking knives - lockbacks preferred, but I also like liner locks.
 
Welcome, Atraleo.

Accidents do happen, as it seems you have discovered. But I think that you would admit that the accident was a result of your carelessness and not a fault of the knife design.

I would think that a 50 something year old hunter (the pops-in-law to be) would understand something like that. I wouldn't expect him to earnestly repeat some uninformed hearsay as fact.
 
Girlfriend's dad has plenty of company. There are regulars on this very forum who won't use a slipjoint for exactly the same reason.

I tend to think lockblades are more dangerous in this respect: when they fail, they do so suddenly and without warning. Go back through the archives, and you'll find plenty of stories of knife nuts being bitten when a lockblade closes on their fingers. It happens to all brands, all price levels. The advantage with the slipjoint is that one isn't lulled into thinking it becomes a fixed blade when opened, as sometimes happens with lockblade users.
 
Slippies you have to be careful if they get stuck in something...could even be a wadded bit of tape on a box you're opening. Just have to be conscious not to lift up pushing the blade towards closing.

I've definitely nicked myself and had a few close calls over the years with them, though 90% of the time it was when the blade wasn't sharp enough or I was cutting something a heavier blade would have been a more rational choice for.

I just started carrying around a stockman again after years of only lockbacks and I have to pay a little extra attention closing it and using it. It's razor sharp and I'm liking it a lot actually, but when you get used to using a one-hand opening locker, it's just different.
 
I've cut myself a few times - none seriously, just little nicks. Let's think about the blame in each case . . . *thinks*. Funnily enough I've never been able to blame the knife, no matter what kind. I don't even like the concept of carrying a locking knife because slipjoints aren't safe - for any task that you can't use a slipjoint knife safely you should go with a fixed blade! The trick to using a slipjoint is that the pressure should be on the sharp part of the blade which would cause the pressure to hold the blade open even harder, not to make the blade close.
 
Hellofa story Jackknife. I'm 28 so I'm pretty close to the current generation. Guess I was just lucky enough to have a dad that taught me the proper way to use a pocket knife.

Shecky. Couldn't agree with you more on locking blades breeding laziness. To someone with bad form using lock blades and no experience using non-lockers, a slipjoint could definitely be dangerous.
 
BackwoodsBummin' said:
I would think that a 50 something year old hunter (the pops-in-law to be) would understand something like that. I wouldn't expect him to earnestly repeat some uninformed hearsay as fact.
Click to expand...

I don't think that that was his intention. Maybe he was just voicing his concern due to his inexperience. Maybe your just making a big deal out of nothing.
 
BackwoodsBummin' said:
Not trying to make a big deal out of anything, singularity35. Simply discussing the ignorance of a large portion of the population and sharing personal experiences of when we did dumb@#$ stuff.
Click to expand...

Well, you have to admit that what most of us here in the forums consider to be accepted and common knowledge is actually specialized knowledge for the rest of the population.
 
Oh hell, yeah. I slip joint can just snap closed at any second, and with D2 steel that will take finger right off. He is smart to not use it!
 
I agree with slipjoints being perfectly fine for just about every EDC task. There is no reason that with proper knife handling a slipjoint should bite you because you won't be putting stress on the back of the blade because the cutting surface is on the front and that's the part you need! However I still EDC a locking knife just because I'm big, clumsy, and like one hand opening which most if not all slipjoints don't offer. Just my personal preference, I like the added security of a lock just for peace of mind and for the "Just in case" attitude.
 
A slip joint is like a gun. The tool itself is perfectly safe. Its a few idiots that use them, that cause the problems...

If someone is afraid of a slip joint because it doesn't have a lock, the chances are really good that they shouldn't be using knives at all.

My 13 year old son really likes knives. His favorites are slip joints. I spent quite a bit of time working with him, teaching him the proper way to handle and use them, as well as take care of them. I did the same thing with guns, and even though he is only 13, he has earned my trust with both.
 
Haven't read the whole thread but I have had a knife close on my fingers 3 times I can remember through the years, all with locks that failed. All were me pressing into something with the tip with some force. I now won't own cheap knives (once) and don't trust liner and frame locks (the other two times).
 
I get bit and nicked every once in a while by my slipjoints. But it's always when I'm playing around with them (knifesturbation). In other words, I do, but it's my own dumb fault.
 
My SOG Aegis' lock failed on me when I was trying to cut a hole in a vinyl gutter guard. I was pushing the blade through the top at multiple spots and it was very tough stuff. Eventually the blade folded, but not all the way to my fingers, just at a 90* angle to the handle.

I'm not sure if I managed to hit the lock release button at a weird angle while I was working, or if the lack just failed. The knife always did have a little too much blade play to begin with.
 
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