the worst abuse your SAK has ever survived (or not)

T

tnozh

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Hi,

Recently on another thread two participants contributed this:

znapschatz said:
SAK whacks include: breaking some ice covering an outdoor lock; used it as a tack hammer to put up flyers; most recently smacked a reluctant wheel onto a garden cart axle. My "technique" is to grip the scales on the toothpick/tweezer end and hit with the spring side of the SAK. I don't do it very often and usually am somewhat careful about what to take on, but so far only a few marks, no noticeable damage. This might be considered knifal abuse, but I got this thing to use as a tool, not an heirloom.
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freezergeezer said:
I've done the same thing with my Huntsman on occasion! It's amazing how much abuse these things will ignore. :D
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How about everyone else here? What is the worst abuse you have ever inflicted on your SAK?
 
Well, probably the very worst abuse of my Huntsman is simply not using it! lol.
I switched to a early Leatherman (back when there was only one!), snapped it through the pliers casting, went back to the SAK, then bought a knock-off Leatherman Supertool (Made by Rolson I think) which was easily as good as the LM for about £20. SAK's in the drawer again but sees occasional use, especially for sheeple intensive times. Then my girlfriend (now wife) bought me a Gerber Legend for Christmas. Best multitool available, imo. But then I was a service engineer, and it offers closer to what I want than any Leatherman so far. (Sorry a bit OT there)
My Huntsman still sees occasional use, especially when walking in the country, but my EDC is the Gerber.

Now that's what I call abuse of a SAK!
 
I've been carrying a Swisschamp for about 8-9 years now. The one I have is the second one I bought after my first one was stolen :(

In any case, I bought that one about 5 years ago. Even though I always carry either a Sebenza or a Calypso Jr. I almost always pull out the Swisschamp when I need to cut or fix something.

So now, after 5 years the corkscrew is so loose I feel it's about to fall out, I've dropped it so many times that the spacer on the outside of the main blade is so bent that I have trouble opening the main blade if it isn't properly lubed, and I can actually see the pivot pin through the bend.

However, I learned my lesson....... I don't ever let my wife use it, so the main blade is still straight :D That reminds me: Is anyone else married to a woman who doesn't know the difference between a knife blade and a screwdriver? :rolleyes:

As soon as I get a Vic Spirit I'll send the Swisschamp in for a refit.

Guy
 
Denix said:
Is anyone else married to a woman who doesn't know the difference between a knife blade and a screwdriver? :rolleyes:
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Ever try getting her an actual screwdriver? Combine the screwdriver with the gift of a nice lady-like Sebenza, and she'll never go back. ;)

GeoThorn
 
I used my '80's vintage Huntsman to slice open a container of acid to fill a lawn mower battery. The large blade is still perfectly functional, but horribly blemished.
 
Denix said:
That reminds me: Is anyone else married to a woman who doesn't know the difference between a knife blade and a screwdriver? :rolleyes:
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That just brought back a memory of how my first SAK bit the dust. Somehow, I've almost completely forgotten I ever even had that knife. I didn't even remember it for those "Worst thing someone did with your knife" threads.

It was an old V'nox that I'd bought off a friend for $30 or something. It was a weird one, one I haven't seen the likes of since. The main blade was fully serrated, and the other blade was a hawkbill/pruner. It had scissors and a saw, no pliars or file (or maybe it did have a file, I forget). Anyway, somebody asked to borrow my SAK. I asked why, and they said to get this screw out. He handed it back to me with the blade tip chipped and nearly broken off. I was dumbfounded. I was pissed, but he was a friend, so I couldn't yell too harshly. But it's a dam. SWISS ARMY KNIFE! IT HAS A SCREWDRIVER!!. What on earth would possess him to use the BLADE on a screw.

Anyway, he offered to replace it with one he had, which turned out to be a Soldier. I was a bit dissappointed, being that my knife was much bigger with more tools, but I must admit, the Solder turned out to be a great knife. I've abused that thing more than any other knife and it keeps going. That includes drilling holes in pennies (for no reason other than boredom) with the reamer, attempting to mirror polish the blade (which I miserably failed at), and using the bottle opener as a prybar with my entire bodyweight behind it. No wonder the Swiss Army uses this model.
 
Planterz said:
using the bottle opener as a prybar with my entire bodyweight behind it. No wonder the Swiss Army uses this model.
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Cool. Do the Alox scales add any strength compared with the standard cellidor models? I'd be afraid to break one of mine. Maybe I will get a Victorinox Soldier as a beater.
 
After the 1985 earthquake in Mexico city we were relocated to and old building that wasn't so damaged, I was using the file in my Victorinox to enlarge a hole in the metal base of a cubicle to put some computer wires through and touched a live wire that I did not know was there (and should not have been), there was a big spark and the file blade got stuck welded to the metal, the tip and part of the blade melted down a bit but the knife is still functional and I'm glad I came out OK.

Luis

Edited.- Now that I think about it, we only had a few Apple computers at the time, so I don't think we were putting in computer wires, phones maybe ??, I have forgotten.
 
Duke05 said:
Cool. Do the Alox scales add any strength compared with the standard cellidor models? I'd be afraid to break one of mine. Maybe I will get a Victorinox Soldier as a beater.
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I'm sure it does.
 
Has to. Thick aluminum > thin aluminum liner and cellidor.

I've put my Soldier through twelve layers of hell, but the worst is my old Deluxe Tinker. Massive amounts of abuse and beatings from working in a lab, as that was often the only tool around. :mad:
 
I know a Leatherman's not traditionally an SAK but I feel they are somewhat similar so here goes my story. I went to start my truck one morning to go to work and no luck. Turns out the battery was dead. So, I whipped out my trusty old Wave and loosened the battery posts in no time. A friend luckily took me to get a new battery. Upon returning, I sat the new battery in the truck and started to thread the battery post screws but realized I needed to tighten them more than by hand so I whipped out my old Wave again. Needles to say, sparks flew when I bumped the other battery post with the handle of my old Wave. I guess I was lucky since it could've exploded but I escaped only with a minor scare and a small burn mark on my old Wave. I can safely say that it adds a bit of character and it always reminds me of my fortunate accident.
 
I have an old SAK Angler that I've carried for the last 20 years or so. It's spent so much time sliding around in my pocket and done so much work that the celidor scales have worn down to the point where some years ago the little siver decals became proud of the surface and started to catch on my hand and/or pocket.. As the knife is a worker and not a show-piece, I simply peeled them off and kept on carrying the thing.
About 6 years ago, I was climbing a tree next to a busy road (it's a long story!*LOL*) when the SAK fell from my pocket. It hit a branch beneath me, bounced out into the road and lay there waiting for disaster to strike it. Sure enough, it wasn't long before a truck managed to find it and give it the once over. By the time I had climbed down from the tree and gone to look for what was left of it, it must have been run over by at least half a dozen vehicles. I found the knife in the gutter about 40 yds down the road, minus one celidor scale and plus a few scratches. The scale, still unbroken, was in the centre of the road. I took my knife home, fixed the scale back on with a little epoxy resin and cleaned up a few of the worst scrapes and it's till doing fine service alongside one or two others as my EDC. I don't know if you count being run over by a truck as misuse, abuse, or sheer bad luck, but for the knife to have survived it with so little damage is surely some testament to the solidity of the thing.
I have no idea exactly how old this knife is as it was given to me second-hand by a friend. It had the fish decal on it to denote "Angler" but has scissors in place of pliers, and has no hole in the auger/reamer.
 
Pretty scary stuff! Maybe we should add SAK's to next week's "is Strider better than Sebenza" thread :D

Guy
 
Denix said:
Pretty scary stuff! Maybe we should add SAK's to next week's "is Strider better than Sebenza" thread :D

Guy
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*LOOOL* *ROFL*

:D

You may laugh, but SAKs are essential necessities!!!

I own and EDC Strider and Emerson knives. But when I need to disassemble an EKI or want to change the position of a Tek Lok I need my Cybertool!!
 
I had a SAK in my pocket one night while I was surfing through channels and caught a few seconds of an Adam Sandler movie.
 
BlackShark said:
*LOOOL* *ROFL*

:D

You may laugh, but SAKs are essential necessities!!!

I own and EDC Strider and Emerson knives. But when I need to disassemble an EKI or want to change the position of a Tek Lok I need my Cybertool!!
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Same here. I EDC a Sebenza, but always pull out my Swisschamp :rolleyes:

Guy
 
Last year I found an old SAK outside that was beat to death and useless (no scales, blades didn't quite open all the way due to some deformity, broken and bent blades, broken backspring...wasn't me! :eek: ), so I taped the blade open and used it as a throwing knife against a wooden shed door that was down on the ground in my back yard. I forgot it there until yesterday. I retrieved it. I live in Massachusetts, and this year we got loaded with snow. So how this knife managed to survive outside for a year with only a few rust spots and NO STAINING is beyond me. The rust spots weren't even pitted, just formed on it like mold, and they easily came off with steel wool. It's incredible what these things do! Anyway, two or three years ago I was a knife-as-jewelery guy, and knew nothing about metal. So I used a 200ish grit piece of sandpaper and went to town to get scratches out. Then I tried to regain the mirror finish. The blade is now half as thin and half as wide :o
 
lancesknife01.jpg


The picture above is of a battered Victorinox Swiss Army Knife owned by a coworker, a soft-spoken fellow named Lance. I heard Lance struggling with some heavy plastic wrap on a piece of technical equipment one day and discovered him sawing away at the wrap with the small blade of his SAK.

"Lance, Lance, you're killing me here," I lamented, trying to offer him the small razor knife I kept in my desk. "Just how dull is that knife?"

He tested it. "Pretty dull," he said. He handed it to me.

What I at first took for a cheap Chinese copy turned out to be a genuine Victorinox, battered beyond all recognition. There were chips in the primary and secondary blade, and one of the blades had a bend in it so bad that I don't know how it closed at all. The finish on the plastic handles had been worn away so badly that the handles themselves were no longer smooth; the SAK cross was almost gone.

"Here, Lance," I said, "Let me sharpen that for you. It will only take a minute." I used the Smith's retractable diamond hone I kept in my desk and put a working edge on his butter-knife dull SAK's blades in a few score worth of seconds.

I just couldn't bear to see him struggle with a dull knife -- but part of me was proud of him for using his knife so thoroughly.
 
Phil: Take that puppy home, give it a razor edge, clean it, oil it, and give it back. That way it should last him a while before the edge is completely useless.

PS: Even though I can't bring myself to do it, I really like seeing SAKs that take a LOT of use/abuse. :D
 
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