Just thought I'd post a little something on my warrentied Paraframe II.
Locking arm (framelock, aluminum frame) broke off before turkey day, and I sent in in to Gerber for warrenty shortly afterwards. Gerber's service deptartment was extremely cooperative, and sent me a brand new replacement free of all charge (except shipping my old knife to them).
Unfortunately, their quality does seem to be continuing downhill. The fit and finish is definately worse than the one I bought a year and a half ago. The blade itself came dull as you can imagine, almost rounded, with very very deep grinding marks on the bevel. Serrations were sharp, though.
Oh, and the frame was thinner than my last one, the locking arm was thinner, the blade pivot screw no longer had a rubber o-ring to help keep it snug, but the lockarm did have a nice little ball bearing detent with a small hole/recess in the blade to keep it shut (I actually DONT like this, but it is a nice safety feature).
Since i left my Carborundum stone up at school, I was forced to reprofile on my Lanksy... Which went just as slow as I remembered; but it did work fine. Eventually I had a nice bevel at the 20* mark and put a nice little micro bevel on with the 25* mark. Within a few strokes at 25* it would shave consistantly, so I just polished it up a little with the 600 grit stone, and it would shave very nicely.
All in all, I can't wait for this one to crap out on me so I can get a spyderco (thinking either Native or possibly one other who's model name escapes me right now). But its not a BAD knife, just a typical user-grade production... My Gerber Ridge was a better made knife, as is my brandless 3-blade slip joint I keep in my leather jacket; but both of those are too small for a work knife.
Locking arm (framelock, aluminum frame) broke off before turkey day, and I sent in in to Gerber for warrenty shortly afterwards. Gerber's service deptartment was extremely cooperative, and sent me a brand new replacement free of all charge (except shipping my old knife to them).
Unfortunately, their quality does seem to be continuing downhill. The fit and finish is definately worse than the one I bought a year and a half ago. The blade itself came dull as you can imagine, almost rounded, with very very deep grinding marks on the bevel. Serrations were sharp, though.
Oh, and the frame was thinner than my last one, the locking arm was thinner, the blade pivot screw no longer had a rubber o-ring to help keep it snug, but the lockarm did have a nice little ball bearing detent with a small hole/recess in the blade to keep it shut (I actually DONT like this, but it is a nice safety feature).
Since i left my Carborundum stone up at school, I was forced to reprofile on my Lanksy... Which went just as slow as I remembered; but it did work fine. Eventually I had a nice bevel at the 20* mark and put a nice little micro bevel on with the 25* mark. Within a few strokes at 25* it would shave consistantly, so I just polished it up a little with the 600 grit stone, and it would shave very nicely.
All in all, I can't wait for this one to crap out on me so I can get a spyderco (thinking either Native or possibly one other who's model name escapes me right now). But its not a BAD knife, just a typical user-grade production... My Gerber Ridge was a better made knife, as is my brandless 3-blade slip joint I keep in my leather jacket; but both of those are too small for a work knife.