What would make you return a knife?

D

DangerZone98

Joined
Dec 7, 2019
Messages
3,603
Whether the issue is related to aesthetics or function, up to you. Here are a few of mine:

Unreliable lockup
Loose detent
Considerable rust
Subpar overall fit and finish
 
DDR Dominator 3.5: extremely warped blade, deep scratch in titanium clip

Boye Cobalt Basic 3: large, very deep scratch in spine with a surrounding gouge where they unsuccessfully tried to buff it out, extremely uneven secondary bevel

Manix G-10 S110V: poorly centered (warped?) blade

Native FRN S110V: huge chip in forward face of lock well which prevented tight lockup

Autonomy 2: metal shavings falling out of the action due to a known engineering defect where the tang galls the locking pin on deployment

Condor Yoshimi: returned twice, both for badly warped blades

Masalong Pterosaur: tip bent the first time my son inserted it into the sheath

Cold Steel Large Luzon: failure to lock on light deployment

Work Tuff Elbrus: blackwash finish literally wiped off on a paper towel

Ka-Bar Ek Model 4: 1/16" of tip snapped off from factory

Kizlyar KO-2: massively warped blade

Kubey KU150 Panthera: returned twice, first return was for a big scratch in the pocket clip, second return was because the knife's packaging had suffered some sort of ingress-at-sea, and was a solid mass of rust

Kubey Darkness: Listing showed revised KU065 D2 version with nested liners, received earlier KU003 version with AUS10 and flush liners

Cobratec FS-X Large D/E : Action completely seized, would not deploy a single time.
 
I’m not in the habit of returning knives unless there is some obvious defect (which is a rarity). A problem with the lock , a big scratch or scuff or severe lock rock would make me wanna return it but again , this has hardly ever been the case in my knife-buying experience.

If I received a knife and it wasn’t everything I thought it would be yet it was working fine then I would just sell it here on the exchange and take a bit of a loss. Sometimes buying knives online can be a gamble. I know that going in and I am fine with it.
 
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Only one time in my life !
This year - Spyderco in ZDP-189
Had some very strange acratches on blade
Probably manufacturing incident and QC shoddy work
 
If the wrong knife was sent.
If the knife was misrepresented in the sales thread
If the knife doesn't function correctly
If the knife got damaged during transit ( poor packing ), that's about it.
 
This did.

hdladBC.jpg
 
New knife? Any flaw that I will keep looking at and being mad about.

Used knife? Any flaw that should have been disclosed that I will keep looking at and being mad about.

I have finally learned to start asking lots of questions before buying a used knife, like:

Are there any flaws that you can see?

How is the fit/finish? Do the scales line up properly etc?

Is the blade perfectly straight? Can you double check? Etc.

Some people just don’t look at a knife as closely as most folks on this forum, and I’d feel bad sending back a knife for something the other party simply didn’t notice…
 
HP2114B said:
DDR Dominator 3.5: extremely warped blade, deep scratch in titanium clip

Boye Cobalt Basic 3: large, very deep scratch in spine with a surrounding gouge where they unsuccessfully tried to buff it out, extremely uneven secondary bevel

Manix G-10 S110V: poorly centered (warped?) blade

Native FRN S110V: huge chip in forward face of lock well which prevented tight lockup

Autonomy 2: metal shavings falling out of the action due to a known engineering defect where the tang galls the locking pin on deployment

Condor Yoshimi: returned twice, both for badly warped blades

Masalong Pterosaur: tip bent the first time my son inserted it into the sheath

Cold Steel Large Luzon: failure to lock on light deployment

Work Tuff Elbrus: blackwash finish literally wiped off on a paper towel

Ka-Bar Ek Model 4: 1/16" of tip snapped off from factory

Kizlyar KO-2: massively warped blade

Kubey KU150 Panthera: returned twice, first return was for a big scratch in the pocket clip, second return was because the knife's packaging had suffered some sort of ingress-at-sea, and was a solid mass of rust

Kubey Darkness: Listing showed revised KU065 D2 version with nested liners, received earlier KU003 version with AUS10 and flush liners

Cobratec FS-X Large D/E : Action completely seized, would not deploy a single time.
Click to expand...
Gotta ask: Are you keeping a black list or do you just have photographic knife memory??
 
I've had no quality complaints about any of the knives I've acquired in the last 20 or so years, all from reputable manufacturers.
 
HP2114B said:
DDR Dominator 3.5: extremely warped blade, deep scratch in titanium clip

Boye Cobalt Basic 3: large, very deep scratch in spine with a surrounding gouge where they unsuccessfully tried to buff it out, extremely uneven secondary bevel

Manix G-10 S110V: poorly centered (warped?) blade

Native FRN S110V: huge chip in forward face of lock well which prevented tight lockup

Autonomy 2: metal shavings falling out of the action due to a known engineering defect where the tang galls the locking pin on deployment

Condor Yoshimi: returned twice, both for badly warped blades

Masalong Pterosaur: tip bent the first time my son inserted it into the sheath

Cold Steel Large Luzon: failure to lock on light deployment

Work Tuff Elbrus: blackwash finish literally wiped off on a paper towel

Ka-Bar Ek Model 4: 1/16" of tip snapped off from factory

Kizlyar KO-2: massively warped blade

Kubey KU150 Panthera: returned twice, first return was for a big scratch in the pocket clip, second return was because the knife's packaging had suffered some sort of ingress-at-sea, and was a solid mass of rust

Kubey Darkness: Listing showed revised KU065 D2 version with nested liners, received earlier KU003 version with AUS10 and flush liners

Cobratec FS-X Large D/E : Action completely seized, would not deploy a single time.
Click to expand...
You are either extremely unlucky or have bought close to a thousand knives to have that many bad knives.
 
Only returned 1 knife out of around 400-500 purchased in the past 4 years.

It was a Kershaw Skyline w/a blade that was so off-center that the blade rested against the liner and could not be adjusted to center it.
 
Returned an Ace Sonoma 2 that had a detent so strong that rendered it unflippable. Never had that happen with any other flipper; got a replacement that worked fine. Have a few front flippers that are a little difficult (a Pena Barlow comes to mind), but the Sonoma was just unusable.
 
1: Hogue deka faulty lock.

2: Spyderco Endura uncentered blade.

So far that's been it.
 
In general, I will return a knife that is messed up in a way that impedes performances, looks bad, or that I can't reliably fix myself.

Some recent examples include a QSP Leopard with the weakest detent I've ever encountered, a severely rusted Stedemon, and a special-edition Artisan Arroyo that was supposed to have pretty scales. The latter was supposed to look like the picture below. The scales are effectively suspensions in acrylic. The one I got for my wife just didn't have anything going on... It was almost entirely white and you could see through to the milling under normal lighting. :oops:

31b3978f-b439-49b5-a90d-ebe3ef0a642a__30573.1606223203.jpg
 
I've returned a Slysz Bowie for a gouge in the lock face new from the factory, the benchmade mini adamas for pretty bad lock slip (I could tap it with a knuckle and collapse the blade), and a victorinox spirit x for the blade not locking.

Price range has always determined tolerance of issues for me, however I also have found that I seem to be a mulligan magnet. However if an issue is primarily cosmetic and not an eye magnet, I usually am able to overlook it. These days I always buy examples I can see in hand whenever possible to try to avoid the hassle.
 
Only returned one knife which was a ZT 0808blk because it had a discoloration spot on the pivot that looked like rust.
Some of my cheap knives have uneven grinds but that’s not a big deal on a $30 user.
For a while my biggest regret was not returning an XM-18 (on Teflon) because it wouldn’t flip at all. Took it apart one day, sanded the blade where it contacts the washer, left the pivot a little loose, and now it’s decent.
 
Somewhat rare event for me -but recent;y returned one knife simply because I couldn't find a review of it's locking mechanism that made any sense. Opened and closed once and then took advantage of the liberal return policy. And just today got a custom knife I'd been looking for for the last twenty years - side to side blade play - contacted seller and seller will take it back. I warn sellers that blade play is something I care about - since I'm very likely to use my knives-cosmetic condition doesn't matter much to me. My average over decades of knife use is probably have returned one in every thirty or forty knives I own or have owned. 'Course I'm so old that the majority of my knives were purchsed at knife shows or over a retailers counter - in my experience -a lot easier to get what you want that way.
 
I've only returned one knife and one razor. Knife was a Kizer flipper with a detent that was so stiff it was actually painful to flip open. The razor was a Dovo that had a warped blade.
 
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