Dear Benchmade,

hauntedhouse said:
Add me to the list of customers turned away by benchmade's QC issues (and them not addressing it).
This sloppy 940 in front of me is the last Benchmade I will buy, unless they publicly address their quality control and there's a notable improvement.
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Go ahead and add me to the list as well. The last Benchmade I owned was gifted to me, but I already said that I would never buy another one myself.
 
I've seen poor QC from other knife companies, including Chris Reeve. I bought a small Sebenza a couple of years ago that was almost impossible to open one handed. I sent it back to CRK and it was returned only slightly better. They said I was opening it wrong (I've had 5 or 6 Sebenzas over the past 23 years and consider myself to be quite capable of opening them correctly). In contrast I bought a used (like new) 555-1 not too long ago and that had centering issues, stiff action and a bit of lock stick. Sent it in to BM and it came back with all the issues fixed, it's just wonderful now. I'd say 8 out of 10 Spyderco lockbacks have what they term lockrock, that is, front to back blade play. It really bugs me in spite of assurances that it doesn't not affect the strength of the lock up. They won't fix it as far as I know. They don't offer replacement blades in spite of cladding some of their blades in steel you can almost scratch with a fingernail... I'm into Benchmades because their many of their designs tick a lot of boxes for me: Arguably the best locking system on the market, truly ambidextrous actions, ultra lightweight, lots of usable edge relative to handle size, my favorite steels and of equal importance, an awesome warranty and great CS. I'd love to see that their QC was more consistent, but since I can be pretty certain that they will address any issues I may have, it's not such a big deal in the light of the other pluses.
 
I have a Crooked River, RSK MK1 and mini RSK MK1 that all came with great edges. But this 940-1 I just received? By far the worst factory edge (almost hard to believe this came from a knife company) in my last two years of purchases. It's wobbled all the way down, and I'm a know-nothing noob with an inexperienced eye. If I could capture it on my iphone 4s I'd show it to all of you.

I dunno if I'll buy BM again. I usually don't completely write off companies for such shortcomings (a lack of integrity is usually required), which can be less problematic for the buyer by purchasing from dealers such as DLT with no hassle returns.
 
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Phixt said:
I have a Crooked River, RSK MK1 and mini RSK MK1 that all came with great edges. But this 940-1 I just received? By far the worst factory edge (almost hard to believe this came from a knife company) in my last two years of purchases. It's wobbled all the way down, and I'm a know-nothing noob with an inexperienced eye. If I could capture it on my iphone 4s I'd show it to all of you.

I dunno if I'll buy BM again. I usually don't completely write off companies for such shortcomings (a lack of integrity is usually required), which can be less problematic for the buyer by purchasing from dealers such as DLT with no hassle returns.
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I would like to see a picture of what you're talking about, compare it to the grind I'm holding in my hand, which is generally acceptable. I may not be totally clear on what wobble is?

I just randomly pulled the trigger on a standard 940 that I physically inspected at Cabelas (I woke up with an impulse to get a new blade), only my second benchmade, as I never really liked them until recently (weird). As far as I can tell this one is good, locks up well, action is smooth, blade can drop freely, it was stone cold centered until I started messing with the pivot for preference. The grind isn't 'perfect' but I'm going to grind it out to where I want anyway so I never got bent out of shape about it. I also never seem to get, and even expect, a 'perfect' grind out of the box for mid-level production knives. Maybe my standards are lower and rusty from actually being away from blades for what amounts to a decade.

I don't think I would return this for another or my cash back due to quality with this particular product, but maybe the OCD will kick in after going deeper down the reading rabbit hole.
 
TheEdge01 said:
Same here, my first expensive knife was the Benchmade Mini Barrage, second was the Griptilian. I would hate to see them go out of business, but if the competition continues to get it right and they don't, Benchmade will go the way of the dodo bird.
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That is a stunningly brash statement considering BM position in the marketplace. Benchmade isn't going anywhere. The vast majority of their revenue is not dependent on twitchy and fickle knife geeks. I would wager that among the members of this eclectic forum you will find far more Benchmade fans than naysayers.

Same thing happens on other gear geek forums-the flavor of the month is revered until the pack migrates to the next big thing. Nothing wrong with it, just have to acknowledge that is where we ar going now. None of the flag bearers of the knifemaking industry are going to board up the factory because of noise on a knife forum, that most owners are unaware of it's existence.
 
fjblair said:
That is a stunningly brash statement considering BM position in the marketplace. Benchmade isn't going anywhere. The vast majority of their revenue is not dependent on twitchy and fickle knife geeks. I would wager that among the members of this eclectic forum you will find far more Benchmade fans than naysayers.

Same thing happens on other gear geek forums-the flavor of the month is revered until the pack migrates to the next big thing. Nothing wrong with it, just have to acknowledge that is where we ar going now. None of the flag bearers of the knifemaking industry are going to board up the factory because of noise on a knife forum, that most owners are unaware of it's existence.[/QUOT

Did I say they were going out of business in the near future? Did I say they were definitely going out of business? At what point did I say forum complaints would doom their business? I was simply stating that I noticed a decline in Benchmade quality along with several other members on here. If there are 50 people on this forum claiming to have experienced quality issues, I would imagine there are many many more out there.
Benchmade is a large company, and it takes a lot of money to run a large company, the money comes from customers buying their product. If too many customers pull away, the company will take a huge hit financially.
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I'd like to add my experience as well. My first three knives were Benchmade, started with a T-latch Model 42 back in 2000, followed by a Mini Skirmish, which is still one of my smoothest opening knives, fit and finish excellent on it. Then came a Griptilian, with the blade not centered and an extremely stiff lock. I thought ok, well this knife is going to be a user so I'm not going to worry about it.

Fast forward a few years and after many Spydercos and Zero Tolerances I decided I wanted another Benchmade. I picked up a 484 Nakamura from Amazon. The first one had the blade so far to one side that it was rubbing the scale. I asked for an exchange and the next one had a chunk missing out of one steel liner and was even missing the aluminum pivot ring on the clip side. I couldn't believe it! Needless to say I exchanged it again and finally got one with a centered blade. Oddly the blade was actually noticeably larger in height than the previous two, which I didn't really mind. However this one had a ding on one pivot ring, and had noticeable side to side blade play. I really like the Nakamura so I just tightened up the pivot, sacrificing a smooth deployment for good lockup and decided to keep it.

Fast forward again and I decided to finally get a 940-1, which I've had my eye on for a long time. I went to my local knife store and asked to see multiple examples of the 940-1, knowing that the odds of getting a good one right away was slim. I was shown 4 units, 3 of which had blades nowhere near centered, and all 4 of them were so tight out of the box that neither the merchant or myself could deploy the blades without first loosening the pivots with a hex tool. Is this normal?? The one knife that had a close to centered blade I tried to tweak with the hex tool, but as soon as I got it to the point where it had a smooth action, there was a lot of side to side play, not to mention the grind on this particular example was extremely uneven. I'd watched so many youtube videos on the 940-1 over the past week and every single one talked about how the 940 was one of the smoothest knives they'd ever owned. Did my knife store get a bad batch or something? In any event I left the store very disappointed and without the new knife I'd been hoping for. I'm from Canada and after taxes a 940-1 costs 400 dollars. For that amount of money I expected a lot more.

I know a lot of guys will say, well you can ship it to Benchmade and they'll fix it right up! Well, if I'm going to spend 400 dollars on a knife I don't really want to spend what would likely be another 50 dollars to ship it cross border and back. I just can't understand how Benchmade can have such great designs, great materials, but such poor QC. I asked to see a Spyderco Para 3 while I was at the store and it was dead center, locked up solid as a rock and had an action smooth as a baby's bottom, for less than half the price!

Please try and improve the quality Benchmade, I absolutely love your designs but if my experience with the 940-1 is any indication I can't justify buying any more of your knives.
 
Benchmade said:
All knives that we ship to Canada must have the pivots tightened in order to get through customs.
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Yup, unfortunately the monkeys over in Canadian customs like to tramp around on our rights and rewrite the meaning of laws to suit their purposes. This means a normal BM pivot will fall under an illegal automatic or "gravity" knife and be considered illegal and seized.

Thank you guys for automatically tightening up pivots for your Canadian customers.
 
I just rec'd a new 940-1, which quality-wise, I'd give it a 9.75/10. My only complaint is that one of the counter-bores for the screws seemed to be put in at too large of a diameter, which created a very thin area of CF, that was chipped off. We're talking size-wise <.010", so no big deal and most people wouldn't even notice it.

What was most interesting is that on the label of the box, there was a date and what appear to be initials. Mine was dated 6-7-17; so I have to assume BKC recently started this, possibly as an additional quality inspection and to hole people accountable. Only speculation, but kind of interesting.
 
If the boxes are dated that does sound like additional QC could be involved. If so, that's good news.
 
Well...that's impressive...great response I guess that come from some of the complaints here? This will probably help you guys long term overall outlook wise.
 
i think its great that you are now focusing on the quality aspect.

two recent videos revolving around the topic which is a great concern to all of us.


 
Jordan@DLT said:
If you order from us you can ask us to inspect the knife before shipping in the comments section of the order. We are happy to make sure everything is ship shape before it goes out to you.
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I love your customer service attitude.

I'm curious though as to how you'd handle a situation where none of the knives you have in stock are without flaw? Say you only have two left and one's off center and the other has blade play.
 
T.L.E. Sharp said:
I love your customer service attitude.

I'm curious though as to how you'd handle a situation where none of the knives you have in stock are without flaw? Say you only have two left and one's off center and the other has blade play.
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In that case I would contact the customer and ask if one would be acceptable or if they'd prefer to cancel and refund.
 
Jordan@DLT said:
In that case I would contact the customer and ask if one would be acceptable or if they'd prefer to cancel and refund.
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That's excellent customer service. Most places would just send the lesser of two evils and hope the customer didn't send it back. DLT seems as if they'd rather lose a potential sale & gain a customer for a future purchase than worry about the quick sale. Great job DLT. I've never ordered from you before (I have a great shop about 45 minutes away) but if they can't fulfil an order for whatever reason, I'll be heading directly to your site.
 
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