Kizer Feist and the gritty action....

jnl

Joined
Feb 12, 2013
Messages
2
Hello everyone,
A few days ago I had a chance to have a great and productive in-person meeting with David and Max of Kizer to go over the production issues that are causing the "gritty action". I showed them exactly what changes have to happen to correct the issues. Kizer will be making the appropriate adjustments as soon as possible. Also, I was assured that Kizer would take care of any existing Feist customers with complaints once they have ironed out the problem on the production end. Please give them a little time to implement the necessary changes and we will update once we have new info.

Best,
Justin Lundquist
 
Totally respect that you're taking such an active interest in remedying this issue! Will be picking one up once things are dialed in for sure.
 
This is great news. I had wanted to try a Feist, but with the initial reports I bailed.
I'll give them another look when the kinks are worked out.
 
It's good to see a company take interest in their customers concerns, that says a lot about Kizer.
 
Wow
Hello everyone,
A few days ago I had a chance to have a great and productive in-person meeting with David and Max of Kizer to go over the production issues that are causing the "gritty action". I showed them exactly what changes have to happen to correct the issues. Kizer will be making the appropriate adjustments as soon as possible. Also, I was assured that Kizer would take care of any existing Feist customers with complaints once they have ironed out the problem on the production end. Please give them a little time to implement the necessary changes and we will update once we have new info.

Best,
Justin Lundquist
This is great to hear. I just got my Feist for father's day and I was a bit disappointed by the action. I planned on keeping it regardless so it's a very nice gesture on Kizer's part to help us early adopters out. I also find the detent quite strong, I wonder if it's just me.

As of 6/13 Kizer customer service told me they're beginning production on the next lot.
 
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Thanks, Justin.

I returned my Feist and am eagerly awaiting a new batch without the grittiness.

It would be helpful to know what you found that needs fixing.

Thanks.
 
Thanks, Justin.

I returned my Feist and am eagerly awaiting a new batch without the grittiness.

It would be helpful to know what you found that needs fixing.

Thanks.
Many people have said the floating stop pin is what is causing the gritty noise. I would have to agree, especially since you can hear it rattle when the knife is semi open (not locked or closed).
 
Many people have said the floating stop pin is what is causing the gritty noise. I would have to agree, especially since you can hear it rattle when the knife is semi open (not locked or closed).

Is that something that is easily fixed? Wondering if someone could fix that themselves without having to send it in for service.
 
Is that something that is easily fixed? Wondering if someone could fix that themselves without having to send it in for service.
Well don't take my word for it because I'm no engineer or experienced knife modder, but somehow immobilizing the pin would fix it I think.
 
Justin and/or Kizer,

Please let us know when the next batch of the Feist flippers come out that has addressed the issues mentioned. Also, how would one ask for this "fixed" batch from a dealer?

Thank you.
 
Yes please let us know, the feist has made it to my must have list. Always like the front flipper action ever since the Kershaw 1415, I believe that was the number.
 
So I bought a brand new Feist and just received it today. I took it apart, oiled the internals including the small channel that the pin rides in. Reassembled and seems to be working smoothly. Out of the box new it didn't seem gritty either but a bit stiff, I adjusted the nut screw tension and that took care of that. Blade centered too. No complaints, nice little knife. When I took it apart, I could tell though that if the channel wasn't smooth, it would definitely cause some issues with blade deployment/action.
 
So I bought a brand new Feist and just received it today. I took it apart, oiled the internals including the small channel that the pin rides in. Reassembled and seems to be working smoothly. Out of the box new it didn't seem gritty either but a bit stiff, I adjusted the nut screw tension and that took care of that. Blade centered too. No complaints, nice little knife. When I took it apart, I could tell though that if the channel wasn't smooth, it would definitely cause some issues with blade deployment/action.
By stiff do you mean the pivot action? What about the lock bar, how was yours? I find it to be extremely hard to disengage, I can't really use my thumb so I end up turning it over and using my index finger.
 
By stiff do you mean the pivot action? What about the lock bar, how was yours? I find it to be extremely hard to disengage, I can't really use my thumb so I end up turning it over and using my index finger.

Yes, exactly the pivot was stiff but just needed to be loosened a little bit and then was fine. The lock bar doesnt seem to be hard to disengage, I can do it easily with my thumb.
 
Hm ok. Maybe there's a sweet spot and I'm just not finding it with my thumb.

It's a pretty small knife so I could see how it would be tough to open if the lock bar has any stick to it. Based on the issues that your knife has, have you considered contacting Kizer support and see if they can help you? Shame that you are having these problems with such a cool little knife.
 
Ok I just got my Feist. It came with abit of a loose pivot and grittyness. So I took it apart. The ball bearings are captured and run on another dished steel washer. The internal stop pin goes through the blade into tracks that run semicircular around these dished washers. The tracks and little pockets milled out for the dished washers had some spalled metal from the milling process. It was not loose spalling but rather still connected to the frame. Used the corner of my sharpmaker stone to polish it down abit. Put it back together and the grittyness is gone.

Note this knife has so many small pieces. It was a pain to get back together. Atleast the bearings werent loose.
 
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Hello everyone,
A few days ago I had a chance to have a great and productive in-person meeting with David and Max of Kizer to go over the production issues that are causing the "gritty action". I showed them exactly what changes have to happen to correct the issues. Kizer will be making the appropriate adjustments as soon as possible. Also, I was assured that Kizer would take care of any existing Feist customers with complaints once they have ironed out the problem on the production end. Please give them a little time to implement the necessary changes and we will update once we have new info.

Best,
Justin Lundquist

I did have to to push them to refund a customer's return postage on a gritty Feist. But Tracy at Kizer sorted that out in this thread.

http://www.bladeforums.com/threads/front-flippers-feist-wakulla-changing-the-game.1451802/page-6
http://www.bladeforums.com/threads/front-flippers-feist-wakulla-changing-the-game.1451802/page-6
The Feist I have has a good dose of "lock stick". But no gritty feeling.

I see you explain it in more depth in this reply from Instagram. Hope you don't mind me posting it?

"The Feist internals are not the same as the Wanderer so the issues were only with the Feist. The problem is that they didn't make the stop pin a tight push fit in the blade and the way they were milling the bearing pockets was creating flashing. I think the Feist was the first time they tried to make a knife with a stop pin in the blade. My original internal design uses a stop pin fixed between the scales rather than a pin that is in the blade. They decided to change it for some reason. They are supposed to be correcting the Feist manufacturing issues ASAP. Because the Wanderer uses a pin fixed between the scales and it uses washers with no bearing pockets it doesn't have the issues that the Feist had."
 
Yeah the action on mine has improved with time but the lock stick is absolutely awful, I can't for the life of me close it with my thumb. I have to use my index finger and hold it in an awkward way
 
Just to add another data point, while I really like the design in almost every aspect the execution makes it difficult to enjoy. When I received my example, there were burrs on both sides either class 4 or 5 type that caused a great deal of interference with the stop pin.

After removing as much of this as possible, the action was improved, but the floating stop pin still will ride on rough machining marks in the base of each channel. This means the subtle roughness is always there in various degrees depending on the side the pin has drifted to.

I attribute the difficulty in centering both by the factory and during reassembling on pivot holes that are not round on my example. That is also a disappointment.

A question for other owners... are others finding the pocket clip useable? Mine is far too tight even for slacks, so it just sits in the bottom of the pocket un-clipped.
 
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