- Joined
- Jul 30, 2006
- Messages
- 38,695
I am partial to Buck knives. I've carried and used them since the 60's. Most of you also know that I am a mod in the Traditional Forum. I've carried and used traditional knives, including traditional lockbacks since the 1950's. So, I don't say this lightly and I say it with a goodly amount of experience in such matters, "Why has Buck added a nasty lump to the 422LT blade/spring interface."
I like the hand-filling handles of the 110 and 112 knives. And I like the smaller blade of the 112 compared to that of 110, because I find the shorter blade to be handier and more controllable. But I like plastic handles instead of the heavier metal and wood. For me it gives a better balance to the knife. I bought a new old stock 422 (1980's vintage) for that reason a couple of years ago. Nice knife. A few years ago, Buck made some 112's with paperstone handles a few years ago. Nice knives. I gave several away as gifts. (I have to like a knife a lot before I will gift it.) I've kicked myself any number of times for not buying an extra for myself.
The 422 is nice, but it's thick behind the edge, as many Buck knives were back in the 80's. So I decided to purchase an 112LT with the edge-2000 profile, which I find to be an improvement over other profiles. I like the FRN handle, and I like the cutting edge. But, to my surprise the tang-backspring joint is misshapen when the blade is open. This is not bad quality control. This is a purposeful change to the design.
Both the blade and the spring have an upward lump in them. Oh, I know why they did it, if you make a lump at the joint, it is less noticeable that the back of the knife is uneven with the spring. It means they don't have to be as precise with their tooling and processes. In other words, it's cheaper to build that way.
Good Golly Miss Molly, it's ugly. Worse, that lump is right where I put my thumb when I am cutting with the knife. It isn't sharp, but I notice it every time I use the knife. So aside from being ugly as sin, it interferes with my knife usage.
I get it. I'm an aerospace engineer and we tweak our designs to be more easily assembled by Production. But we don't do it when it interferes with the design. I have said, "NO." to plenty of design change proposals made by Production in my day because what they wanted to do would interfere with the function of the design. In my opinion, somebody at Buck should have looked at the result of this change and done the same. This is one knife I will never give as a gift. It will likely find a hiding place in my dresser drawer.
422 no lump
I like the hand-filling handles of the 110 and 112 knives. And I like the smaller blade of the 112 compared to that of 110, because I find the shorter blade to be handier and more controllable. But I like plastic handles instead of the heavier metal and wood. For me it gives a better balance to the knife. I bought a new old stock 422 (1980's vintage) for that reason a couple of years ago. Nice knife. A few years ago, Buck made some 112's with paperstone handles a few years ago. Nice knives. I gave several away as gifts. (I have to like a knife a lot before I will gift it.) I've kicked myself any number of times for not buying an extra for myself.
The 422 is nice, but it's thick behind the edge, as many Buck knives were back in the 80's. So I decided to purchase an 112LT with the edge-2000 profile, which I find to be an improvement over other profiles. I like the FRN handle, and I like the cutting edge. But, to my surprise the tang-backspring joint is misshapen when the blade is open. This is not bad quality control. This is a purposeful change to the design.
Both the blade and the spring have an upward lump in them. Oh, I know why they did it, if you make a lump at the joint, it is less noticeable that the back of the knife is uneven with the spring. It means they don't have to be as precise with their tooling and processes. In other words, it's cheaper to build that way.
Good Golly Miss Molly, it's ugly. Worse, that lump is right where I put my thumb when I am cutting with the knife. It isn't sharp, but I notice it every time I use the knife. So aside from being ugly as sin, it interferes with my knife usage.
I get it. I'm an aerospace engineer and we tweak our designs to be more easily assembled by Production. But we don't do it when it interferes with the design. I have said, "NO." to plenty of design change proposals made by Production in my day because what they wanted to do would interfere with the function of the design. In my opinion, somebody at Buck should have looked at the result of this change and done the same. This is one knife I will never give as a gift. It will likely find a hiding place in my dresser drawer.
422 no lump