Curious about my Small Tinker

S

supergnat

Joined
Jun 27, 2015
Messages
167
I purchased a Small Tinker from the auction site and have noticed two peculiar things about it:
1. It's lacking a keychain attachment.
2. There's no half-stop on the cap lifter/screwdriver.

I view #1 as a good thing since key chain attachment points are often uncomfortable when using the knife. I've often pondered grinding them off with a dremel but have never actually followed through with that idea.

#2 is a curiosity for me. I've never seen another Victorinox that didn't have a half stop on the cap lifter. Was there a time when Victorinox didn't put a half stop on the cap lifter?

This knife doesn't seem to be very old. The reamer has an eye for sewing which I've been told means the knife can't be any older than 1985.
 
supergnat said:
I purchased a Small Tinker from the auction site and have noticed two peculiar things about it:
1. It's lacking a keychain attachment.
2. There's no half-stop on the cap lifter/screwdriver.

I view #1 as a good thing since key chain attachment points are often uncomfortable when using the knife. I've often pondered grinding them off with a dremel but have never actually followed through with that idea.

#2 is a curiosity for me. I've never seen another Victorinox that didn't have a half stop on the cap lifter. Was there a time when Victorinox didn't put a half stop on the cap lifter?

This knife doesn't seem to be very old. The reamer has an eye for sewing which I've been told means the knife can't be any older than 1985.
Click to expand...

There are no half stop on 84mm Vic screwdriver/bottle openers, I believe because they didn't think tools that size could stand the torque like their 91mm counterparts, but there should be a keyring attachment point. Maybe it got dremeled off by a previous owner, which would have saved you the trouble.
 
Hmm...if there was a key ring attachment, I can find no evidence of it. Perhaps the previous owner was masterful with the Dremel, but I think it more likely that it was manufactured without one.

Are you sure that Victorinox doesn't put half stops on 84mm screwdrivers? My Bantam has a half stop on the combo tool and the combo tool is less robust than the cap lifter.
 
Both my Small Tinker & my Tourist do indeed have a half-stop on the Screwdriver/caplifter. They are both post 2005 manufacture.
 
Yeah, according to SAKWiki, the half-stop wasn't added to the 84mm cap lifter until very recently.
 
Ecchi-Spud said:
Yeah, according to SAKWiki, the half-stop wasn't added to the 84mm cap lifter until very recently.
Click to expand...

Hmm...interesting. So that puts the manufacture of my particular Small Tinker somewhere between 1985 and 2011.

SAKWiki mentions that some Small Tinkers were made without keyrings, but doesn't give any details.

If I wanted to get a new Small Tinker without a keyring, how difficult would that be?
 
sorry guys but that lack of key ring is factory = The first one I owned was a gift from my dad in the mid to late 1970,s an 84 mm knife tinker and it has a contoured phillips =not just round stock = I have two others - one with key ring one without but both have the round stock phillips = none have a "half stop" on the caplifter - a great knife which I use almost daily!
Peace and don't cut yourselves
Revvie
 
The keyring on the larger SAKs has never made sense to me. In theory it could be used to attach a lanyard or suspension clip, but I've never seen anyone do that with a SAK.
 
supergnat said:
If I wanted to get a new Small Tinker without a keyring, how difficult would that be?
Click to expand...

Keep searching the beach on the Bay of Fleas, sooner or later everything washes ashore: there are NKR advertising knives for Swiss businesses you've never heard of, and "economy" models with NKR, tweezers or toothpick.
 
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