I know this is an old thread, but for future reference for anyone searching, since no one actually answered; the good ZT counterfeits that were sent to ZT were hard to spot even for them! The only thing found on a particular example is that metric screws were used. So if the relevant screw size from an American knife doesn’t screw past a rev or 2 it is fake. Another option is to have the steel tested with an XRF or PMI gun to see its composition. High end Chinese fakes can have moderate to high end Chinese steels, but usually different to genuine, and even equivalent steels to ZT blade steels (M390 etc.) will have different %’s which you could cross check with ZT.
PSA!
I’m in Australia, but from what I’ve seen of the Chinese counterfeit knives online (that are sent to US in bulk with dealers giving feedback about how the customers can’t tell the difference and such) I would get steel tests done on any modern American production knives - even from an “Authorised dealer”. Underestimate modern Chinese knife counterfeiters at your own peril! There are certain counterfeiters with their own “brand names” within the Chinese knife counterfeit community who charge much more than the others because their replicas are so good that no one has questioned them. There are LITERALLY Chinese counterfeiters of those counterfeiters who make good fakes with cheaper steel and try to sell them under the top counterfeit brand names, I shit you not. I became aware of this stuff since around 2019 and it was already a long flourishing system before then, and virtually the entire ENORMOUS counterfeit knife industry in China is made for the sole purpose of being sold to Americans IN AMERICA!!! If I bought any of the following knife brands in the last 10 years just to name a few, I would get the blade steel tested by a metallurgist (don’t bother checking the HRC, they can make even 8Cr13MoV any hardness they want up to 62):
ZT, Benchmade, Spyderco, Microtech, “USA made” Kershaw, CRK, SOG, Cold Steel, and many more.
I have absolutely zero invested in this issue, I am passionate about this for 2 reasons; firstly if I was a knife enthusiast in America and somebody had seen what I have seen I would want to know; secondly - I don’t have anything against most of the counterfeiters in general; most of them are literally trying to survive… but the party/ies who are profiting in the supply chain in America who are switching them out and selling them as genuine purely for profit should be facing severe robbery and fraud charges with mandatory imprisonment! And don’t tell me a dealer/shop owner with fakes believes his supplier is supplying genuine and he’s not making money from it. If you believe that I have some cheap beach front properties to sell you. Not saying no naive dealer has been stooged before, but they are in the best position to sell fakes and then blame it on a rogue supplier, no? They are who I’ve seen glowing feedback from, the people individually selling them. If you were selling ZT’s or Benchmade would you be careful who your supplier was?
Like STD’s, if you’ve ever wondered, get checked for your peace of mind. And if it comes back good, you can confidently flaunt your shit to whomever wants to see it.
This escalated quickly, imma put it on fb somewhere, by all accounts Americans are more hidden from this stuff than I realised.
