How to spot a fake Infidel

dkb45

dkb45

Joined
Dec 16, 2012
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I came across a guy today at a local knife shop that wants to get rid of his Infidel. That's a knife I have eyed for a while, it was just always out of my reach. I happened to mention that I have a ZT 808 I'm looking to get rid of, and he asked if I wanted to do a straight trade. I got to look at his knife, it is a pretty heavy user but everything seemed fine. Granted I am nowhere near an expert in Benchmade knives, especially something I have handled like 4 time in my life.

It's not like I have a reason to doubt the guy, he was pretty knowledgeable about everything, one can just never really be too careful. Are there any tell tale signs of a fake?
 
In a lot of cases it's about the fit and finish. Fakes can be rough compared to Benchmades. I know there are Infidel fakes, so until you're sure do some looking around on eBay. After a while you'll be able to spot them; they just don't look right. Good luck!
 
Ulf Krogstad said:
No pic? Coating is a tell tale sign for me, should be powdery textured.
Click to expand...

No pic, I didn't take one. The coating is the right kind of powder coat kind of anodized coat for the aluminum, blade is beat blasted. The only real issue was some blade wobble, which I know is pretty common for many OTF autos, so that seemed normal (here's where I have to defer to you guys, not familiar with par for the course on this specific knife).
 
I'd say was probably real and didn't live up to your expectations. Infidel didn't live up to mine either, especially for the price. I know I would have broken the blade as flimsy as it is in a month. If as you say was a heavy user can definitely see it having blade play. Wish they would make a version with a thicker blade and overall more heavy duty, even though would mean more weight. ZTs are cloned way more to precision than most BM clones, havent seen BM clone couldnt tell apart from genuine, which I'm thankful for.
 
Well I did buy it, after a thorough inspection there is nothing to make me doubt the validity. The milling on the aluminum is perfectly crisp, the coating is abrasive to the nail (consistent with hardcoat aluminum), the blade grinds are right, and the logos are nice and clear. The screws are also right sized torx, and the weight is about right (don't have a scale, but I can tell it is around the 6oz mark).
 
The real Infidels are light in weight and the clip is one of the best ways to tell. The fakes have very crisp text (odd) and the authentic one is battle-worn.

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