My LC200N Mule Rusted. How is that possible??

I'm going to go with no to alien squid :) , just ink and a quill. And it never touched the underside of the scales :)
 
I can only speculate, but this has to be contaminated steel. This steel shouldn't rust like that. That's one reason it's used in the aerospace industry.
 
neffarious said:
I'm going to go with no to alien squid :) , just ink and a quill. And it never touched the underside of the scales :)
Click to expand...

Good. If it were real alien, the knife would’ve dissolved completely, and the eastern US would be under quarantine by now. I didn’t think before asking. Better luck with your replacement blade!
 
in to learn what went wrong. interesting that its rusting for this steel.......nice to see spyderco jump all over and take care of the op.
 
Im wondering if it was not LC200N

Maybe a different steel which was mislabeled.
 
I am going to venture a guess that the Mule in question is not LC200N. There was some sort of mix up.
 
Or as someone else mentioned; the knife was contaminated by another steel during manufacturing.

Might be by the smallest amount of steel bits/shaving comming in contact with the Mule.

IIRC that was the Spyderco explanation for a H1, which turned up rusty.

Its not like H1 usually has a tendency to rust.

Either way, Spyderco will do right by you as they have before.

Im sure, there will be a perfectly good explanation, as LC200N has a good record.

Its certainly not keeping me from ordering a LC200N Mule.
 
You know, I was doing some corrosion testing last year on hardware and I made some test pieces of Lc200n (Chad Kelly actually made them) that were pinned/screwed to g10 with various types of fasteners. I put the three pieces on the kayak and within 24 hours I was seeing this type of corrosion on all of them. Very odd as I have torture tested this steel (in several Spydercos and customs) in HIGHLY corrosive environments for months and never seen any corrosion at all. Chad and I discussed what was going on and he told me that he finished the test pieces on the same rough belt that had been used to grind some 52100. Because they were test pieces they were left with a rough (maybe 80 grit) finish so the grind must have been embedded and contaminated with tons of non stainless steel. The result was pretty amazing. It looked exactly like the steel itself was rusting badly, but having used numerous knives from the same maker with the same HT and never seeing any rust, I have to believe that belt contamination was the culprit. That would be my first guess on what you are seeing with this mule. IMO it is a much more plausible explanation than a mislabeled steel and based on my experience that type of contamination could definitely cause the exact type of issues you are seeing with that mule. Just my guess...nobody will know for sure until Spyderco has a look at it...hopefully they will update this thread once they do.
 
BladeScout said:
Or as someone else mentioned; the knife was contaminated by another steel during manufacturing.

Might be by the smallest amount of steel bits/shaving comming in contact with the Mule.

IIRC that was the Spyderco explanation for a H1, which turned up rusty.

Its not like H1 usually has a tendency to rust.

Either way, Spyderco will do right by you as they have before.

Im sure, there will be a perfectly good explanation, as LC200N has a good record.

Its certainly not keeping me from ordering a LC200N Mule.
Click to expand...

Surfingringo said:
You know, I was doing some corrosion testing last year on hardware and I made some test pieces of Lc200n (Chad Kelly actually made them) that were pinned/screwed to g10 with various types of fasteners. I put the three pieces on the kayak and within 24 hours I was seeing this type of corrosion on all of them. Very odd as I have torture tested this steel (in several Spydercos and customs) in HIGHLY corrosive environments for months and never seen any corrosion at all. Chad and I discussed what was going on and he told me that he finished the test pieces on the same rough belt that had been used to grind some 52100. Because they were test pieces they were left with a rough (maybe 80 grit) finish so the grind must have been embedded and contaminated with tons of non stainless steel. The result was pretty amazing. It looked exactly like the steel itself was rusting badly, but having used numerous knives from the same maker with the same HT and never seeing any rust, I have to believe that belt contamination was the culprit. That would be my first guess on what you are seeing with this mule. IMO it is a much more plausible explanation than a mislabeled steel and based on my experience that type of contamination could definitely cause the exact type of issues you are seeing with that mule. Just my guess...nobody will know for sure until Spyderco has a look at it...hopefully they will update this thread once they do.
Click to expand...

Yeah, Im leaning towards that explanation.
 
Idle thought: could there be something in the body fluid of the squid that adheres or bonds to this new steel in some way that doesn't happen in other steels?
 
QAJAQ said:
Idle thought: could there be something in the body fluid of the squid that adheres or bonds to this new steel in some way that doesn't happen in other steels?
Click to expand...
Not unless he mistook the squid for something else.
gw4NjHV.jpg

SS81L9P.jpg
 
If it is due to contamination of the steel by some other steel, all Mules in this batch should have this problem. But we have not heard aother report of this problem have we? Unless all owners have been babying their LC200N Mule.
 
Sounds like a one off. LC200N doesn't do that. BHQ left their spydiechef in the great salt lake and it didn't rust. Hope this gets resolved, and I'd be interested in seeing what the cause is. Regardless, here's to hoping that spyderco does a PM2 or Manix 2 in LC200N really soon.
 
It seems like the corrosion under the scales is centered around each of the pins? Was there a lot of corrosion on the fastening hardware?
This obviously does not explain the blade itself.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top