Opinel no 15 slim fillet knife bent - Straighten or ignore?

[theapodan]

I have an Opinel no. 15 fillet knife that I don't use very often, but I had occasion to use it to fillet and skin a bunch of fish weekend before last. I finally took it into the house to clean, and have a problem.

When I skin the fillets, I press down sideways on the knife while drawing it the length of the fillet, and in doing so the blade bends somewhat. I've never noticed a problem using a fillet knife in this way, but the opinel is quite a bit thinner and more flexible than the knife I usually use (a Dexter-Russell v-lo)

When I closed the knife after cleaning it, the blade caught on the edge of the slot, which i attributed to the handle swelling a little maybe, but after waiting a couple of days for it to dry, it still catches, and I looked more carefully at the knife and noticed that the blade is now bent, enough to catch in the slot in the handle, but not really enough to notice otherwise.

Should I try to bend the blade back, or am I better off leaving it alone and just continue to use it, since presumably it would just bend again? By pressing sideways on the blade it goes into the slot on the handle fine.

Also, is this knife defective, or is this typical for the opinel stainless blades and just the price you pay for having a nice flexible blade?

Thanks.

 

[collim1]

A fillet absolutely should not take a bend so in my opinion it is defective.

Trying to bend it back may break it.

Just re read your post and it appears this is a folding fillet knife. Are you should the blade itself is bent? My guess is the pivot is out of whack and the blade alignment is off.

 

[Obsessed with Edges]

At least some fillet knives may take a bit of a bend or warp (some from the factory), and can subsequently be 'corrected' somewhat. I'm mentioning this (and bumping this thread) because I recently picked up an inexpensive Rapala fillet knife (4" fixed blade w/birch handle, made in Finland) that had a sizable 'left turn' in the blade when viewing it from the butt-end of the handle. The blade was both canted left immediately at the junction with the handle, AND also had a noticeable bend/warp in the same direction about mid-blade or so.

I 'fixed' both issues by pressing the forward 1/3-1/2 of the blade flush to a flat surface and carefully lifting the aft 1/2 of the blade upward (this eventually straightend out the mid-blade bend) and then pressing the nearly full length of the blade flush and lifting at the handle, to straighten the bend/cant at the junction to the handle. At least with this knife, there was a LOT of temper & spring to the blade itself, so the flexing against the blade's warp looked pretty extreme while doing so. I flexed the blade while paying close attention to how much resistance I was feeling, keeping it just short of the point where it feels there's little more for the blade to give. All that said, the blade is noticeably straighter now.

Doing all the above with a new knife is purely optional, and I wouldn't argue with anyone wishing to just send it back to the manufacturer, if not comfortable trying to fix it yourself.


David

 

[lonestar1979]

Little bend is nothing to worry about,I have bent Rapalla 4inch fillet knife and it functions normally and sharpens up to razor edge.

 

[bgentry]

I learned blade straightening from Murray Carter's videos. It's really a lot easier than it might seem. David's method of holding the blade down flat with the heel of your hand and then lifting the handle with the other hand is exactly what Murray teaches as a beginning technique. It works pretty well!

I've only straightened maybe 20 blades or so, most were very minor bends. Out of those, I broke one blade that was SEVERELY warped and had been for something like 15 years. My grandmother (Yia Yia for any of you Greeks out there) is still mad at the person that bent it by *shoving* it into a knife block at an angle. Anyway, I was lifting way harder and with much more bend than I should have. I probably had 30 degrees of bend in the blade as I was flexing it to try to straighten it when *SNAP*, it broke off leaving an inch of blade on the counter and the rest of the knife in my hand. I was surprised but unhurt.

Just be less extreme than me and you'll probably be able to straighten your blade safely.

Brian.