Sal, will you please take a look at this?

A

AwayFromMySpydieHole

Joined
Jan 30, 2017
Messages
285
Ok, so maybe I'm just a little too concerned with it, but this seems to be an issue with more and more spydies that I've noticed. Before I go on, please know that I have bought literally hundreds (possibly thousands) of Spyderco knives. I've been heavily buying their product since around 2006. I *love* spyderco knives, and they make up at least 90% of my extensive collection. I've been a knife nut and spyderco lover for a long, long time.


But, recently I've been noticing a trend with the Golden made spydies that leaves me a little annoyed, but maybe it's just because I pay too much attention to it?

As of late (as in the last year or so) I've been seeing a what I consider to be a large variance in the blades, after sharpening. What I mean is that it seems like way, way too much steel is being removed from some knives during sharpening. And again I only notice this on Golden spydies.

The majority of the steel removal happens in the ricasso area, but it goes all the way out to the tip, also. In the most extreme example I've seen, it leaves 2 of the same exact knives with blades that are 5/64 different in size - in both length and width (spine to edge). Now, that is not insignificant at all. For me, I can go a whole year (or longer in most circumstances) without ever grinding off that much material, so it hurts to get 2 brand new knives and see that one has a couple years worth of life ground off of it straight from the factory.

It isn't ALL knives, please don't let me make it sound like that. It is however, most. I have ordered 11 spyderco knives in the last week alone, and 8 of the 11 are bad enough to really bother me. I find myself ordering duplicates just to (hopefully) get one in the bunch that hasn't had a significant portion of the blade ground away.

I've added some pictures below. I can't really illustrate blades being different in actual length and width, so I tried to just show the recent purchases that have been ground away at the ricasso area. The first picture is an M390 military that I got years ago.......back when this wasn't really a problem. Notice how there is no steel removed at the ricasso? That's how the knives (in my opinion) should come. With a fresh edge, but minimal, if any, steel removed. The rest of the pictures hopefully highlight what I am talking about.

Again, I feel like I need to reiterate that I love spyderco knives. I'm only making this thread because I've seen this getting worse and worse over time and it's to the point that I cringe when I open boxes of new knives, because I can't stand to see all that steel removed and have blades that are nearly 1/8 of an inch different in size.......when they don't need to be.

Thanks for reading, and I hope this doesn't seem like a bash on spyderco. I sincerely do not mean it to be like that. This is a friendly post meant to suggest looking at what I feel is an issue. Thanks everyone, and especially thanks to Sal.


M390 Military (Perfect blade, no excessive steel removal. How they ALL used to come)
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Cruwear Manix (bought 3 of these, 2 were like this)
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S110V Para 2 (bought 2 of these, both were like this)
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You get the idea I think. I hope this shows what I'm talking about, and also I hope I made it clear that this isn't only an issue at the ricasso. The blades that have been ground down at the ricasso are almost *always* physically shorter and smaller than their counter parts that haven't been excessively sharpened.

Thanks again for reading guys.
 
Mo2 said:
The way i look at it is, these are mass production knives.
Click to expand...

That's a valid point, no doubt. I am hopefully not making it seem like some huge, world ending issue.


It's just something that I've seen get progressively worse (for lack of a better word) over time. They used to all come perfect......and I mean PERFECT. I am just hoping that somehow we can get back to that, while keeping production high and costs low. :)
 
I'm as OCD as they come.

And even I have to say "You've got to be kidding".

I say put away the micrometer and enjoy the damn knife ;)
 
I've noticed this on my s110v PM2 as well. It is kind of annoying but I guess I was going to ignore it haha.
 
AwayFromMySpydieHole has a valid point,not to ignored by and certainly not to be ridiculed,come on Wolverine666!
 
This is a pet peeve of mine as well. I just bought a knife from a different manufacturer that was worse than the above photos. It was a $300 knife with a recurve that wasn't by design...
 
AwayFromMySpydieHole said:
That's a valid point, no doubt. I am hopefully not making it seem like some huge, world ending issue.


It's just something that I've seen get progressively worse (for lack of a better word) over time. They used to all come perfect......and I mean PERFECT. I am just hoping that somehow we can get back to that, while keeping production high and costs low. :)
Click to expand...

Right there is the real problem IMHO. Society, especially in this country, has come to expect perfection in everything...from babies being delivered to the products we buy and the medication we voluntarily take. It is part of the reason we are so litigious. The reality is (are you sitting down for this?)...perfection exists nowhere but in our minds. Nowhere. We are also used to (dare I say "spoiled") getting everything "our way". Again, that is not reality.

The issue is not with Spyderco at all, but with you, the OP. Sal and company work their butts off to bring you the very best that they can in every single knife made available to the public. They are highly engineered tools that have passed quality inspection and meet Spyderco's exceptionally high standards. I have no doubt that Spyderco would LOVE to please every customer 100%, but hopefully you know enough to know that is impossible.

Simply put, you can look at the glass as half empty or half full. I prefer the latter myself. Life is much better when you don't sweat the small stuff. Just my .02. you are free to take what you like from it and leave the rest. :thumbup:

Back to our regularly scheduled program...
 
japanese ones remove far more metal than those shown, sometimes years of sharpening worth of steel gone before it's even used......but i think it's due to hand sharpening more than anything. i have japanese enduras that are far worse, but still work as a knife so i just accept it. plus mass production, tolerances and all that, etc. i just accept them and use them.


wonder if it's the machine i've heard of on the american made ones? someone said a machine does the sharpening now, not done by hand......i read on this forum, but i have no idea......
 
on_the_edge said:
Right there is the real problem IMHO. Society, especially in this country, has come to expect perfection in everything...from babies being delivered to the products we buy and the medication we voluntarily take. It is part of the reason we are so litigious. The reality is (are you sitting down for this?)...perfection exists nowhere but in our minds. Nowhere. We are also used to (dare I say "spoiled") getting everything "our way". Again, that is not reality.

The issue is not with Spyderco at all, but with you, the OP. Sal and company work their butts off to bring you the very best that they can in every single knife made available to the public. They are highly engineered tools that have passed quality inspection and meet Spyderco's exceptionally high standards. I have no doubt that Spyderco would LOVE to please every customer 100%, but hopefully you know enough to know that is impossible.

Simply put, you can look at the glass as half empty or half full. I prefer the latter myself. Life is much better when you don't sweat the small stuff. Just my .02. you are free to take what you like from it and leave the rest. :thumbup:

Back to our regularly scheduled program...
Click to expand...

Maybe there's also a problem with you? In believing that your opinion is more valid than the OPs? I've heard other people complain of this in the past. I don't see why Sal and Spyderco wouldn't want to take a look at this issue and see if they can do better in a production setting. And if not, then OK.
 
I'm sure they have specs, and those edges fall within them. Just like not every frame/liner/compression lock is going to sit at the EXACT same spot on every knife. Small variances are going to exist in a production knife. Even Chris Reeve has a margin of acceptability when it comes to lock up.
 
We all as consumers have the right to expect whatever we want. We must just realize that as our expectations go up so does the likelyhood that we will be disappointed. I don't think that there is anything wrong with mentioning it nor do I think that it is excessively ocd to have even noticed it but based on your wording it does sound as though it bugs you a lot more than it would bug me. I have just come to expect some variation from knife to knife on knives at this price point. I am in favor of constructive criticism as Spyderco has always been open and responsive to it.
 
The most extreme example you have seen is 5/64". That is much closer to 1/16" than an 1/8". In the most extreme case.

It's not ideal, but not the end of the world either. You don't have to buy so many knives because they all can't get used and then others can enjoy them. If your standards are so high then maybe buy fewer and higher end knives.

When a company gets popular and grows to meet demand, quality usually slides while trying to keep up with production to meet demand. At least they haven't all been outsourced to China in order to meet demand which happens to most companies that go thru fast paced growing pains.
 
believe it or not,i'm the "glas is half full guy",but some people who should need glasses look trough spydiehole's.
 
They can make Spydercos to tighter tolerances than Chris Reeve made knives if they so choose. Naturally costs would be Sebenza'ish. I prefer Spydercos and hope they continue to fight tooth and nail to keep costs down so I can afford them on my now retired-fixed income salary. My first Endura cost $32 and I'd walk past dealers at the gunshows in 92 to go to one that didn't charge $35. I look at it as they are fighting to keep costs down to keep guys like me as customers. I've stated here at this forum for years that I care about performance first, ergonomics second. I care not one bit for eye perfect knives. As soon as I get them they will no longer be perfect the way I use them. It's the same with the other thread recently about rough finishes in the Spyderhole. I give these things no thought to be honest until threads like these turn up. It isn't my place to tell the OP to buy different brands though.

Joe
 
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Raised prices to get closer to perfection?

Hmm maybe I'm actually ok with $190 Technos for now. I do play the lotto though so hopefully that will change. Promise I'll bump this thread if I do.
 
on_the_edge said:
The issue is not with Spyderco at all, but with you, the OP. Sal and company work their butts off to bring you the very best that they can in every single knife made available to the public. They are highly engineered tools that have passed quality inspection and meet Spyderco's exceptionally high standards. I have no doubt that Spyderco would LOVE to please every customer 100%, but hopefully you know enough to know that is impossible.
Click to expand...

If the OP is a long time collector and has bought thousands of knives and stated that this is a recent problem and only from the Golden factory means something has changed in Golden. If the blades were perfect before it isn't unreasonable to expect them to keep the same standard.
 
I dunno. I was going to grab my collection box, and start examining blades, but I decided I didn't want to travel that far down this particular rabbit hole.

I did happen to have a Manix 2 XL in my front pocket; the ricasso still has some steel. Is it enough steel to meet the theoretical "perfect" Manix XL? Dunno.

I also believe that we all have the right to critically examine our purchases, and decide whether they meet our standards. Plato said something like "For there doth exist the form of a Manix XL in the logos which is perfect; but yet all Manix XL knives in the physical world will of necessity fail to appear exactly like their form."

Since there is this ideal standard we have in our minds, and since reality can't match that, we are left with a choice to point out the aspects of the physical sample which do not meet the perfection of our idea.

Some of us get hung up on how a knife "flips", and we go down the rabbit hole of washers, phosphor bronze, nylon, bearings, ceramic bearings, this flips with that finger while that finger can't flip this blade at all, and so on.

Some of us get hung up on holes, Spydie holes in particular, they can be too sharp for some, not sharp enough for others, they weaken the blade laterally, they don't weaken the blade, they look unique and attractive, they look like a chicken's eye in my pocket.

Some of us get hung up on clips. Too loose, too tight, too shallow, too deep, wrong color, right color.

Some of use write posts that everybody else reads and thinks "WTF?!!! I want some of what he's drinking."

The way the mind works, we will always either be going down some rabbit hole. It's a feature of the brain. Some say it works well, others that it doesn't...

Choose your rabbit holes wisely, and choose on your terms.
 
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