Shipping of internal parts

[`br4dz-]

It would be a nightmare to sell parts for every Spyderco model, but what about a small amount of the more popular models? PM2, para 3, military, Delica, endura, manix 2, and such.

 

[Chris "Anagarika"]

I can see why people who live overseas would need to have parts mailed to them as it can be expensive to ship a knife to Spyderco. Sometimes (like for me) the cost of shipping can be as much or more than the cost of the knife. However, for those living in USA, sending a knife back to Spyderco is very inexpensive and it would seem to be a better option for them to send the knife to Spyderco and have the professionals fix the issue. For those who are actual knifemakers and recognized as such, perhaps something could be worked out where they could get parts. Some of these folks could be trained globally to be warranty repair persons, as well.

In agreement as I also live overseas. To answer Sal’s question:
I have plenty of FFG Endura 4 and some duplicates of other models (Stretch, GB1). The Enduras are all steel variants each. No counterfeit as I can determine so far.

 

[Brock O Lee]

I have not needed knife parts since I started buying Spydercos more than 7 years ago, but it is always nice to have the option to buy some.

How about offering a kit with a bunch of common screws/parts for each popular knife family?

Keep it simple and ignore the weird and wonderful and discontinued models...

I would be happy to pay for shipping, but keep it as low cost as possible (USPS First Class Mail International) and don’t bother with insurance.

I have quite a few in-house designs from Golden (Military, PM2, Manix, Native, UKPK) a few from Taichung (GB, Sage, Nilakka, Tuff etc), a few from Japan (Caly, Stretch, Delica), one from Italy, no fakes.

 

[chumaman]

this is such a good news
Spyderco would have to reward loyalty
I'm for ... especially Military

 

[colin.p]

I have a PM 2 and a Para 3 that I bought new in December of last year, so my experience with how rugged Spyderco's are is limited to what I read. However, I can't see anything really wearing out other than maybe screws and clips, so I don't see that I personally would need any internal parts per se.

It's not that Spyderco is alone in not wanting to ship internal parts out, but I think it would ultimately be to their benefit that that option would be available (there is THAT other U.S. knife manufacturer that could ship out parts ex lock springs, but that is the subject of another thread). If people strip a screw out, contact Spyderco and get a replacement screw package for a couple bucks and I would think everybody would be happy as clams. Oh and make replacement clips (deep carry) available with your sexy spider logo on them as well (for a small fee of course).

But then again, what do I know.

edit: Sal you asked "Collecting and shipping parts overseas is expensive. Will you pay for that service?". I would definitely pay as I live in Canada (kind of overseas, well across the St Lawrence at least). I fully expect that my Spyderco's will at least double in value, as the retail price is already going up quite substantially, all thanks to our protective border clowns. So I would like to keep these things working for as long as possible as I can see OHO folders becoming rather scarce and parts would keep them usable.

 

[Comprehensivist]

Hi Sal,

I am new to Spyderco knives in the last four months. So far I am very happy with the quality and function of your products. I appreciate your participation on this forum and concern for issues like this.

My question to you on this topic is how expensive would it be to include a basic replacement parts kit (i.e. screws & washers for sure & maybe a properly fitting wrench?) in the box with every new knife? That might offset some of the hassle of carrying lots of inventory and hiring people to process all the parts orders, packaging, shipping, etc.

Thanks,

Phil

 

[Stays Sharp]

Extra parts is a profit oppurtunity for your struggling dealers. Put a MAP on screws and clips and they're good to go.

 

[PeteyTwoPointOne]

Wow...it boggles my mind to think of all the parts Spyderco has to manufacture or source out, keep on hand, keep inventoried, and keep sorted for all the vastly different models and variations within models.

Sal, this has got to be the less sexy side of innovation and evolution.

 

[OutdoorsFamilyMan4]

It certainly would be a daunting task to try and inventory and manage parts for all the models that Spyderco makes. I definitely think keeping parts for at least the most popular models would be a good start. But with Spyderco's commitment to CQI it may prove to be too costly or take up too much space. My thought would be to try to go to more Universal parts that are compatible with most of the popular models. There seems to be four to six different styles of pocket clips with different screw configurations. Would it be more cost-effective to only use two different styles ( the one on the pm2/ Delica and the wire clip)?

 

[BD_01]

I have three Southards, two brown and one black (probably my favorite knife of all time). I recently bought an after-market bearing & race kit even though the knives are functioning fine. I did so as an insurance policy, just in case one of them goes wonky in the future and the parts are unavailable from Spyderco.

I wouldn’t mind purchasing replacement parts or accepting the fact that there may be a charge for parts if I sent a knife in for repair. I wouldn’t expect legacy parts be available forever.

If I dork up a screw or something, that’s on me. I’ll pay a few bucks to replace it.

I’ll be honest: if a bearing knife starts flipping crappy, I’ll try conservative measures to clean it out. If that doesn’t work, I’m a guy that would prefer to take it apart and figure out why. It would be nice to know I could purchase some parts if I found a dorked up bearing race. Even if I had to purchase a whole “pivot pack” just for a single part, I’m sure I would do it.

 

[Homo habilis]

I am sure Hinderer makes a decent penny with all the bling he sells for his knifes. Every screw comes in brass, copper, TI and counting. Obviously his model selection doesn’t even come close to Syderco’s. But maybe for the popular models like the PM2, Manix, Military and so forth that would be a silution to: 1. Offer parts, 2. Make it profitable, 3. Make your customers extatic .

 

[Hopweaver]

I am sure Hinderer makes a decent penny with all the bling he sells for his knifes. Every screw comes in brass, copper, TI and counting. Obviously his model selection doesn’t even come close to Syderco’s. But maybe for the popular models like the PM2, Manix, Military and so forth that would be a silution to: 1. Offer parts, 2. Make it profitable, 3. Make your customers extatic .

Never looked at it like this before, but you do make a convincing argument. Limiting it to a couple models makes your idea seem viable. However we do not know how much of a headache this causes Hinderer. The assumption is that his 'bling' parts are easily manufactured and profitable.

 

[RipD]

Appreciate you opening up the dialog on this. As others have stated, I shudder to think about what it would take to manage the parts inventory.

One option is to have part kits available for each knife when it's in production. Complicated for knives with multiple versions or changes over time. I would not expect to be able to get parts for every knife indefinitely. This would allow me to purchase parts when I buy a new knife just to have them. I may never use them, but I would not have to worry about Spyderco or a dealer having them in the future. And having spare parts likely helps when I sell/trade a knife.

This would work fantastically well for me and I hope would make it worth your time financially. I would gladly pay $5-10 for a set of screws to keep in the box for a knife in case I needed them.

Devil is in the details on this: how many kits per knife, what parts, to include, individual parts or full sets..... My vote would be sell me a full set of parts at a price that works for you.

 

[tap78]

I've been asking Spyderco Service if I can buy a spare BBL cage, that broke (my fault) while cleaning my Manix2 154cm with solid liners, but sadly I got an info, that I should send a knife to Spyderco to Golden. Sending a knife with insurance is way more expensive that buying a spare polymer part worth probably a few dollars+shipping. I can't imagine that repairing that broken part requires sending a knife overseas. It would be very nice to know, that You can use and maintain Your favorite knives and have a strong backup in service even if you do something unwise

 

[gadgetgeek]

I think that there might be a middle ground here somewhere. As for washers and screws, does each knife have all its own sized stuff, or are there at least some standard sizes? Even if a washer kit had different thicknesses and came in "small knife" "big knife" versions, anyone interested should have enough to make things work, provided there is not 100 different sizes. There would be some compromise of course, but the buyer would know that its not the ideal situation. For screws, same thing. Instead of dealing with one screw for one part, maybe just getting a kit could work. If it was "bag-o-bits" 50$ then I'd buy one. Even if I didn't have need for all the parts, I bet I could find someone who did. Crowd source the spare parts? Heck, maybe just bag up the shop sweepings? For scales and the like, could you sell cosmetic blems, or the like? Factory second parts? Most people who are trying to fix a knife just want it to work, so a pristine new scale might not be needed. I get that some stuff is just not fixable, and things like blades I can understand not happening. I mean yes benchmade does it, and they have not turned over nearly the same number of models as spyderco as far as I can tell. With CQI parts, would it be possible to have the equivalent of an 80% part? One that would work with all of the versions, but would need to be modified to fit? I'm not sure how big some of the CQI changes are, I'm guessing the FRN ones are the largest and least common, where as CNC knives would be easier to update.

Would it be possible to set up "authorized" repair centers in places like europe, canada and australia? That could also reduce the need for long shipping, and no risk of legal knives having to cross unfriendly borders. It would not be a perfect solution, but maybe the importers can help with that.

 

[John_0917]

I totally get Spyderco charging for clips, even ZT is now doing that and I don't see anything wrong with high quality manufacturers charging for clips (except for mass produced Chinese knives ie Kershaw).

I do wish Spyderco would offer blade replacement, I have a knife that I would willingly pay a fair charge to have rebladed if possible. I don't think we should ask Spyderco to ship blades, ZT doesn't for comparison. Perhaps a fair fee would be $30-50?

As far as the availability of certain blades, Benchmade deals with this issue by saying that if your steel/version isn't available anymore they will replace it with whatever is current, I think this is reasonable. For models that are long out of production, when parts are gone they're gone tough luck (usually takes many years).

 

[wade7575]

For Spyderco to include wrench's is not very practical at all,if you want good fitting wrench's that will last a long time buy Wiha wrench's I have been using them for years and I have never had a problem with them for Torx heads.

Hi Sal,

I am new to Spyderco knives in the last four months. So far I am very happy with the quality and function of your products. I appreciate your participation on this forum and concern for issues like this.

My question to you on this topic is how expensive would it be to include a basic replacement parts kit (i.e. screws & washers for sure & maybe a properly fitting wrench?) in the box with every new knife? That might offset some of the hassle of carrying lots of inventory and hiring people to process all the parts orders, packaging, shipping, etc.

Thanks,

Phil

 

[wade7575]

I would be willing to pay for part's and shipping and another option would not to just UPS use USPS where you it won't cost as much.

I also remember in the other thread Sal you mentioned about people not putting their knife's together correctly you could include something on written down on one of the papers you include with the knife encouraging people that you they do feel the need to take their knife apart to look on youtube first to see if anyone has put a how to video up of the model they have and maybe mention somewhere as well I the about using Wiha wrench's an not just cheap crappy wrench.

I think most of us know to use better wrench's on the forum that are more active and read this many times but I bet for stripped screw problems one of them is people who have never been on the forum or who are educated.

 

[gadgetgeek]

I totally get Spyderco charging for clips, even ZT is now doing that and I don't see anything wrong with high quality manufacturers charging for clips (except for mass produced Chinese knives ie Kershaw).

I do wish Spyderco would offer blade replacement, I have a knife that I would willingly pay a fair charge to have rebladed if possible. I don't think we should ask Spyderco to ship blades, ZT doesn't for comparison. Perhaps a fair fee would be $30-50?

As far as the availability of certain blades, Benchmade deals with this issue by saying that if your steel/version isn't available anymore they will replace it with whatever is current, I think this is reasonable. For models that are long out of production, when parts are gone they're gone tough luck (usually takes many years).

The other difference is that there is one griptillian blade shape (ok 3, but they are concurrent) where as we are up to version 4 on just the endura, and all of its versions. So each variation might or might not fit depending on CQI which adds to the overall complexity. Now it would be possible for an older blade to be re-made, but then its just a factory built custom, with none of the benefits of the production line to bring the cost down. Would that re-blade still be worth it at 75$?

 

[Cursum Perficio]

Thanks for asking Sal.

My own view is that of someone living on the other side of the globe, and would prefer to avoid sending a folder on a world trip if I can.
I make sure my 23 (so far) Spydercos are genuine by only buying from the right dealers, use only quality torx bits (Wiha), think about what I'm doing and why before I do it, keep all the boxes so I have the exact model number, accept responsibility for my own actions if I mess up, and will gladly pay for the service.

I would like to see the more common parts available to buy online, even though I would rarely need to do so, even if it's just for my own quirky aesthetic preferences, like wanting black clips on everything, and black screws for my Cru-wear Manix to go with it's black BBL.