Veff Serrations

[bladebobby]

Hey gang,

Awesome forum. Glad to be a new member.

I'm seeking input from anyone who's really put the Veff serrations through their paces.

Some seem to think the Veffs really are a revolution in serrations, others seem to think they're more of a novelty that might not truly catch on. I've got a Crawford Truimph 1031K with Veffs on its way in (now discontinued - my luck!) but I'm wondering - as some have suggested - if Veff serrations are only effective on the "draw", and can't really make a contribution on the "push", effectively negating any true "sawing" action.

I'd really love to hear opinions on this.

Thanks everyone - great to be here.

bladebobby

 

[EricV]

They work very aggressively on the draw stroke of a cut but also allow you to cut things not very serration friendly with a push stroke. Unfortunately I have never seen them ground thick enough to not be incredibly weak, the CRKT factory consistently grinds them so thin that they flex easily and will break off after contact with most rigid materials. They're not as robust as standard serrations in my experience.

All that is about the CRKT executed serrations, I still haven't sent a knife out to Jeff Veff for having them added to a knife, which is I service I believe he still offers. I think they are a good design, but poorly executed in most factory cases.

 

[shecky]

There's this thread reviewing a CRKT knife with Veff serrations that doesn't fare so well. Assuming no overly abusive treatment, I have trouble attributing the failure to anything but a poor heat treat.

 

[Joshua J.]

The angle of the scallops shouldn't affect the performance of the serrations. The principle behind the serrated edge is the same as the principle of any knife edge, only taken one step further.
Knives cut because they apply the forces produced by your hand onto a very small area, IIRC it's in the tens of thousands of pounds per square inch. This is why a knife point penetrates Kevlar armor where a bullet won't.
You take that one step further when you divide the edge into a bunch of little points, now all your cutting energy is going into the point of the serration instead of being evenly distributed across the length of the edge. This doesn't make any difference push cutting, it's the slicing action that benefits, and makes serrations specifically good for fibrous materials.

 

[EricV]

The angle of the scallops shouldn't affect the performance of the serrations. The principle behind the serrated edge is the same as the principle of any knife edge, only taken one step further.
Knives cut because they apply the forces produced by your hand onto a very small area, IIRC it's in the tens of thousands of pounds per square inch. This is why a knife point penetrates Kevlar armor where a bullet won't.
You take that one step further when you divide the edge into a bunch of little points, now all your cutting energy is going into the point of the serration instead of being evenly distributed across the length of the edge. This doesn't make any difference push cutting, it's the slicing action that benefits, and makes serrations specifically good for fibrous materials.

Not sure why you think changing angles doesn't effect force, as it applies greater amounts of cutting edge to the item being cut, changing the direction of force to be more perpendicular to the item, increasing resistance and allowing the user to put down more force. The same principle that is behind a hawkbill knife. It has less to do with the actual points of the serrations, and much more to do with having more edge per inch of blade length.

An example would be trying to pick up the handle of a shopping bag with a straight finger and having the handle slide off, versus having a hooked finger and holding the handle against your finger. With a PE you have to adjust your slicing stroke to push against the object being cut more than you do with a serrated edge because the troughs of the serrations hold and cut the object like small hawkbill knives. Its why bread knives will still cut fine even if the tips of the serrations are beaten down by a glass cutting board, its all about the trough. There is of course more info on this on the site in any of the numerous threads about serrations in general, what makes the Veff serrations interesting is that they give a longer shallow cutting surface which would seem to make them info a PE and standard SE hybrid of sorts.

Hope that didn't come off as jerk like as that wasn't my intent at all, I'm just trying to explain why the edge angle does make a difference, good or bad is up to the user.

On a side note, I just read an interesting article on .22lr rounds having better penetration than some standard pistol rounds because of the principle you mentioned with area of impact, it was an enlightening read.

All the best
-Eric