REX 45 Para - snapped tip!

[Hitby]

Good afternoon all, I have a REX 45 Burnt Orange Para 3 and stupidly I've managed to snap the tip off. Can it be saved? If so, how?

I'd appreciate any help as it wasn't cheap and it's really bugging me

Thanks in advance for any help!

[Michael Janich]

Dear Hitby:

Welcome to the Spyderco Forum.

I'm sorry to hear about the broken tip on your knife, but the good news is you didn't lose much and it can be easily fixed by grinding/sanding the spine of the blade down to meet the edge. That can be done by hand with wet/dry sandpaper, with a Dremel tool, or by sending it in to Spyderco's warranty repair department. If you choose the latter, there will be a charge of $20.00 plus $5.00 return shipping. Complete details on the return process can be found here: https://www.spyderco.com/service-suppor ... ty-repair/.

Stay safe,

Mike

[RustyIron]

Mike's right. Subtly curve the spine down to meet the edge where it isn't broken. If you have a delicate touch, it will take 10 seconds on a disc sander or bench grinder, and then finish it up with a sharpening stone so your scratch pattern matches the rest of the knife.

If you're more hamfisted, you can put a sheet of emery cloth on a flat surface, and using long, deliberate strokes while keeping the blade square, you can get the same effect.

Not to take bread off the table of the kids in the repair department, but it's just fun to carry a knife that you've fixed yourself.

[The Mastiff]

I'd appreciate any help as it wasn't cheap and it's really bugging me

Is it an OCD thing? The knife has essentially the same utility and lifespan it had before and there are a lot of people who would love it just the way it is.

:)

Joe

[z1r]

I'd appreciate any help as it wasn't cheap and it's really bugging me

Is it an OCD thing? The knife has essentially the same utility and lifespan it had before and there are a lot of people who would love it just the way it is.

:)

Joe

But many would feel that some functionality is lost if the blade doesn't have a sharp tip. I know I do.

I recently came upon an Opinel with a tip almost exactly like the OP's. It was super inexpensive so I picked it up, took about two minutes at home to grind down the spine and restore the point. I'd advise being very careful with power tools since it is very easy to grind too quickly and generate excessive heat.

While it can be easily remedied at home, if you are not comfortable, pay Spyderco the $20 for some peace of mind. Well worth it.

[kennethsime]

After you get that tip fixed, be sure to pick yourself up a dedicated prybar so you don't run into the same situation again - I like the AAP 1.5!

[makawakaroni]

That is not too bad! Like the others said, you can easily fix that with a grinder or ceramic/diamond stones.
At least you have the choice to give it a more rounded, more robust tip if you want.

[Airlsee]

I'd appreciate any help as it wasn't cheap and it's really bugging me

Is it an OCD thing? The knife has essentially the same utility and lifespan it had before and there are a lot of people who would love it just the way it is.

:)

Joe

Call it whatever you want, but there is absolutely no way I would be okay with a snapped tip. Not being able to even cleanly penetrate a bag of chips would drive me insane. Not that I do a lot of chip bag poking, but just knowing that the tip of my knife was blunted and it was my fault would cause me to fix it.

I understand what you are saying, but I definitely understand why OP wants this remedied immediately.

If it were me, I would use a cheap course grit stone, or diamond plate and grind the spine down to meet the edge at the tip, as others here have recommended. I've had to do it before, but it was a smaller section of the tip that had snapped off (the one I remember most was a relatively new CRK Small Inkosi) the crowned spine caused a lot of difficulty for me.

Good luck Hitby. Keep us posted, and welcome to the forum.

[z1r]

Here's the Opinel I fixed. If the tip break would have been much larger, I would have had the reshape the curved edge from the bottom so as to avoid getting to close to the nail nick. Something the OP doesn't have to concern themselves with

[Sonorum]

I have a S90v Native which lost about the same amount of tip as yours did. I fixed it in a few minutes on a coarse DMT stone. Really not that difficult and not a lot that can go wrong!

[aaronkb]

Others have already provided great advice, so I’m just here to ask…. What on earth did you do to that thing??

[Josh1973]

If you use a belt sander be sure to do a few seconds then stop and dip the blade in cold water for a second or two.Then repeat until it is resolved. You want to try avoiding over heating the area you are grinding. Overheating can cause the Rockwell hardness to change resulting in a fragile tip.
You may want to use some course diamond or oxide stones in place of the belt sander as it will be a whole lot easier to avoid overheating.

[Evil D]

Dremel with a sanding barrel. I'm so bad at rounding off tips on the Sharpmaker that it's a routine touch-up for me.

[Mrj]

I had it happen to a camo s30v para 3. I used the work shop bench sharpener to make a more rounded tip. It actually works great in all applications. I tend to use belly more anyway but I fixed my situation.

[Rinzler]

I'd appreciate any help as it wasn't cheap and it's really bugging me

Is it an OCD thing? The knife has essentially the same utility and lifespan it had before and there are a lot of people who would love it just the way it is.

:)

Joe

I disagree and doubt that there are more than a handful of people in the world who would be happy with a blunt tipped knife.

[skeeg11]

I'm going to respectfully disagree here. I'll even go as far to say that Spyderco disagrees up to a point. :p :D

Why else would they make blunt or round tip knives like the Z-Cut? Not everyone likes to poke holes in everything. In fact, it may actually be deleterious to the job at hand. :)

[The Mastiff]

I disagree and doubt that there are more than a handful of people in the world who would be happy with a blunt tipped knife.

I don't know about that. I routinely use worse knives than that and they work fine. I'd give it a few passes on wet dry garnet sandpaper if it bothered me and just keep using it. Unless it changed it enough to become dangerous which that doesn't look like from my perspective. I worry about things like how sharp my edge is and is it set up right for the job at hand. Looks don't really enter into things with me with the exception of pink and slime green knives. :)

[Hambone]

If you aren’t comfortable reworking the tip yourself and don’t want to send it back to Spyderco; I am sure, depending on where you are located, you can run down a forum member to help ya out.

[TkoK83Spy]

Others have already provided great advice, so I’m just here to ask…. What on earth did you do to that thing??

I'm wondering the same thing myself. The Para 3 tip is rather stout in my experiences.

[aaronkb]

Others have already provided great advice, so I’m just here to ask…. What on earth did you do to that thing??

I'm wondering the same thing myself. The Para 3 tip is rather stout in my experiences.

Especially in Rex 45… my g10 version is my go-to “stupid **** to do with a knife” knife.