Broken FRN

[paladin]

Personally, I would have expected more detailed pics of the ENTIRE knife, especially considering there is an OBVIOUS anomaly near one of the pins...

And I find it mildly ironic coming from a fellow forumite who is known far & wide for his incorporation of "data," that there is such scant little data available for us to try the "Case of the Fractured Fiberglass Reinforced Nylon."

It is such a sensational episode equal to Cliff Stamp's powers of deduction, reduction, & observation...and Excel chart-making skills.

I will stay tuned in, I love a mystery especially one with a good "Cliff" hanger :p

[jabba359]

There are some concerns about the extensive skeletonizing :

...I would suspect a fault in the FRN...

Would it be fair, then, to say that there are some concerns about the extensive surface damage to the FRN and pivot screw area that we suspect may indicate that harder use preceded the wood carving activity during which the knife failed?

Absent any evidence other than the photos you provided, all we have to work with is our observational abilities to see that there is damage that may not be consistent with solely wood carving, and that the previous activity that caused the surface damage could conceivably be what also initiated the structural failure of the FRN, even if said structural failure didn't become fully apparent until the wood carving activity.

Nobody except you said that your friend had some sort of conspiracy against Spyderco. Nobody called your friend a liar. You brought it up first and paladin merely speculated on the topic since you mentioned it. The only questioning of your friend seemed to be about whether his cause and effect were correct, him saying that wood carving caused the effect of broken FRN, while others speculated (due to their observations of the condition of the knife) that the cause of the broken FRN may have been an earlier incident and that him noticing the effect may have been delayed. Or it could have been a glitching in the injection molding process. Or some foreign debris may have contaminated the FRN. Or aliens may have shot it with lasers at night while he was sleeping (though in my mind, aliens would have something way cooler than lasers).

If you don't want any speculation, then why post this in the first place? Obviously you contacted Spyderco about it privately, so if there is an issue they could address it privately. You know that you don't have anywhere near enough data to draw any sort of accurate conclusion, so what exactly was the point of posting this on a public forum? Due to the limited data, we aren't able to help you solve the issue anyway, if there is one. So instead, the public (since you brought it up to the public) is left to ruminate on it as they will.

I'm not saying that we should hide these things, but I'm genuinely curious what your goal is with the post? If it was to alert Spyderco of a potential problem, then it's a bit redundant since you already contacted them. So far, you seem dissatisfied with the replies. Perhaps if you clarified that point, we could engage in a discussion conducive to your desired outcome for this thread.

This is a forum, all POSSIBILITIES can & SHOULD be entertained unless ENOUGH info is provided to eliminate such a discourse.

I would change that to "all REASONABLE POSSIBILITIES can & SHOULD be entertained unless ENOUGH info is provided to eliminate such a discourse." Otherwise we end up having to disprove aliens shooting lasers, spirits of the undead possessing our blades, and time-traveling hooligans wreaking havoc on our edges.

[Cliff Stamp]

If you don't want any speculation, then why post this in the first place?

You can have discussion without speculation, rumors and innuendo. It is always possible to assume the individual reporting the failure is misrepresenting it. However it is almost always never productive to do so because it is near impossible to prove and the effect that it has and the lack of direct utility in doing so. This is why you never see Sal doing it, even aside from the legal implications of saying "It looks like X" when the individual noted this wasn't the case, yes this is calling them a liar.

However I would ask where is all of this skepticism on the positive reviews? Where is all of the questioning of that data and those pictures. It is in fact very reasonable to think people will exaggerate positive performance, we in fact know this happens. Why don't we then do that? The answer is because again it is near impossible to prove, it is idle speculation and it would have a destructive effect on the forum. This kind of reaction is in fact one of the unfortunate reasons I no longer actively support people bringing up problems here.

This is a direct loss to Spyderco because they lose the ability to respond to them as the discussion is carried out elsewhere. No customer service response would ever want that to happen because they lose all power to handle/mitigate the issue.

[noseoil]

Look at the screw holding the pivot. What do you see compared to one which is from the factory & new?

[jabba359]

Okay, you answered what you don't want from this thread (speculation, rumors, innuendo, or skepticism). But what do you want to get out of this thread that you wouldn't have gotten out of your private correspondence with Spyderco? I really am interested.

As I said, I'm not sure why you posted the thread since: A) you already contacted Spyderco, the only entity that can properly investigate the failure, B) you don't want any public discourse that may suggest alternative plausible possibilities where the manufacturer isn't the culprit. So why open this up this topic to the public?

[paladin]

You can have discussion without speculation, rumors and innuendo. It is always possible to assume the individual reporting the failure is misrepresenting it.

Ok, then why protest so much about it from you?

this is a forum, and no one is above getting duped. No one implied YOU ARE LYING, sir! I personally was concerned you POSSIBLY could have been told a half-truth, not all the story, or <gasp> a lie by a third (thus far anonymous) party. :eek:

Are you above being lied to?

Still, for once, I would have welcomed at least a couple of those scanning tunneling electronmicroscope pics you're noted for.

I bet that FRN fracture would have looked like the Marianas Trench under magnification! :eek:

Surely such a cool, detached, unbiased steel clinician such as yourself had to make more observations than what you've released for our consumption...you did realize we were going to consume & digest this thread, right? :confused:

Come on...I know you've got a graph with at least 3 or 4 data points already prepared on this...where'ya hiding it? :D

I am TRULY disappointed if you ONLY reported this to Spyderco without observing, testing, analyzing, & collecting data before you remitted it to Golden!

And if you did not personally report this, then you are remiss for letting your friend send that in without one of Canada's (nay, North America's, in my humble opinon) foremost metallurgy afficianado/buff/tester getting to gather more data. You would have truly been his friend if you looked at it in a more detailed fashion.

[Cliff Stamp]

Are you above being lied to?

Again, so do we only take this skeptical approach to the critical posts or do we apply it do all of the posts including the positive ones and demand that the people praising Spyderco provide some kind of proof they are actually reporting what happened?

This is a simple question - is this forum going to set that high of a bar for skepticism in a fair and unbiased manner or is it going to be held only for posts which are critical/negative in nature?

[RadioactiveSpyder]

Ahhhh!!! OMG, laser-firing aliens are trying to destroy our FRN Spydies!! :eek:

P.S. Yes, I know, not a helpful post, but I couldn't resist :D

[paladin]

Skepticism, Cliff is also a two way street...

Are you (or your friend) above it?

And negativism is a highly subjective topic...you Sir are not the sole arbiter of what's considered + or - , regardless of how many charts you can post that may prove otherwise...

You protest also ... you just do it in a different way from me & some others...

I joined this forum (and lurked for years before) so I could hang out with friends who share a common love for all things Spyderco...

Just because someone attempts to counterbalance your viewpoints doesn't invalidate either set of viewpoints...it is interplay, heck it can even be fun in addition to educational/informational. :)

[dreadpirate]

The hex screw looks like it was removed using the wrong size wrench (something I have done before). I don't think the handle was beaten. Is it possible for someone to take the knife apart and do something to it (unintentionally) that would weaken the handle?

[Cliff Stamp]

And negativism is a highly subjective topic...

So again, do we apply this skeptical approach to the posts which only are critical or we apply them equally to those posts which praise and do we also then discuss how those people might be distorting the truth. It is a simple question - is this practice carried out in an unbiased manner or not?

As a frank question, do you really think you are actually acting in an unbiased manner and that if this post had been a positive review praising the knife that this skepticism would have happened. Are you really going to make that claim - that is what you want to hinge your argument on?

[Holland]

I don't think people should get too whacked out of shape over it until Spyderco gets to see it.

That's just my take on it for what that is worth.

Just seems odd to me as I know FRN is hard to break with as much as it flexes, I know because I have done it and more than a few times, same with G10.

Only had one handle break before the blade personally and that took me standing on the knife between 2 landscape timbers and bouncing on it until it cracked and I weigh like 195 LBS.

Most folders I can put in my vise and snap the blades without much of an issue, something I have found over the years.

Griptilian? :D

[paladin]

Arrgh...

This sensational thread has even lured the "dreadpirate" from the murky depths of Davey Jones' Locker to come up & feed :)

[noseoil]

"This is a simple question - is this forum going to set that high of a bar for skepticism in a fair and unbiased manner or is it going to be held only for posts which are critical/negative in nature?"

An excellent question. Yes!

[jabba359]

The hex screw looks like it was removed using the wrong size wrench (something I have done before). I don't think the handle was beaten. Is it possible for someone to take the knife apart and do something to it (unintentionally) that would weaken the handle?

It's certainly possible, but likely not probable. The damage I'm looking at is less with the pivot and more with the gouges in the FRN around the pivot and elsewhere on the handle. I wouldn't necessarily say the knife was beaten (which indicates willful destruction), but that it seems to have been subjected to harder use that may account for the FRN failure.

Arrgh...

This sensational thread has even lured the "dreadpirate" from the murky depths of Davey Jones' Locker to come up & feed :)

I was thinking it was the Dread Pirate Roberts coming here to defeat the inconceivable Vizzini. :D

[dreadpirate]

Arrgh...

This sensational thread has even lured the "dreadpirate" from the murky depths of Davey Jones' Locker to come up & feed :)

I have this knife and am definitely interested in this story.

[Cliff Stamp]

Is it possible for someone to take the knife apart and do something to it (unintentionally) that would weaken the handle?

I wondered if the screw could have been over tightened to the point it cracked the material as this isn't uncommon, Reeve had a problem with broken blades awhile ago for this very reason.

I tried it on a few FRN's I had to the point damaged the Torx heads and pretty much turned the folder into a fixed blade where you could barely turn/rotate the blade. I could not crack the FRN and given the fact the pivot becomes non functional it doesn't seem likely.

However during the initial machining it isn't impossible for something more drastic to happen. Something of that nature would seem to me to be the next thing to look at if the material wasn't flawed and the handle could not be made to crack in that manner again.

It might also be possible, rare/unlikely, but possible that something got inbetween the screw and FRN and that was jammed into the FRN. I was able to damage a knife like that (I used a small rock), but again, freak type thing unless you are tooling about on a beach maybe.

[jabba359]

I have this knife and am definitely interested in this story.

Well, hopefully this is another one of those times where a single knife has an issue and the problem isn't repeatable. That's usually the way it goes. One person has a failure, everybody freaks out (not saying you're freaking out ), sales drop due to the sky falling, and then nobody else has the same issue.

Buuuut...every once in a while we get a Navaja-broken-carraca situation where it ends up being a small, but non-isolated issue. Or like the Caly's with their gritty pivots. At this point, it's impossible to say which side of the fence this issue falls on, but seeing as how I haven't seen any similar reports of failure with the design, I'd wager that it's an isolated incident. If I were you, I'd keep using the knife and if it fails due to a design or material defect, you can know that Spyderco customer service will take care of you.

[paladin]

And negativism is a highly subjective topic...

So again, do we apply this skeptical approach to the posts which only are critical or we apply them equally to those posts which praise and do we also then discuss how those people might be distorting the truth. It is a simple question - is this practice carried out in an unbiased manner or not?

As a frank question, do you really think you are actually acting in an unbiased manner and that if this post had been a positive review praising the knife that this skepticism would have happened. Are you really going to make that claim - that is what you want to hinge your argument on?

You have a penchant for lifting quotes & laying a trail of red herrings when the game is afoot, sir.

But to answer your question...YES! I would TOTALLY expect skepticism from certain individuals if it were a positive review about the knife. You see, I am like the yang to their yin. I am the skeptic of their skepticism. I am biased about their unbiasedness(?). Well...uh...It's all about balance (or equally posting, your term..good one, BTW).

Now I've got a franklin for you...I think the most pertinent quandary (even bigger than why the FRN failed) is why you let such a seminal, unique (your summation, again) case study which BEGGED your considerable skill be brought to bear upon it...why in Jove's name, sir, did you let that specimen escape the grasp of your intellect with such a (seemingly) cursory examination?

[Cliff Stamp]

But to answer your question...YES!

So to clarify, I can expect the same skepticism from you on positive reviews and commentaries?

Do you really think your history on the forum reflects the same?

Do you think the history of the other people in the above with similar demands/speculations also reflects their skepticism is unbiased?