Caribbean Detent

[hereiamu1]

The detent ball barely engaged and I could flick the knife open without touching the compression lock. Now it is almost as good as the PM 2 and Para 3.

[tvenuto]

For those that might not know what you did, I'm guessing you used a countersink bit to lightly chamfer the edge of the detent hole:



My detent is light, but not terribly so. I think it's sitting fully in the hole, but I just might disassemble and check. I have the capacity to make that modification.

[timlara]

I like the detent on mine. It Spydie flicks open reliably, but also stays closed unless I do a really hard inertia flick, so that's how I want it to be.

I will say that Taichung doesn't seem quite as good a tuning compression locks as Golden yet, though.

[curlyhairedboy]

I've held one and I agree, but the chamfer bit might be a little too aggressive imo. I've had better luck with hand-twirling a diamond dremel bit.

Detent tuning is one of those situations where too much is far worse than not enough, so tread with caution.

[tvenuto]

You can hand turn that bit as well.

[curlyhairedboy]

You can hand turn that bit as well.

true! :)

[Xander3Zero]

You modified the detent hole so that it requires you to disengage the compression lock to open the knife??

[tvenuto]

You modified the detent hole so that it requires you to disengage the compression lock to open the knife??

When he said “flick” I took that to mean “shake without touching the blade”

[Sharp Guy]

Thanks for the reminder. I've been meaning to tweak the detent on my Sliverax by doing this.. I have several tiny diamond bits that should work. Maybe I'll give this a go tonight.

[Rutger]

You modified the detent hole so that it requires you to disengage the compression lock to open the knife??

No.

Spyderco replaced all the steel detent balls on the Caribbean model with ceramic ones prior to release. Cause of rust issues. I'm not sure if these new ceramic detent balls have a slight different size or if the Taichung factory just hasn't nailed the compression lock detent down yet. But on some the detent ball does not completely go into the hole when closed. Because of that the action of the knife isn't as good as on a PM2 made in Golden. Since it is not fully in the hole it takes less force to open the knife. By slightly increasing the hole size it should fully engage in the hole. But as others have mentioned it is easy to ruin a knife by removing too much material.

I have a Caribbean which has a little soft detent too. It's not so soft that it will open in your pocket or will not flick open well. But i can definitely notice a difference with a Golden made PM2 or Para 3. Maybe i'll mod this too when the day comes that i take the knife apart for cleaning.

[Sharp Guy]

I increased the detent on my Sliverax tonight. I measured it with my trigger pull gauge before I took it apart and it was at 17 oz, which is fairly light. I used the diamond burr in the picture and chamfered the hole a little at a time until it was at 28 oz. It's much improved now. I probably could've gone a little bit more but I didn't want to risk causing a sloppy detent. I'm happy with the way it is. ☺

[hereiamu1]

I used a dremel bit and a drill.

curlyhairedboy
By hand twirling do you mean with your fingers? I don't see that happening, the blade is too hard. Maybe a hand drill?

When I said flick the knife open that's probably not a good description. What I could do was a down up down motion and lock the blade fully open.

I agree that this should be done with extreme caution if at all. Things can easily go wrong.

I don't know why but this seems to be an ongoing theme with knifes coming from the Taichung factory. Maybe there is a reason we aren't aware of that keeps Taichung from making the detent hole a little bit bigger? I did this same mod to my Dice a long time ago. A flippers detent is important and should offer just enough resistance so the blade snaps open without any hand movement.

[hereiamu1]

I increased the detent on my Sliverax tonight. I measured it with my trigger pull gauge before I took it apart and it was at 17 oz, which is fairly light. I used the diamond burr in the picture and chamfered the hole a little at a time until it was at 28 oz. It's much improved now. I probably could've gone a little bit more but I didn't want to risk causing a sloppy detent. I'm happy with the way it is. ☺

Nice, I have been thinking about getting a Sliverax. Might have to put one in the cart when I order the forum knife. :D

[Sharp Guy]

I used a dremel bit and a drill.

curlyhairedboy
By hand twirling do you mean with your fingers? I don't see that happening, the blade is too hard. Maybe a hand drill?

I used the pin vise in the picture. It allowed me to easily hold it perpendicular to the blade. Turning it by hand was much easier than I thought it would be with that diamond bur.

I don't know why but this seems to be an ongoing theme with knifes coming from the Taichung factory. Maybe there is a reason we aren't aware of that keeps Taichung from making the detent hole a little bit bigger? I did this same mod to my Dice a long time ago. A flippers detent is important and should offer just enough resistance so the blade snaps open without any hand movement.

I do agree that the Golden models seem to have stronger detents on average but they're not all too light out of the Taichung factory. My Sage 1 & 2 measured 22 & 20 oz which is fine. My two Gayle Bradleys are 22 oz as well. I just measured my Advocate and that opened at about 31 oz.

Here's a thread I did on detents about a year ago that might interest you. I have several knives that I need to check and add to that list one of these days.

http://www.spyderco.com/forumII/viewtop ... h#p1183031

[curlyhairedboy]

Sounds like I need to get a trigger pull gauge...

[silvershade255]

I increased the detent on my Sliverax tonight. I measured it with my trigger pull gauge before I took it apart and it was at 17 oz, which is fairly light. I used the diamond burr in the picture and chamfered the hole a little at a time until it was at 28 oz. It's much improved now. I probably could've gone a little bit more but I didn't want to risk causing a sloppy detent. I'm happy with the way it is. ☺

Nice, I have been thinking about getting a Sliverax. Might have to put one in the cart when I order the forum knife. :D

Hmm, I'll have to take another go at mine, seems I could go a good bit more.

Go for it! It's really a great knife.