Flick damage

[ace]

Hi --I am wondering about other people's experiences with damage or loosening of the pivot or lockup areas of knives due to aggressive flick opening of said knives. I have several that I CAN blast open when I want but I believe that this would cause damage over time-I now do one handed opening on all knives, but I like to do a quick steady rotation, rather than a switchblade-like flick opening. Thoughts?

[BuffaloBill]

i use blue locktite on the pivot torx to keep everything snug and where it should stay. never had to re-tighten any pivot screws yet.

[npueppke]

I am a huge fan of flicking knives open and I have never had a problem. When they start to get loose I just tighten the pivot screws a little. Yes you can us a bit of lock tite if it loosens up too quickly.

I don't think you'll do any damage to the knife. I've never had a problem before with any of my knives.

[jezabel]

In my experience it's a bad idea. With lock backs the lock bar suffers from peening over time. With compression locks the stop pin will quickly wear leading to vertical play. Liner locks should be okay, as should the BBL lock (I think, I dont actually own one yet).

my 2 cents

Jez

[whitefeather]

Keep flicking, you will have problems. You can't smash two pieces of metal together repeatedly without having some deformation.

[BuffaloBill]

i dont flick. but just curious...how many times over how long a period do you really think it will being to be an issue? realistically.

i personally dont think you could flick it open with enough force, enough times to cause enough deformation to wear it would effect blade play, or lockup. but then again i dont know much about metallurgy.

[Brad S.]

Quite literally, all it takes is once. If a knife is opened a single time there will be wear on all the surfaces that touch. This is true of all moving parts. You may not be able to see the wear with your eye, but its there.

Flicking you knife does this, but with more force, which means it wears faster. And if you hit to pieces of metal together hard enough you get peening/denting/... etc. Flick your knives it will cause wear... Notice I said wear not damage.

Realistically... all it takes is once on a day when the steel is finally at its stress point. Some will handle it better than others. Ive flicked some knives thousands upon thousands of times and never had a problem... I flicked a knife from another company and the blade broke(poor HT, but thats another issue) Others Ive flicked a few hundred and seen clear wear.

Ive taken apart hundreds of knives, and seen the wear and damage. Trust me its there.

The better idea is to practice control of your blade instead of mindless flailing.

[markg]

Liner locks should be okay

Nope...

Flicking will cause wear on the stop pin, which will in time create blade play.

I hate flicking blades.

One, it draws unneeded attention to us, as knife users. It says "look at me, I am bad, notice my knife?" Just bad PR we don't need.

Flicking a knife in a stressful situation usually results in unintended practice in knife throwing.

It causes unneeded wear.

[jezabel]

Nope...

Flicking will cause wear on the stop pin, which will in time create blade play.

I hate flicking blades.

One, it draws unneeded attention to us, as knife users. It says "look at me, I am bad, notice my knife?" Just bad PR we don't need.

Flicking a knife in a stressful situation usually results in unintended practice in knife throwing.

It causes unneeded wear.

..... your right there, what was I thinking writing that?

[spoonrobot]

I'm one of those guys who is occasional flicker that has yet to notice any damage.

I've got a few knives that are designed to flick open (Kershaw RAM) and have yet to notice any wear or negative affects after a lot of flicking open. I've got some lockback Spydercos that have a quite a few flicks on them and have yet to notice any damage to them either.

I do believe that flicking can damage a knife but it's entirely possible that it won't at all. Kind of depends on the knife, materials and so forth.

Better safe then sorry, only flick your users. :D

[npueppke]

Sure flicking will cause wear, but so will just using your knife. The forces on the stop pin are much greater when you're cutting something hard like wood than when you're flicking it, but the force is applied much quicker when you flick the blade open (I think they call this the impulse in physics). It all kind of depends on the materials and how aggressive you are with it, but I kind of think that knives are designed to take some flicking. Again, everything will cause wear in the knife. Just my 2 cents.

[Water Bug]

I concur that needless, hard flicking will hasten wear and tear on knife components no matter what type of lock it possesses. It's far better to save that strong "FLICK!" for those moments where the quick deployment of the blade is a necessity (i.e., life or death situations).

Yeah, and I know the next question that's coming... "How does one practice for those life and death situations if one doesn't flick their knives?" That's where Spyderco's Trainer models come in handy. Flick those things all day long and save your primary knife for your cutting needs.

[mmyron1]

I have never flicked my Spydies but I have found that Benchmade Axis locks loosen up quite a bit if flicked open. I have a few that needed Blue LockTite. I found lock backs are simply not easy to flick open anyway.

[saltybones]

ive flicked many knives from cheapo walmart specials to benchmades and spydercos, granted i dont do it all the time, just once in a while but ive only ever had one knife break and that was because the handle was made of cheapo plastic. i also have a kershaw blur that i use at work along with my spyderco and the blur is spring assisted so everytime its open, its a forceful flick and nothing as of yet is wrong with it and ive had it 2 yrs so far

[araneae]

Maybe think of it like this. Which is harder on your engine: If you drive like a race car driver all the time, or if you drive it like your grandma? Some where in between is probably just about right.

An occasional flick, probably not a big deal, but constant flicking over time may accelerate wear. I tend to be a little more discreet, but will do a spydie drop here and there.

[MCM]

No one has mentioned side opening auto's.
Same thing applies.
Better made knifes generally have few issues.

[J Smith]

Sure flicking will cause wear, but so will just using your knife. The forces on the stop pin are much greater when you're cutting something hard like wood than when you're flicking it, but the force is applied much quicker when you flick the blade open (I think they call this the impulse in physics). It all kind of depends on the materials and how aggressive you are with it, but I kind of think that knives are designed to take some flicking. Again, everything will cause wear in the knife. Just my 2 cents.

That quick smack is much harder than just heavy pressure when using the knife.
Kind of like hammering a nail.It goes in with the quick hard force were as it takes much more force if you were to try to push it in.

[Shanklick]

Definitely depends on the knife on how much it will affect it. I have a number of assisted openers that have been "flicked" more times than other knives of mine have been opened normally and have never needed any adjustment while some of the high quaility "non-flickers" have from just normal appropriate opening. Two of my AOs in particular are my tightest locking knives in my collection and this is after entering the 1000s range on "flicking" them. If you want to tell me the damage is still there, fine. It's damaged and works better than any of the brand new manually opening knives I have. I think I can live with that.

If the knife I am using was not obviously designed to snap open then I don't do it. If that is the way it was designed to be used then I do not hesitate to use it that way. I'm not in a position where I open knives around sheeple a lot as it is but if I do it's the slow and discreet Native that comes out and no it is not flicked.

[docwatson]

While it makes sense to me, that the sudden stopping of the blade would cause some stress, are Spyderco and other quality knives over engineered for this? Just asking, because as someone already mentioned, an assisted opener and an auto do this every time you open them. Lastly, all knives wear out over time,as do anything mechanical, not tellilng anyone anything they don't know. A correlation to this, I think, is a few years ago, we were told by all the "experts" to rotate our pistol mags, and let the springs "rest". Since then I think we have learned that A. springs don't rest. and B. a quality magazine spring can stay loaded for years and still function perfectly. Now, I am not sure how this all relates to "Flicking", but I really appreciate a knife that I can open one handed, that is why I carry the newer style folders instead of my case knives, which require two hands.

[Barsoomian]

I always flick my knives open probably because it gives me something to do with my hands when at home bored instead of smoking :)

My Spydies have taken it fine, i think, most of them are new and bought this year. BUt my BM 940 which came with a degree of side to side play, developed some serious side to side play after a few days of flicking and i had to adjust the pivot screw and loctite it.