All About Pocket Knives

Nice work Don Luis!
It is always a pleasure to see some of the things you have made.

Dale

Don Luis wrote:I took it apart and rehandled it with stacked pieces of 3mm plywood.

Luis,
That came out real nice!





M.B.

Case XX Utility, scales need help.



Camillus Utility, solid old knife.

Lovely Camillus there Wullie! Not causing my stomach to do flips, but very nice.

I gotta write down some notes on my knives before I forgot....

I'm wondering if that old CASE XX isn't actually a Camillus.
Other than a few very minor details, the knives are identical.

I don't Wullie... They do look close but I can hardly imagine Camillus made it for Case.

Heck, give 'em Love and pocket time!

I'll get some more pics up tomorrow. Those two knives came from the same plant. Maybe Case made 'em for Camillus. LOL

It could be that Camillus made them for CAse.
Tom WIlliams told me that Camillus made the TL-29 for Case.
In fact, Camillus made TL-29s for most of the American companies at one time to another.

Dale

Just Plain Dave wrote:I don't Wullie... They do look close but I can hardly imagine Camillus made it for Case.

Heck, give 'em Love and pocket time!

Surprise, surprise! Camillus did make it for Case!
Camillus made several of the plastic-handled "work" knives for Case for many years, including these utility knives. They also made some of the red-bone handled Barlows!

Upnorth that news does not surprise me. But I'm wondering what the handle material is on that knife. Pic looks like rough black but I've not seen rough black deteriorate like that has.
Celluloid perhaps?

Phil

Ah well, if you don't learn something new every day why bother.

Back in the day (even if we are talking 60's) it just seems ludicrous that Case would trust Camillus to put the Case name on something they built.

I know that stuff happened but it's just weird.

Just Plain Dave wrote:Ah well, if you don't learn something new every day why bother.

Back in the day (even if we are talking 60's) it just seems ludicrous that Case would trust Camillus to put the Case name on something they built.

I know that stuff happened but it's just weird.

Why is that weird?
Camillus traces it roots to 1876 to the company that became Camillus. That was 10 years before the 4 Case brothers were involved with Cattaraugus, (according to Goins). My point is that Camillus made great knives for 130 years. Sure, they made some inexpensive knives but they also produced more knives for WWII that met the US Government Specs than any other company in the USA! Their WWII production topped 17 million knives, and that is a lot of knives in about a 5-year period that met the high standards of the US Military. In addition they still made some knives for civilian use.
Camillus made high quality knives in large numbers.

Now consider that one of the biggest expenses in producing a knife pattern is the tooling necessary to produce a pattern. Tom Williams told me that the average tooling for a new pattern at Camillus was over $10,000. You have to sell a LOT of $25 Scout Knives to recoup the cost of the tooling, let alone make a profit.

If you have a company like Camillus who make knives in the millions and if you pick up a SFO contract for a few hundred knives, it only makes sense to subcontract the work to them. They already make the pattern and can make them far cheaper than you can make them if you have to buy the tooling too.

Fixed costs like tooling limits the number of patterns that a company can offer at a competitive price. Subcontracting to a company like Camillus allows them to offer many more patterns at a much lower cost and higher profits. Good for the bottom line!

It will be interesting to see how many American companies still offer the TL-29 once the existing stock is depleted, since Camillus made the majority of them.

Dale

I suspect Case, or any other cutlery company of the time, would have loved to have had their name placed on this old 4 1/4" Camillus jack. (It's currently listed on Ebay. Not my knife, Not my auction. I'm not bidding)

Charlie Noyes

Dave you will be surprised at the knives that were made by one cutlery company and have another's name on them. I have seen several men swear that another company couldn't make a knife that could compare to the Case XX knife they were carrying in their pocket, and unknown to them, they would be carrying a Camillus, Kabar, & ect. knife with the Case XX brand name on it. No one could ever convince those men that another company made their knife and put the Case name on it. I personally think that a person got what they paid for from Camillus. For me the fun part of accumulating (or collecting) is looking back through the history of the knives and learning something new about them.

Aimus

I know these aren't scout knives, and I'm getting off topic, but here's another Camillus that any company would have been proud to claim as their product.

This is also listed on Ebay, and currently at somewhat over $200.00.

Not my knife. Not my auction. I'm not bidding.
Charlie Noyes

This is a Sword Brand by Camillus...nickel bolsters with steel liners and bail, punch marked
Spiral and they made sure to mark the "canopener"...

That's a pretty one Bob.

I've got one of those Sword Brand knives too. Mine has the same cruddy shrinking black scales as that way cool "CASillus" knife I've got posted.

If the steel looks as good as that one Wullie you should see about getting it re-scaled.

It's posted on page 5 of this thread.

Here's a Robeson unofficial scout knife. I really like the banner shield and bone handles!

That old Robeson is dead sexy!!

Owd Wullie wrote:That old Robeson is dead sexy!!

Thanks Wullie! For the compliment to my knife and because you came up with a perfect way to describe the scout, "dead sexy". Hope you don't mind if I borrow that phrase from time to time.

Does the dead sexy Robeson have a pattern number on it?
Is it the full sized 214 pattern or the smaller 814?

Nice knife!

It's interesting that the can-opener and the punch are not in their usual positions. They are reversed from normal. I'm not saying the knife has been apart. But, those two blades are not in their usual spots.

Cutler might have been in a hurry, or not very experienced. Who knows?

Below are the 214 and the 814 patterns. Note the positions of the can-openers and the punch blades.

Charlie Noyes

WelderBob;
Does that Sword Brand Camillus have bone scales?
Pretty knife
Charlie Noyes

Charlie - Not very familiar with Robeson knives but the master blade tang is stamped Robeson Shuredge on one side and 642214 on the other.