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Bill, as usual displaying the wisdom of a King Soloman. Great 
Might I add that the same goes for "custom hand made" as well. I have seen some hand made knives with blades that should have been thrown away rather than have a rescue attempt. This includes errors such as trueness of the blade, 2 inch grind marks, plunge cuts that still have deep scratches and even rough file work. Perhaps I'm being picky, I don't expect every knife to be perfect, but I don't expect glaring errors either. I have one knife that I can see about 1/32 of an inch where the left side of the handle, near the bolster is thinner than the right. Also the right near the butt is thicker by the same amount. This maker came highly recommended, other things are off on the knife as well. The human eye can be trained to be a highly accurate tool to spot errors that can be verified by measuring tools (micrometers, calipers, etc.). On this particular knife, if the thickness error was on only one side it would be hard to see, since it is on both, it really stands out to the critical eye. Before I started to make my first knife, I bought about 1/2 dozen fixed blades to critique and only 1 has no errors that I can see. This was made by P.K. Hansen of Denmark, I should post it, when I get around to it.El Lobo wrote:Well zeke...
You are posting some controversial questions, aren't you?
Junk is junk.....no matter where it's made. So.....you can't really go by any particular overt statement like that. Most U.S.A. made pocketknives are of good quality...but, there are losers made by U.S.A. firms as well. You need to examine each knife for it's merits, and choose for yourself.
JMO.
Bill