All About Pocket Knives

Doesn't it look like the master blade has been welded just above the tang on this knife? Might also explain the discoloration? Or is it just me?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/OLD-CASE-TESTED ... 0005.m1851

Yeah,and a poor job of it.

The Ricasso is certainly a mess on the printed side of the tang. I have found in forty years of welding, and working w/ welders that not many of them are good fabricators. Even fewer are good with a grinder, and finish work.

It's a tough call but I would have to say it is a distinct possibility that is was welded. It's either that or it was simply "re-finished" to a horrible extent.

Lots of people have heated their blades into soft steel over the years so it could have been a simple overheating of the blade, and the resulting polishing attempts were just smearing soft metal off the blade.

Tough call!

Ps... I'm expecting a data cable for the camera tomorrow, and I have a package set up for you... Thanks!!!

It does kind of look like that, Bob. But I think it more likely that the blade has been cleaned too aggressively. Some folks just do not know when to stop with the buffing.

That's a welded blade. You can see a "bubble" in the weld that wasn't buffed out. Aggressive over-buffing doesn't do that. For comparison, here's a similar one that was given to me by a guy that tried to weld a blade onto the tang of a broken one. The rest of the knife is near-mint but it had a broken master blade. I've had it for over 50 years.
Ken

Looks welded to me.

Ken, is the "bubble" the black spot above the S in CASE ?
kj

Yes. Looks like a bubble formed there and left a depression that was too deep to buff out. On the picture in my post, there's a similar area near the kick, and one above it at the base of the blade near where it meets the tang.

The knife I have was welded by a part-time knife mechanic and trader I knew in the 1960s. Knife collecting as a hobby pretty much didn't exist yet at the time. He fixed broken knives to return them to use as functional tools, and make a little extra money. He had tried welding broken blades but didn't like his results, so he just gave me the knife. I was a teenager at the time.

In the 1970's the same fellow worked for the authorized Case repair center located in McKinney, Texas. Case later took all repair work into their factory in Bradford.

Ken

You never know where a part time skill might take you in life.

Thanks Ken. I would have just passed those off as spots of oxidation on an old non-stainless blade. I need to pay closer attention to marks close to tang-blade meeting.
kj

Definitely looks welded and the resulting build up was over ground to remove pits and under cutting.

There are people out there that can weld a blade onto an existing, but broken tang, in such a way as to be virtually undetectable.

The person that welded the OP knife is not one of them.

I know nothing about the technologies involved, but I know they do not include welding in the traditional sense.

I've heard it referred to as "TIG" welding, for whatever those initials might stand.

When I bought this Robeson knife, the master blade was broken about 1/3 back from the tip. I paid not very much for the knife, but I did pay a sophisticated knife mechanic in Minnesota eighty dollars to weld an identical Robeson blade onto the existing tang, preserving the knife's pattern number.

I just happened to have a mint example of a metal handled "Safety Award" knife that Robeson produced and its master spear was identical to the broken blade in every respect, except its pattern number.

I sent him both knives and eighty dollars, paid in advance. He removed the blades from their respective tangs and welded the full blade onto the tang in this bone handled sleeveboard.

I would never sell this knife without disclosing that and, indeed, I may never sell it at all, as I do not want it getting back out on the open market.

The photos should expand with a left click or two.

Charlie Noyes

Looks absolutely 'factory'; no tampering evident anywhere.
Now i need to be suspect of even my best knives !
kj

Charlie whom ever he was, he had skills.

TIG is the acronym for tungsten inert gas. https://www.millerwelds.com/resources/a ... o-tig-weld. Likely a lot more sophisticated equipment than the guy had that welded my knife.

Ken

Thanks for posting that Charlie.
That workmanship is exactly what I referred to in my first post.
Some fellas are butchers, and are good with a torch while others are just good at every aspect of finished work.

That has ALWAYS been my issue in finding help in fiberglass repair/fabrication work.
Some fellas GET what the finished project is supposed to be, and they work forward with the finished product in mind. Every step is planned to create a flawless outcome. Others make such a mess around the repair area that the required outcome is much harder to attain.

In the case of the two poor examples shown you can tell that the welder did NOT have a finished product in mind.
TIG creates massive yet focused heat. Wrapping the blade in a cold damp towel will prevent the discoloration, and actually removing the blade for finishing/heat treating should have been a must from the beginning. Using blocks to prevent overspill or deformation of the surrounding material should have been used as well.

Now in all fairness I too am new to the mechanics involved in knife repair but I could not be happy with the results on either of the poor examples if I had done that work. Perhaps the mechanics that did the work were not satisfied either, and have greatly improved their skill sets over the years.

It was interesting to see a good repair vs a couple of poor repairs.
KUDOS to the real mechanics out there...

The man was a college instructor. He's retired now and living somewhere in South Florida, so no more Minnesota winters.

He was a knife collector/enthusiast. How he got into knife repair, I do not know.

Cindy Taylor introduced me to him.

I think I utilized his services four times, two for a blade weld and two for other repairs.

He created a pair of those serpentine guards for a Robeson folding guard hunter that cannot be distinguished from originals. I sent him two knives, one with the guards missing and other intact. He just duplicated what was on the good knife, but he had to remove them to do so. One cannot tell if either knife was ever messed with.

Always had to pay up front and there were no guarantees on the blade weld jobs. Apparently, the welding process is fraught with possibilities of failure.

Another AAPK member and I tried to locate him a couple of years ago. I had a job I'd like to have had done, as did the other member.

We were unsuccessful.

Charlie

It's a shame you lost touch with him. Good mechanics are few, and far between.
I've been repairing everything that has come my way for more than forty years, and I can count the true masters I have met on one hand.
Even people that specialize in ONE thing are not always up to the real quality that make them stand out from the crowd.
Most of the time I just shake my head at how people can accept a payment and not care about their name on the work they did.
"It's Just a Job" I guess...