All About Pocket Knives

I just received my 2nd Kabar 1207. I don’t think my question is specific to that particular brand or model but I use it for example. I know the 1207 was a “factory manufactured” knife that spanned 14 or 15 years or so. . . 1966 to 1980 I believe. I’ve had a nice 1207 for a few years and as I said, I just got another. Obviously, I have no idea where in that 14 or 15 year timeline each of them was made. But when I put them side by side, I realized that they are almost the same but not dead-nut. The newer one (newer to me anyway) has a handle that is probably 1/4” longer than the older one. And when I hold them up, the blade profile is slightly different. The curves are slightly different.

Now my manufacturing background says that factory efficiency comes from purchasing power, duplication of processes, logistics, etc. I admit I’ve never been in a “knife factory” and I assume there’s probably a lot of individual hand-work that goes into the process. But I don’t imagine it’s like Forged in Fire either. I guess maybe it’s not really “mass production” like Henry Ford dreamed of either?

There’s probably lots of opinions here but If modern mass production methods. . . Robotics, CNC, etc. . . are employed, do you end up with the same, superior or lesser quality? Yes, I also realize that differences in steels impact price probably much more than manufacturing methods.

I’ll add some pics of the 2 knives side by side when I get home off the job.

Edit: adding pics now. . .

Not the same factory, but I have been in the Bear and Son factory in Jacksonville AL. The blades and springs are cut out in a water jet machine, with very close tolerances. But grinding the blades is done by hand, and you can get a few slight differences there. There is a YouTube video here on the channel from GEC which shows knife production.
Before CAD and CNC, I think there were slight changes in patterns as the tooling was updated and changed occasionally. That is probably what you are seeing.

They are like snow flakes. Inexplicably no two are exactly the same.