Bargains

[Herman Trivilino]

Here are some pocket knives I bought the other day in Jean's Antiques just outside of Wimberley in the Texas Hill Country.  It's a little tourist town with lots of shops, but this one is far from the town center and the prices are much better.

One of the store's crannies had a display case full of knives.  Mostly pocket knives.  Some were both sharp and new, and those were the expensive ones.  Some were used and very much in need of sharpening.  They had the lowest prices so I picked up a couple.  The one in the upper left hand corner has a "ASPEN" logo in its plastic handle and the words "STAINLESS STEEL JAPAN" engraved in the bolster.  It looked like maybe the very tip had been broken off at some point in its life.  It has one blade.

The knife in the upper right hand corner has two blades.  There's a small metal oval inset into the handle but whatever logo was on there has completely worn off.  The bolster of the larger blade has "JAPAN" engraved on one side and an interesting logo on the other.  It's a triangle with the letters "X" and "L" engraved in its lower two corners, and some kind of sunburst looking thing in the upper corner.  Engraved below the base of the triangle is the word "CUTLERY".


The other four knives shown in the bottom of the picture were bundled and bargain priced so I picked those up, too.

 

The three in the bottom right hand corner seem to be new.  You can still see the grind marks on the bevels, but they were never properly ground to a sharp edge.  Maybe they are some kind of rejects or factory seconds.  Or maybe primary retailers were unable to sell them because they weren't sharp so they were unloaded at wholesale prices.  They have no markings on them other than the "MADE IN PAKISTAN" labels stamped on the blades.

The knife centered on the left side has the words "FROST CUTLERY" and "STAINLESS STEEL" engraved on the bolster, along with a logo that looks like an eagle with its wings poised for a landing.  It also has a belt clip.

[Jeff Farris]

Well, if you can put an edge on those Pakistani blades, you're a better man than me. I've tried for 20 years and cringe every time some one hands me one. The only demos on other people's tools I was ever unsuccessful in were Pakistani knives.

Frost's can be quite good, though.

[Herman Trivilino]

I'm having trouble with the Pakistani blade.  At first I used a 20^o bevel angle and the view at 40X showed the edge had broken off in many places.  So I tried 25^o and was successful.  The problem, though, is that at a 25^o bevel angle the edge angle is a whopping 50^o.  Now, this edge angle may be acceptable in some cultures, but it doesn't pass most of our sharpness tests.

It does seem to hold up well to whittling!  If it were sharpened on a Japanese water stone at this same angle it may produce an edge that most people would find acceptable.  Or some might possibly even find it preferable.

It's interesting that close examination of these blades reveals that the bevels on each side are well formed at the factory, but are at a very blunt angle.  So blunt that the bevels are almost too narrow to see with the naked eye.  The edge feels blunt.  I couldn't see anyone in this culture buying such a blunt knife.  The edges remind me of what we see on the hatchets and axes at the local hardware stores.  You couldn't cut yourself if you tried.

[Rob]

It sort of defies reason really doesn't it?  I mean why make something whose quality is so poor it's useless??

[grepper]

Any idea why the edge breaks?  Crap for steel?  Super hard steel?  Does it form a burr when you try to sharpen it?  If it forms a burr, is the burr very brittle?

Problem knives drive me nuts.

[mike40]

Those Pakistani knives are good conversation pieces anyway. In answer to Rob's question, to sell? I know it defies logic, but many products are made just to sell as they are not good enough to actually use. I

have purchased a few such products myself, more than I care to admit actually. Remember the old adage "let the buyer beware"? That of course was the only consumer protection we had in the old days.

[Rob]

You're right Mike....it's the logic of the market place

[Herman Trivilino]

Any idea why the edge breaks?  Crap for steel? 

That pretty much sums it up.  Although you're glossing over some of the details.   

Is there a burr?  Well, what is a burr?  A rolled over sliver of steel that we can see or feel?  I don't feel a burr.  I don't see a burr.

The test I use is wipe the blade on an old towel.  The burr snags little threads and pulls them out of the towel.  These threads are then visible if not with the naked eye then with magnification.  At 40X what I see are a few places along the edge where some threads are caught in a little zig or zag along the edge of the steel.  I guess you call this a broken burr.  If you imagine a line of soldiers and think of that line as a burr on a knife edge, in this case that line of soldiers is broken in so many places that it's hard to even call it a line.

[Herman Trivilino]

Here's a profile of a typical Pakistani blade.



I estimate the bevel angle to be somewhere in the neighborhood of 35^o. 

Note that the edge has been deliberately flattened off.  When I first saw this on one of the blades it wasn't as well formed and I wasn't even sure it was there.  But viewing another blade I saw it easy enough.  To me this indicates that this is no manufacturing defect.  It seems it's being done deliberately. 

I've got three of these knives.  I'll sharpen them all at 25^o but I have no idea if I'll be able to use them.  I suppose they would make good loaner knives.  As in, you're camping with a friend of your wife's cousin and he asks if he can borrow your pocket knife to dig out a buried tent stake.

[Herman Trivilino]

It sort of defies reason really doesn't it?  I mean why make something whose quality is so poor it's useless??

It begs the question, how can it be worth it to do such a thing?  (Assuming it was done this way on purpose and wasn't the result of someone trying to cover up a bad mistake.)

A pocket knife with 2 or 3 blades is an engineering marvel.  All of the blades folding away safely, but when opened held securely in place.  It seems all that would be the expensive part.  How much could you save by replacing decent steel with crap steel?

By the way I used one of the knives to cut open a large cardboard box today, and then cut away the wrappings on a piece of unassembled furniture.  It seemed to hold up really well.  A lot of every day tasks require a sharp edge, but razor sharp is overkill.

Anybody want to invest in the Pakistan Blade Company?

(Oh yeah, the word "Pakistan" is printed on the blade.  It came right off when I was wiping away the honing compound!)

[Rob]

That's funny Herman.  It gets worse, the more you interact with it....like peeling the layers of an onion, each revealing another disappointment.

I love the idea that after all those let downs....finally the label wears off....it's almost cartoon like in its comedic value.  I have visions of Wile. E. Coyote running off the cliff but not falling till he looks down and realises his predicament :-)

[Ken S]

For many years I have carried a Swiss Army "Tinker" knife in my pocket.  I chose that model because it has enough blades for my real world uses and yet remains fairly thin. It serves as much as a half baked screwdriver it does as a knife.  It does not replace a proper screwdriver, however, it is always in my pocket.  It is handy for opening boxes and letters, as well as stripping telephone cable (one of its original uses when I was working). 

I don't pretend the stainless steel used for the blades is legendary for holding an edge.  Carefully honed, the edge is probably middle of the road for sharpness.  That is more than sufficient for cardboard, tape or envelopes.

I realize the bargain knives are part of an ongoing research project.  That's a good thing.  Back in the everyday world, most of us only carry one pocket knife.  I might feel differently if I was a knife collector.  I'm not.  For my everyday use, I would prefer one good knife to half a dozen bargains.

Ken

[Rob]

For me...its all about enough quality for the job but also the next job and the next..... But I will say that if a Lie Nielsen plane gives a person a huge amount of pleasure to use (which of course it does), then that has to be factored in to the thinking.  The enthusiasm and motivation generated by ones reaction to a truly awesome tool has a significant role to play in getting the job done well and as such is a component of the quality.

I always try to buy the best if I can afford to....buy cheap....buy twice is my motto.

[mike40]

It would have been interesting to perform the rockwell test on that Pakistani blade Herman. After hearing about the name rubbing off I am now suspicious that this is a counterfeit Pakistani blade made in Lower Slobovia. On the other hand with that ground flat edge it might come from a country with strict health and safety laws. Nonetheless it is a great conversation piece!

[Herman Trivilino]

I'll see if one of my colleagues in the geology department can help with that test.

The problem is that the steel on the surface is probably not the same as the steel within the the blade.  I know that's true in the cases of the really shiny blades.  They look like they've been chromed.