Due to the recent post by "Rainy Day" and the "failure" of his #15 CDT, I think a thread on documented failures of RMK's is warranted. Circumstances surrounding these failures is paramount.

Now, no "I heard" and "someone told me" second and third hand stories.

One problem that comes to mind has occured on 3 of my orders. Keep in mind..."3" out of thousands but still a repeat occurence. One was even instrumental in the development of my "Stanaback Special" which I have documented before.
Model #23-4 1/2" in stainless steel has developed a hairline crack in the top false edge, about half way up. One case was noticed in the main room of the Randall shop. This one was re-ground by Jeff McCartney and became a 4" Stanaback Special in the early-mid 1980's. One was spotted by yours truly, after I had taken delivery but before I sold the knife. A new replacement knife was made. One was noticed by a customer shortly after he received delivery. The knife was sent back to me and a new replacement was made.
That's the extent of "issues" of this type that I have had first hand knowledge of.
Best, Capt. Chris

I have seen several knives fail to various degrees, generally because of misuse or using beyond its design capabilities i.e. throwing, battoning, cutting improper material, or some other task the knife was not designed for.

Any knife broken at the hilt I know of as Rainy Day's knife was, was due to lateral force put on the blade when it was stuck in something like a tree or used a pry bar. I knew a guy that put a 50's vintage stag 1-8 in the sheath on his table that looked great sitting in his case. Many would ask to see it and when they took it out of the sheath, all you had was handle and hilt. Broken prying open a crate.

I have a 15CDT, just like CrutchTip mentioned, that broke at the hilt. It is off to RMK for inspection.

They will see no lateral stress as that would be evidenced by stress compression of the lateral solder joints and possible indentation of the brass hilt and see that it was a more a shattering. They would also be able to put the two pieces together and if they fit like a puzzle, and the blade is dead on straight, then again, no evidence of lateral movement.

Just like the Capt, seems the stainless can be suspect and have a mind of it's own. Hence, cracking and such. That is to be expected in any manufacturing situation and is never indicative of a companies sum total.

Tom

Rainyday, You never know the blade could have had a stress crack from when it was heated and then cooled during the initial blade work and then when you chopped it finished the break. If I remember from your pictures that the blade had some brass transfer on it. That would show vertical movement of the blade to the hilt. Anyway the shop has seen more broken RMK knives than anyone on this site regardless of what they say. They will know what happened and should take care of you.

Joe,

Only one other instance that I can remember in the last 10 years as follows (This one in 2006). You need to be a member to access the site. I've copied and pasted an excerpt:

http://www.customknivesandguns.com/ckgforums/showthread.php?t=1597&highlight=randall

[i]A friend of mine tests all of the knives he's going to deploy with by chopping on an old, damn near petrified, oak log......

Here's an example of why he does that before 'betting his life' that they're gonna work as advertised........new, out-of-the-butchers paper, never used.....but one chop.

I was told this happened because of a heavy grit grinding scratch that was missed before the heat-treat was done, causing a stress riser that resulted in catastrophic failure of this knife.







Best,

Ron

Good to see ya' posting Ron. We've missed you.
Thanks, Capt. Chris

Wow Ron, that looks exactly like mine. Be interesting to hear how CrutchTip spins it though. It has to be operator error or something like that.

Be nice Rainy Day.
Joe's a good guy and knows as much about Randall's as anyone I know.

Thanks, Cap!

RainyDay: X2 on what Ronnie said. If you spent some time with Joe you'd have a different perspective on him. We're all on the same team.

Best,