What is going on here?

Discussion in 'EXPAT Knives®' started by Expat, Dec 23, 2018.

  1. Expat

    Expat Expat™ Knives Staff Member

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    Speaking of total loss, I'm at a total loss to explain what is up with this guy's cleaver. I have never babied mine at all, I've even left it in the sink overnight where it was wet. Many of you guys passed mine around and abused it. I don't think I've ever oiled it or did anything with it other than use it.

    I don't how he got his the way he did.

    What do you guys think?

     
  2. C99c

    C99c Member

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    "It's a total loss..." What an ignorant, whiny little moron.
     
  3. Expat

    Expat Expat™ Knives Staff Member

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    I'm not a metallurgist, but it would strike me that vinegar would be the culprit here, right? I tried to soak some tools years ago in vinegar to get the rust off and it ended up destroying the metal body of the tool itself, not just the rust.
     
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  4. wilas101

    wilas101 Member

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    I was thinking the same. I don't have a cleaver but ever ESEE I do have has been subject to mild neglect and misuse. I don't oil, I rinse stuff off MOST of the time. they ride around in the floorboard of the truck a lot. none of them have this level of rust.

    I suppose anything is possible and this particular cleaver just had something weird happen during it's construction (no clue what but anything is possible). If this dude is known to the community and regarded as a stand up guy I'd entertain things and want to get that back to rowen so they could check it out.

    That said.... the whole "I'm making a video and going passive aggressive with the 'If they want to take care of their customers" bit would make me want to tell him to trot along his merry way. There's no reason he couldn't reach out either via this forum or straight to Mike and just be like "Hey.... I've got a weird problem. Would you help me figure out what may have gone wrong?" and been cool about it. Anyone who knows anything about ESEE knows rust isn't covered but they also know Mike and Jeff can be perfectly reasonable as long as you aren't throwing a fit.

    I guess all that is to say "Beats me!"
     
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  5. Expat

    Expat Expat™ Knives Staff Member

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    Yeah, I'm not concerned about the cost of a cleaver. I'm super loaded from the sticker business anyway. If the guy deserves a new cleaver, he deserves a new cleaver. But I'm curious about how the metal got this way. It literally looks like it's been in the ocean a few months.

    No way just regular water can eat away metal like that.
     
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  6. wilas101

    wilas101 Member

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    Yeah... my first thought was "how many days is A FEW"? Someone on the facebook group brought up the leather sheath being a contributing factor but I don't know how a few days would cause rust like that even if the sheath was completely soaked when it was put away.
     
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  7. Odinborn

    Odinborn Member

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    This guy is flat out lying to see if his stunt can get him a new cleaver. I'll bet dollars to donuts that if he really did vinegar bathe this cleaver (which it does look like he did), he didn't oil it after he used the steel wool. The edge of the blade looking like that tells me that he personally did something wrong during the process. A couple days of being sheathed doesn't round off the cutting edge, but using an abrasive improperly does.

    My guess is that he stripped the coating previously, saw the rust that will naturally form and freaked out. "Oh no! Into the vinegar with you, vile heathen". He pulled it from the bath and immediately started using steel wool/sandpaper, but never oiled the blade afterwards or left it in humidity. Bare carbon steel loves to immediately oxidize after being exposed to vinegar.

    So yeah. He's probably a one-off customer that made a mistake doing something he didn't have enough experience with, and now he wants to try and get a replacement. I've done vinegar patinas on a lot of blades, and messing up an old axe head the first time looked exactly like his cleaver.
     
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  8. Caleb O

    Caleb O Member

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    I agree. He tried to force a patina and messed up. That's it. Everything else he talked about is blown smoke, and doesn't really matter.
     
  9. erik

    erik Member

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    that looks like he took a coarse wire wheel to it to remove rust, then did the vinegar soak without cleaning up the scratches - and probably for more than "overnight", unless he lives in Alaska or Northern Canada, where "overnight" is significantly more than 12 hours.
    it's also possible he was using 10-15% vinegar from a health food or ag supply store rather than typical 5%.

    I'd be willing to take it off his hands, clean/polish it up, put a new edge on it and put it back into use.
     
  10. Hammer

    Hammer Member

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    Plenty to be suspicious of here, but I'm always particularly suspicious of people who broadcast their "bad experiences" across the interwebs instead of contacting the company. And/or being honest about what really happened....
     
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  11. Odinborn

    Odinborn Member

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    I'm going to agree fully with @erik here. Rewatching the video, I can also see the wire wheel scratches being pronounced. A strong vinegar would also easily cause much of his issue.

    By the way, @Expat I think my cleaver is defective because it's dull. I'd like a free replacement with twice as many stickers sent this time.
     
  12. C99c

    C99c Member

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    One of the best things about Youtube is that it can give you a good idea of what kind of person you're dealing with in a very short amount of time.
     
  13. The Warrior

    The Warrior Member

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    Sounds plausible.
     
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  14. Strigidae

    Strigidae Administrator Staff Member

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    My definition of a total loss is not even close.
     
  15. Zeek

    Zeek Member

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    I'll take it... how much?
     
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  16. Jeff Randall

    Jeff Randall ESEE Knives / Randall's Adventure & Training Staff Member

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    Carbon content in a 1095 cleaver is no different than the carbon content in a 1095 knife. What happened here was not due to a manufacturing issue. 1095 steel will rust. Period. It will rust really bad if not taken care of. Not sure how he managed to get it to rust that bad but my point is anything in 1095 steel (knife, ashtray, door knob, whatever) would rust that bad if put under the same conditions this cleaver was placed under. This cleaver would now look really cool if he allowed the whole thing to rust and pit like this, then polish all of that off and sharpen it leaving the pits. Now you'd have a pretty knife.
     
  17. erik

    erik Member

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    exactly - clean up the edge, do a nice rust blue, sharpen it back up and use it!
     
  18. Hammer

    Hammer Member

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    Great suggestions, Jeff and erik.

    Unfortunately, this knife is a TOTAL LOSS. :D
     
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  19. FortyTwoBlades

    FortyTwoBlades Moderator Staff Member

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    Yup. Looks like he used a wire wheel on it and then etched the crap out of the previously fine scratches, causing them to enlarge. And he used pretty potent vinegar and/or left it for longer than he ought to have. It normally isn't strong enough to cause that kind of deep etching without neglect. Makes me wonder if he even used vinegar and didn't actually use some sort of more aggressive acid instead.
     
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  20. OKcherokee

    OKcherokee Member

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    Ill give him about tree fiddy for it.
     
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