Soap and water cleaning

[Liquid Cobra]

I dry my knives out with a blow dryer. The combination of air being blown into it along with the heat dries out nicely, I've never had a problem.Just take the time and your knife will be fine.

Second, H-1 is incapable of rusting.

We're getting a bit off-topic but, my point (since you clearly missed it) is that I did what would be considered due dilligence in taking care of this knife. Spyderco's manual doesn't say that you have to dry it out with a blow-dryer, air compressor, or anything of the sort, it just says dry and oil it.

Furthermore, you fail to address the real point I'm making which is: why would you think it advantageous to make a knife where the stop pin corrodes more easily than, say, the pivot pin, liners, and blade? I don't see why that would make the knife better, or why that is consistent with the knife's use? Could you possibly address that question rather than ignoring it again?

As far as H1 being incapable of rusting, I believe you need to brush up on your chemistry.

I don't think it is advantageous for hardware to be less corrosion resistant. Simply put, I don't know the answer here. I couldn't tell you if the hardware on PM2's are more or less resistant. But I've never had a problem because I maintain my blades the way I mentioned above.

As far as H-1 goes, this is from Spyderco's site:

H-1 folders and fixed blades are a collection of water-friendly knives Spyderco calls their Salt Series. As part of this series the Ladybug 3 Salt Hawkbill uses H-1 which is a nitrogen-based blade alloy rather than carbon-based. The elimination of carbon in the steel renders it one-hundred percent rust proof but like its carbon-steel cousins, H-1 takes a hard sharpened cutting edge and earns high marks for edge retention."

Here is the link: http://www.spyderco.ca/catalog/details.php?product=624" target="_blank

[GoldenSpydie]

As far as H1 being incapable of rusting, I believe you need to brush up on your chemistry.

Please explain why my Salt 1 did not rust when submerged in ocean salt water for several hours and left to dry without being rinsed...that is, unless the blade material is rust proof... Please be informed that the first picture was taken under water in the Gulf of Mexico, and that the knife was not cleaned between the time of these pictures being taken:





As for your remark that "I'm surprised...people here would just expect a part of a knife to rust out," well, I'm surprised that some people no longer seem to care for their tools. I was taught that a tool, regardless of price or expectations for rust resistance, should be taken care of and kept in top condition, not just left sitting around wet. Or at least, if you leave a tool sitting around wet, don't be surprised when it rusts... :rolleyes:

[NoFair]

H1 can corrode, but normal salt water isn't corrosive enough for it to rust.

I've never had an issue with corrosion from cleaning with soap and water. Just rinse it out with hot water and shake out the worst of it before a slight lube. Sometimes I just drop them in the ultrasonic cleaner we use for autopsy tools and rinse in hot water afterwards.

[wrdwrght]

Sometimes I just drop them in the ultrasonic cleaner we use for autopsy tools and rinse in hot water afterwards.

Spydercos among the autopsy tools!? Do tell...

[Nate]

I'm not sure what to make of it. I use my pm2 for food prep often when doing something trivial like making a sandwich and cutting it in half. I will run it under the faucet and soap up the blade, then wipe it down with a dish towel and back in the pocket. I definitely get water in the pivot often and never make any particular effort to dry out the inside other than a quick shake or two. In over a year and a half I've never felt a need to oil it and never observed any corrosion whatsoever.

A batch of pins that aren't up to speck in terms of corrosion resistence might be the simplest/most likely explanation.

[NoFair]

Sometimes I just drop them in the ultrasonic cleaner we use for autopsy tools and rinse in hot water afterwards.

Spydercos among the autopsy tools!? Do tell...

I sometimes use a Military when doing animal autopsies. (I have used a CTS-20CP PM2 as lately as well, but I prefer the Military)

It fills the mid size role between scalpels and electric bone saw better than the knives at work

[The Mastiff]

It looks to me like there was some grit flushed out and not removed. Whatever it was that was left there began the corrosion process.

That's what it looks like to me but it may just be an illusion from the picture. I can't tell for sure.

I've never really advocated leaving things to dry but I do admit having told people to wash off corrosive material. I would encourage someone who knows what they are doing as well as the outcomes to make up their own minds about whether they should take the knife apart. It has obviously caused problems in the past for Spyderco or they wouldn't have the rules about diss assembly the way they are. I don't imagine though that if you aren't causing trouble by doing so anybody would really care. Just a guess.

As far as making stop pins out of more corrosion resistant materials I'm pretty sure engineering takes that into account, along with strength and whatever else when selecting materials for the knife.

Even the most corrosion resistant steels can be corroded though. I wrote about one way above. That will work with any steel I know.

If you are really this bent out of shape about it maybe you should select knives that suit you more.

Good luck, By the way I typically use solvents and light oils to clean the insides out. I don't have corrosion problems but make sure to dry the steel surfaces anyway. Food processing typically uses more easily cleaned knives but I will use my folders on occasion. When I do I clean them I as I need to.

[Evil D]

So you put it away wet and it rusted. This has nothing to do with washing without taking it apart, as the exact same thing would happen if you took it apart and put it back together wet and left it wet..it would rust. Gotta blow the water out and dry them out or they'll rust.

I would ask you to, in future, please read my post or at the very least the OP, prior to commenting as I stated pretty clearly that I DID blow the water out.

Well, I mean I'm not trying to be a jerk here, but obviously it wasn't or it wouldn't have rust on it would it? This isn't "water in the crevices".

[hunterseeker5]

If you are really this bent out of shape about it maybe you should select knives that suit you more.

I think some of the rather absurd "arguments" I'm getting here are making me look a lot more bent out of shape than I actually am. I, quite frankly, think it was nothing more than a bad batch of stop pins which was probably a supplier fault if I had a guess since it is clearly not an isolated incident. I also wouldn't be surprised if Spyderco just sent a replacement stop pin. I'm prepared to be wrong about that one, but in the past they've always done right by me when a knife I bought had a faulty part. *shrug*

I feel like this thread is, for the most part, really going in an unproductive direction. I'm repeating the same things over and over again, and some people just don't want to hear it. Not quite sure why this is such an issue, when I say something favorable about a spyderco's performance my observations aren't subjected to this level of scrutiny, but it is what it is I guess.

I would like to thank though the people who are actually sapiently reading, commenting, and trying to be helpful. Those of you STILL insisting that following Spyderco's cleaning instructions was somehow stupid, negligent, improper, etc thank you for your contributions, your concerns have been noted, you can now stop as your continued insistence on said point really isn't helping anything or anyone as A) I am not advocating other people use a soap and water cleaning for knives and B) your delightful and detailed procedures for how/why cleaning assembled with soap and water would have avoided the problem are broadly false. I could replicate them one at a time if you liked, and showed why/how they failed to prevent the rusting out we're observing, but experience tells me that wouldn't convince you to focus on the larger point so.......

So again, to hone in on the ACTUAL issue: it doesn't matter how/why I discovered that the stop pin corrodes many times more readily than every other single part on the knife (including the pivot, which you'd think would be a close relative of it), what matters is that this PM2's stop pin rusted at the slightest opportunity. Do you, all of you who've been making arguments about WD40 and hairdryers, think that'd be a good thing if, say, you took the knife hiking and weren't Nutnfancy carrying a can of WD40?

[bearfacedkiller]

- So other people having the same issue as I did, one even posting in this thread, is a disservice and doesn't validate my point how? If there are instances of this specific issue, premature corrosion of the stop pin on Para2s, that seems pretty relevant particularly to all the people trying to make the argument that I'm somehow crazy, an idiot, or grossly incompetent because my stop pin also rusted in a manner which I consider unreasonable. This actually leads perfectly into your next point which was "I wonder if Spyderco got a bad batch of stop pins. That is the only other thing I could think of." Yes, now we're getting somewhere. This is also why it is highly relevant what other people's experiences were, and part of why I posted this here.

I wasn't trying to say that your post is a disservice or that you linking threads with a similar opinion/experience was a disservice. My point was that if you have an opinion and you open google with the mindset that you are right and you search out people who have a similar opinion/experience that you could basically validate any opinion and that is a disservice that the internet provides many people who approach it with that mindset. It was a generalized comment stating that the internet's ability to validate almost any opinion is a disservice that the internet often provides to people. I spend way too much time on the forums (knives as well as other topics) and it something I see all the time so showing me that someone else has a similar opinion/experience doesn't really prove anything to me unless the number of people having that opinion/experience are of sufficient quantity to convince me. For example, a quick google search or bladeforums search will yield many posts that say that Spyderco's knives are overpriced and of mediocre quality as well as many posts that will say that Spyderco offers the best value in the knife industry. If you had one of those opinions and got online with the desire to validate your opinion one way or the other it would not be very hard to do and you could post countless links with both opinions. I just feel as though you could find an example of almost anything on the interweb and if you do not have the right open minded outlook you would easily just find similar opinions/experiences and conclude that you are right. I am not saying that this is what you are doing but was simply making a general statement saying that linking threads that confirm your experience is not significant enough for me to believe that this is a major problem or not. This is not something that I see mentioned over and over again. I still am not saying you are wrong but just that it appears to be more of an isolated incident or incidents than the norm if it was a case of a bad batch of pins. I carry three different para2's and get them both wet and covered in fruit juice from cutting up fruit and I rarely even clean them let alone oil them. I don't oil them because of how much food prep I do. When I disassemble to clean I do apply a light coat of mineral oil to them but that is it. I have never had a problem with rusting on any of mine.

I do not think that you were just trying to validate your point and that your intentions were simply to share your experience to potentially identify a problem and that you show that by clearly stating that you hold the Spyderco company in high regard. I think maybe you were frustrated by it and it may have showed in the tone of your original post and in your responses. People then reacted in a way that triggered you to be defensive further triggering people to think you were bent out of shape. I asked what you were trying to accomplish so that you could clear the air on that because to some it may have seemed simply like you were trying to vent or complain as opposed to being productive. I think the tone of your original post as well as some of your responses may have set us down this path even if your intentions were good. Snarky comments like "I think you need to brush up on your chemistry" don't help the situation even if you feel as though you are under attack.

I am not trying to pile on you with everybody else but rather to share what I meant by my disservice comment as well as to give some perspective that will hopefully get this post back on track and maybe salvage something productive from it. :)

[bearfacedkiller]

I might add that I do not agree with the tone of many of the responses you have received and that certainly has not helped the situation either.
I try to always take the high road and basically calling you inept is unproductive as well.

I still don't understand how a minute amount of water in crevices could cause that much rusting on the bulk of the stop pin. You have adamantly stated that you dried it to the best of your ability so I will believe you so this does indeed seem very strange.

[Evil D]

I've owned I think 4 Para 2's now, and I can support that the stop pin does indeed rust much easier than probably anything else on the knife. I don't know why this is, I have had mine rust just from whatever moisture it gets from being in my pocket close to my body, and I know it's only this because I very rarely get my knives wet, and I very VERY rarely actually wash them due to the fact that I really don't do many dirty jobs like cleaning deer with my knives so the most that gets washed out is usually just pocket lint which I can blow out with compressed air. So, in your defense I can verify that the stop pins do rust easily, but this does just support the suspicion that it wasn't completely dry after you washed it.

This is an old pic of the pin on my 20CP. This is just from sweat/moisture from my pocket.

[razorsharp]

That's bummer about the stop pin. I have never believed you can get a Knife fully clean without disassembly, I have tried cleaning with soap and water then dried the said knife as good as I could with a paper towel and air compressor (you couldn't see moisture) , I was curious how wet it told be inside and there was a bunch of water in the pivot and washers. That would have eventually rusted and oxidised the washers.

[Cliff Stamp]

There are many types of stainless steel, it could be that they are using one which is much tougher but is not as corrosion resistant for the stop pin.

However I would be it is more likely that it wasn't properly passivated and could simply be a batch thing. It isn't a hard thing to check, you can just do a corrosion soak on it before and after passivation - but it would be difficult without taking the knife apart to do it.

I would think it would not be the expected behavior of the stop pins to in general rust far more easily than the knife. It would only take a call to customer service to find out.

I just checked a half dozen of mine and none of the stop pins show rust, but the blades don't either. It just doesn't get humid enough here for it to be a problem, even though I am literally on the salt water.

[paladin]

As far as H1 being incapable of rusting, I believe you need to brush up on your chemistry.

Please explain why my Salt 1 did not rust when submerged in ocean salt water for several hours and left to dry without being rinsed...that is, unless the blade material is rust proof... Please be informed that the first picture was taken under water in the Gulf of Mexico, and that the knife was not cleaned between the time of these pictures being taken:

I think you just answered your own question...Gulf of Mexico, BP oil spill? :p

[GoldenSpydie]

As far as H1 being incapable of rusting, I believe you need to brush up on your chemistry.

Please explain why my Salt 1 did not rust when submerged in ocean salt water for several hours and left to dry without being rinsed...that is, unless the blade material is rust proof... Please be informed that the first picture was taken under water in the Gulf of Mexico, and that the knife was not cleaned between the time of these pictures being taken:

I think you just answered your own question...Gulf of Mexico, BP oil spill? :p

Thanks for the laugh! :D Seriously, that was hilarious. :)

On topic: I would be interested to find out when the OP's knife was made and the date that the knife was made for anyone who experienced a similar issue.

[zhyla]

And good idea, next time I'll use a shop vac which blows at maybe ~10psi as opposed to 100PSI out of my air compressor. Good thinking. If only you were there when I blew the knife out before, I'd know that slower moving lower pressure air would have solved all my problems. /sarcasm

My understanding is suction is more effective than blowing. Which I would have mentioned had I been there. But you wouldn't have listened!

You only seem to want to argue. There are a lot of smart, experienced Spyderco owners here. It would be smart to listen to them.

Your assumption that one part of the knife should be equally rust resistant asanother is, of course, both wrong and odd. Most customers care more about the blade corroding than anything else and that's where the expensive steel goes.

[bearfacedkiller]

GS is getting us back on track. If you do ever take the knife apart there will be date on the tang. Post it on here and it may be of help to others in the future.

[bearfacedkiller]

GS is getting us back on track. If you do ever take the knife apart there will be a date on the tang. Post it on here and it may be of help to others in the future.

[Zenith]

Just my two cents but I have been carrying slipjoints for years and have been cleaning them with soap and warm water for just as many years with no issue.

https://youtu.be/c_ha2jw ... e=youtu.be" target="_blank