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James

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I'm in a bit of a pickle. So I bought a knife from a vendor (MR) and the blade was left alone for 5 months before I started thinning it. I found some pretty bad grind issues (quite a nice divot 1" in diameter causing part of the knife face to be a bit concave), tried to fix them, couldn't and then and emailed the vendor. The vendor referred me to someone (SF) who works for him and SF wants to charge me to regrind the knife.

Now, I don't really mind paying to fix issues if I caused the problem, but this was a factory issue. Should I just flat out email the vendor back after he referred me to SF and ask for a refund 5 months after I purchased and worked on the knife?
 
IF the maker stands behind his work then you should be covered.
 
If I'm understanding the post correctly, this is a vendor and not a maker. And if I understand the abbreviations correctly, this is someone who does not necessarily stand behind replacing defective products (think Moritaka). Not sure what you can do if that is the case.
 
5 months does cause quite a bit of an issue, and so does the fact that you already did some work on it. However, it's pretty common knowledge that over grinds like the one that you mentioned can take some time to show up. The vendor's response is not to the high standards of the vendors on here, but then again I'm guess that this wasn't a semi-custom or rare blade. What was is the knife?
If it's what I'm suspecting, then you it's kind of a situation of buying a raffle ticket and getting what you paid for...
Last thing I'd do though is pay that goofball money to try and "fix" anything.
 
I see this quickly becomming a us v. them arguement, but it should not be. No vendor (short of some custom makers).....or at least most that I can think of would take care of full refunds or free fixes that long after the transaction.

5 months...I think you have failed your due diligence of inspecting the knife to make sure it fit your needs.

I know the particular vendor will take back and refund items within a reasonable amount of time. I have personally returned two items... but 5 months is a bit much.
 
Since it truly looks like something that could have only happened during the fabrication process you would hope that they would be willing to address a defective product. But I agree w/ heirkb -- 5 months is a long time to wait before contacting a vendor and telling them a manufactured product you bought (which has a minimal warranty) is defective
 
I agree. 5 months and your attempts to alter the knife kind of stick a fork in returns and credits.
 
Yeah, I messed up. I should have checked it sooner or even just given the knife a run on a high grit stone.

My camera skills are pretty lackluster, but I'll post a pic after dinner.

Nope, not a moritaka, but it's an artifex. As for whether it can be fixed, who knows. If it can be, it'll need a heckuvalot of grinding. I'll contact them again and see what can be done. I'll keep you guys updated. Thanks for the responses so far.
 
100_2549.JPG


Well here it is.
 
If I was going to pay to fix it, it wouldn't be someone the vendor recommended, especially if it's his name on the knife and he won't at least offer some aid, especially on a type of issue that is known to possibly take time to show.

I do agree that 5 months may be pushing it, but I would be curious how it would be handled by a maker here that put his name on that blade? The other side is that good money would be on not having this be an issue with any makers here.

:2cents:
 
I had something similar on a tojiro DP. It is no longer affecting the edge or right behind the edge because of the thinning, so what's the problem, apart from looks?
 
I had something similar on a tojiro DP. It is no longer affecting the edge or right behind the edge because of the thinning, so what's the problem, apart from looks?

Based on the picture, from what I can tell, I think the problem is that the divot goes from just above the edge to, potentially, the spine. Consequently, in order to correct the overgrind, the OP has to regrind/thin the entire face of the blade.

If he sharpens up to where the divot starts without regrinding the entire surface, he'll have a BIG hole in his edge and it'll continue well up the face of the blade.
 
To truly fix the issue, he'd probably lose most of the tip.
 
But, if he continues thinning as he sharpens, will he not eventually work part of that divot out before the edge ever hits it? It won't fix the problem, but in a home environment it should give him years of use before he ever develops a hole in the edge. My thought is that if he tries grinding that divot out all at once he is going to destroy the geometry of the tip. But, I could be wrong...

Haha ElPescador beat me to it...
 
I'm always in for taking a stab at Richmond but in this case I'm not going to be able to. I've seen this type of thing on a whole slew of Japanese knives so I'm not going to be able to point the finger as this being an issue that is only seen on a Richmond knife. Yes it's crappy but not at all uncommon, just ask anyone who's ever laid a knife down on a flat stone and they'll tell you a story.

As for sending it to his guy, that may actually be a good thing if you can get him to accept liability for any screw ups he causes but if not then you can most certainly do better by blindly picking a name out of a phone book.

Funny but if this came to me to work on I'd be reluctant to touch it simply because it's setting up the craftsman for failure and no amount of $$ is worth taking the chance of screwing up a customer's knife. I hate to find myself in a position where I'm looked at as the one who screwed upa knife when it was already screwed up to begin with, I was just trying to work a miracle is all. :)
 
To throw a wrench in the gears, there's another one, nowhere near as bad, towards the heel. Luckily, however, that area is quite beefy.

I didn't realize that this was that common Dave. Surprising. Looks like I'll be sending MR and SF a long email tonight. Here's to being stuck between a rock and a hard place.

@ElPescador and mhlee - this is exactly what I'm afraid of. Holes in the edge and losing the tip.
 
Yeah, 5 months is a long time. I think you have to eat it.

And you missed the opportunity to 'launder' your purchase by buying a new one (as your replacement) and sending in the old one as faulty. Of course, by posting here you have completely eF-ed yourself. You could have gotten something in writing from MR that the SF work would 'fix' it, and if it didn't work (which it likely wouldn't), then you would have had a second chance at getting your money back or some other discount -- but I don't think that is going to happen now.

Sorry bud, but I look forward to the WIP about you reprofiling/grinding it.

k.
 
Unless the overgrind is deeper than half the thickness of the knife, then you wont get holes in the edge. IMO it doesn't look that deep, so I wouldn't expect to see holes in the future. If you have a right hand asymmetric edge, then it's even less likely.
 
Unless the overgrind is deeper than half the thickness of the knife, then you wont get holes in the edge. IMO it doesn't look that deep, so I wouldn't expect to see holes in the future. If you have a right hand asymmetric edge, then it's even less likely.
your really turning lemons into lemonade at that point!
 
^^ yes, but if there is ever a lemon shortage you will know where to stock up...
 
Considering we (most of us) live in a country where 90+% of businesses have a 30 day return/exchange policy, I think 5 months is a little long to be upset about it. It's part of American retail that is almost ingrained in us via it's popularity amongst businesses.
 
i see both sides. personally i think a partial refund/replacement is the best thing in this situation for both parties involved.
 
I didn't realize that this was that common Dave. Surprising. Looks like I'll be sending MR and SF a long email tonight. Here's to being stuck between a rock and a hard place.


Sorry, I should have been more clear in my explanation, the overall problem of low and high spots on knives is commonly seen when trying to flatten or thin with stones but this specifically is unique in how it's showing up on your knife, it's a tad more serious or problematic than I normally see.

To give an example, when I thin Hiro AS knives I often find big lows right in front of the bolster where the factory ground the welds down. I also sometimes see lows right behind the tip too on these knives. Tojiro DPs also have this same sort of thing but so do Ichimonji and so on. None are exactly the same though.
 
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