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by *AJH* Custom Knives & Services
 
About Knife repairs
"Before & After" pictures
Prices |
Payment
Where your money goes
Important Information - Shipping up repairs
- Return shipping
Switchblade laws
Testimonials / customer comments
Your Comments, Questions, Orders
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 Last serious call for the knife repairs is lst of November. The reason is of course the holiday mail overload - the chance of your knife not making it back to you before Christmas I can't work when the metal is freezing to fingers, so expect some serious extra turn-around time through winter months |
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The only purpose of the knife repairs I do is to honestly repair it, to restore the knife to it's full functionality.
I also strive to make it look as good or better than new. Any modifications also fall into this category. All this work may add value to the knife - but it is not designed or intended to fool any collector. If it is indeed a real collectors item, any repair or alteration to it will actually diminish it's collector's value. |
If you have an access to a flat bead scanner, scan the
knife in the need of repairs or refurbishing
Save the images in JPG or GIF or PNG format. Or take a good sharp pictures with your digital camera - those are already in JPG format. Unfortunately none of these are suitable for email, because they are just TOO BIG. Crop and resize them for email - a good JPG image size from 640 dpi to 800 dpi wide at %50 quality or compression is no more than 30 K - and have it ready for attachment to your reply. |
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I start all the service work as soon as possible, on the first come - first serve basis.
When your turn comes I try to finish the repair within a day or two. The bulk of my repair work mostly consists of extensive handle repairs, including pins/spacers/scale replacement, and occasionally a total change of a handle design, folder springs and repairs, and some stainless welding where possible: The blades broken in half or through any portion of cutting edge can not be welded back together. Total refurbishing consists of stripping the knife to it's individual components, total blade regrind, sand and polish all parts, replace what is needed, and after all is put together, final buffing and sharpening to a razor edge. Common, or special editions of Kitchen and Chef's knives refurbishing - sand away and polish most sharpening scratches, stains and rust. Reshape broken off blade tips, replace old delaminated or damaged wood handles with top quality hardwoods, replace cheap Aluminum rivets with Nickel Silver ones. I glue down all new scales so no water can get to the tang and destroy the handle with rust from inside. Replace leather washer type WW-2, marine and Ka-Bar handles with new leather washers, all glued together this time and on cleaned metal. There are around 32 leather washers on the handle, roughly one quality leather belt. You can supply your own to save $10. Used your pommel as a hammer? Will sand away all dents and polish to a mirror finish. Flat or hollow grinding for getting the used up fat edge to a new, working thickness. If the blade is supper rusty, or have very deep rust pits, it will require considerably more time and resources to make it look presentable again. 90% of all repairs required the total regrind. There is no guarantee that I will be able to remove all the rust pits, since some can go right through the blade, or be too deep to sand away. Manufacturer's logos, trademarks or any other Etched markings not etched deep enough, will be totally obliterated if any blade sanding is required. The etchings deep enough if black, will loose the color and be shiny.
Sorry, can't repair molded plastic, or molded rubber handles
A large portion of old cutlery was manufactured out of plain hard carbon steel, then chrome plated. Any re shaping, like broken off tips, requires that the blade be correctly tapered /thinned and polished. The chrome plating will be polished off, there is no way around it. The blade will stain. The only option is to have it re-chromed after, at the Chrome plating shop near you, or just put up with cleaning it with Comet/Ajax after use. Folder repairs To refurbish the folder, it has to be taken down, pried and broken apart, hopefully without damaging liners or bolsters beyond repair. Even if you knife is in brand new, or mint condition without a blemish, and you would like only a scale replaced, the folder has to be taken totally apart. The new scales has to be glued on, and then riveted to liners - riveting means forming heads on both ends of the pins with the hammer - one head visible on the outside of the scale, the other is ground flush in a countersunk hole on the inside. Refurbishing consist of total disassembly - cleaning, polishing the liners, back spring/lock bars, sanding, polishing and sharpening all blades, sanding flat inside of old scales for the perfect fit. Scales get glued on this time, and are secured with new pin rivets. All main new pins are machined to fit and riveted to smooth blade action without slop. I can make you a new blade if you are unable to get the replacement from the manufacturer. The shape will be close to the original, but no markings on it. I can cut a rectangular, straight slot if absolutely necessary. I use 440-C, hardened and tempered to about 59 RC, for blades and springs, but will use other materials, if requested, available, or supplied by you. Of course all of this work takes much time, and therefore is not cheap, or free. The repair costs can exceed the actual purchase price, sometimes several times over. You do have an option just to throw your knife away and go purchase another knife, or keep old one and cruise garage sales or auctions for the same model with needed parts intact, or in better shape than yours. Than use it to make one good knife out of two. The basic cost of scales includes only any of the exotic woods I have on hand. Speciality scales like MOP, Abalone, Turtle, Fossil or mammoth Ivory etc will cost you extra, and these are expensive. No real Elephant Ivory, legal or pre-ban can be transported to foreign country, choose from many alternatives. You can save quite a few dollars by getting your special scales yourself, than mailing them with the knife. |
Do not store your knives in their sheath, condensation leaches out remnants of tanning acids from leather, and causes much rust..
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This web site was created and is maintained by Tony Hnilica -
*AJH* Custom Knives & Services
