Bent knife

[Sappy]

Hey folks i managed to put a nice bend in my knife this morning so i gave it a rap on the side to straighten it out and its back to being perfectly straight again.

Is it likely just to keep bending or is it all good?

 

[ged]

Hey folks i managed to put a nice bend in my knife this morning so i gave it a rap on the side to straighten it out and its back to being perfectly straight again.

Congratulations! You don't usually get that lucky!

Is it likely just to keep bending or is it all good?

Depends how you treat it. Try not to abuse it so much in future. But if it was only a slight bend, probably all is good.

Metals tend to 'work harden' when you bend them past their elastic limits (in other words they stay bent when you stop applying the bending forces, instead of springing back to their original shape). The more you do it the more brittle the material becomes. During this process you will also create cracks in the material. Eventually there will come a time where there is no longer any elasticity (because of the increased hardness) and/or no strength (because of the cracks) and it will just break. You can demonstrate this to yourself with any bit of metal wire such as a paper clip or a wire coat hanger. You will probably notice that the bits that that the sharpest bends begin by being more difficult to bend further (or straighten out) because of the hardening. If you keep bending it enough in more or less the same place you will feel it get progressively weaker and it will eventually break.

 

[Longstrider]

Any knife that bends relatively easy (as it sounds like yours has .. both ways !) is probably too soft to take and keep a good edge properly, unless is has been very differentially hardened (hard edge and soft spine). This could be caused by a problem with the heat treat or even the steel the knife is made of.
Is it a 'home-made' knife, or a production model ?

 

[Sappy]

Cheers guys.

Its a laminated steel mora . Been heavily used for a few years now.

I'm really surprised this happened considering the way it was used at the time and even more that it returned to perfect straightness after a few taps on the opposite side.

Will see how it gets on tomorrow if it breaks well a tenner for a few hundred hours of joy was worth it

 

[Longstrider]

Aaah,, it's a Mora ... The thin-ness of the Mora blade can make it susceptible to bending if used incorrectly. It might be that you got a 'soft' one, but I doubt it knowing the way these are all production line produced it would be difficult for one to miss a stage and still make it through the factory. They're just thin ...

 

[nic.]

I think that it will be alright, I have heard of someone that used a laminated mora for a spoon knife, apparently it would take a pronounced curve with no ill effects; and it could even be futher bent to suit the bowl shape of a particular spoon.

 

[Totumpole]

I think that it will be alright, I have heard of someone that used a laminated mora for a spoon knife, apparently it would take a pronounced curve with no ill effects; and it could even be futher bent to suit the bowl shape of a particular spoon.

Dont encourage me to start going off bending my moras now.....

 

[MickeS]

The laminated Moras CAN be cold bent for quick fix crooked knives, just be careful when you do it and count on losses. Out of 3 blades I managed to break 2 - I broke the tip off one blade and almost the whole blade on the other...
I will try to post pics of the surviving blade, now with a wrapped spruce mocotaugan handle

 

[Shinken]

yeah dont worry ive had laminated knives that bend and hold a good edge, just dont bend it again

 

[brancho]

My bargain bucket Frost 106 was bent when I got it. Its straight enough and working fine still. It has a kink in it but I am happy with it for a fiver.

 

[Sappy]

Cheers guys been using it every day since it happened and its still perfectly fineand perfectly straight

 

[damo1234]

If your worried you could invest in a full tang knife with a thicker blade, maybe 3mm

 

[Sappy]

Its plenty strong mate just a freek thing could happen to any knife.