What to do with lockless Outrider

[Thunderpants]

I have just purchased a used Outrider which is in great shape but missing the grey button slider lock thingy.
Should I a) hunt down the missing part b) live with a non-locking blade and and ugly hole in the side c) remove the scales and attempt to make my own custom teak/oak/kauri/ (or whatever) scales which might or might not look cool.
Or d) forget about it, send it back and get a refund?  - bearing in mind I paid 33 euros for this thing, & I can get a brand new Outrider for just 7 euros more.
Your thoughts are appreciated.

[Tomcat_81]

Did you just say "Kauri"?
If so, I'd only use it if you can get an extraordinarily hard piece of that stuff or some stabilized. Loved making a small vic with these scales (you could still smell the wood even though it was about 50 000 years old!) but they dented and scratched quite quickly :-(
But still- give it a try, maybe you can get your hands on some Pohutukawa ;-)
Tomcat

[Thunderpants]

Actually I don't have a pile of wood beside me at the moment and all in all I think I'm gonna send this back whence it came and get a refund. It's supposed to be a fully working Outrider and it isn't.

That said, I did see in New Zealand tonnes of Kauri scraps on sale in various shops (Where they were selling swamp kauri tables for $16,000 - and believe me, some of these tables were ugly as sin) and at the time I was thinking - what is anyone going to do with a little sliver of wood? Would have been perfect for a SAK I suppose - but too late now as I am 11,000 miles away from Kiwiland.

[Corwyn]

SEND BACK NOW!

It happened the same to me, but I got mine really cheap and shipping back would have been more expensive than the knife. I'll just send it to Victorinox one day...

[Tomcat_81]

Some tables were awesome, some were awful- all of them too expensive for me... fully agreed!

Back in 2007 I took some small pieces of swamp Kauri with me, planning to make knivescales out of them, but this happened only once.

Even after virtually soaking the Kauri in various stabilizing substances it remained too soft far scales imho. Shame though, since Swamp kauri is great both in workability and appearance...

So if it's not going to be a fun thing for you to try out, send it back to Vic. You'll get back a great new knife!

[jalind]

I have just purchased a used Outrider which is in great shape but missing the grey button slider lock thingy.
Should I a) hunt down the missing part b) live with a non-locking blade and and ugly hole in the side c) remove the scales and attempt to make my own custom teak/oak/kauri/ (or whatever) scales which might or might not look cool.
Or d) forget about it, send it back and get a refund?  - bearing in mind I paid 33 euros for this thing, & I can get a brand new Outrider for just 7 euros more.
Your thoughts are appreciated.

Recommend sending it back. You paid over 80% of the new cost, and for that much you should get a knife that's fully functional with all its accessories (save the original box unless that's special), near perfect blades/tools, with scales in excellent cosmetic condition. Missing the blade lock is a very substantial flaw that should have been disclosed. Not only that, it means the scales have been off of the knife and put back on again (unless there's a way of removing the lock button without scale removal that I'm unaware of). My guess would be a prior owner removed the scales and couldn't get the slide lock back in successfully and either gave up or lost the spring in the process.

John

[Thunderpants]

Yep, I briefly investigated the possibility of buying the missing piece/s but that involved buying a whole new pair of scales. I was tempted for a bit - I dig those blue ones that are usually only found on the nautically themed 111mms - but my expenditure would then have been over the new price. Which would be a bit silly.

I didn't know Kauri was so soft. Next time I'm in NZ - like in 20 years time! - I'll pick up some of those scraps and see if I can make myself a Kauri-Spartan or something similar. The wood in those tables is usually buried under several mm of transparent plastic of some kind, so you can never tell how hard or soft the wood is.

Anyway, cheers!

[Thunderpants]

Forgot to mention, I sent the Outrider back this afternoon.
So if anyone has a brilliant idea - too late!