The
Knife Web Guide™
provides an extensive guide of links, resources and information to online
knife, sword and cutlery-related Web sites organized by category and search. Look
inside for links to knife manufacturers, custom knife makers, swords,
magazines, knife collecting, knife making supplies, related sites and more.
These terms may be arbitrary, but
whatever terms are employed, they may be useless or misleading
unless both buyer and seller agree on what they mean in actually
describing the knife. Therefore all the terms we use in grading
our knives come from the ones listed below.
Describing old and vintage knives is, at best, an inexact science.
We try to be as objective as possible, but we leave the final
judgment to the buyer. Our hassle-free return privilege allows you
to return any item for any reason within 14 days of purchase.
Click here for the
details of our return privilege.
The following assumes mint is 100%.
The
pricing of our knives follows the percentages of the 9 categories like
this:
New
Manufactures Suggested List Price, or less
Pristine Mint 100% plus
Mint 100%
Near Mint 80-90%
Excellent 50-70%
Very Good 40-50%
Good 25%
Poor 5-10%
Junk under $10.00
As an example a near mint knife is
worth 10% to 20% less than a mint knife. A excellent knife is worth
30% to 50% less than a mint knife. A knife in very good condition is worth
50% to 60% less than a mint knife. A good knife is worth 75% less than a
mint knife. A poor knife is worth 90% to 95% less than a mint
knife.
New:
Never sold to a customer and never used. New as shipped by the manufacturer
or distributor with all original packing (box, sheath, etc.) and instructions.
Knives or any merchandise sold as "New" must be eligible for full warranty
service from the officially authorized importer, distributor, or factory
in the USA. New is what most knife stores sell and they are generally
current production knives.
For years the standard for knife collectors has been the National Knife
Collectors Association grading, established in 1973. Basically it is a
sound grading standard, but as collecting has advanced many dealers
adapted additional descriptions, and the overall collecting field has
changed, to the point that many dealers feel there should be a more
detailed grading system. The basic grading standards have been left
intact, but what follows is a clarification and enhancement of those
standards, and also the reasons for the revisions.
Cracks. One important exception: Cracks will occur in mint knives.
If it is mint for everything except a crack, the knife is still mint-–it
is only mint with a crack. This should downgrade the value approximately
10% on most knives.
New Category:
Pristine Mint:
The coin world would call this
MS-63-65, the ultimate in quality and condition–not just mint, but mint
plus something, good fit, no specks on a very old knife, etc. Suffice to
say there are very, very few of these out there. Perfect plus.
The standard mint,
unsharpened, never used, and never carried extensively.
Revision: Almost any knife made prior to World War II is going to
have some rust specks here and there. If you only wait for mint New York
Knife Company knives with no rust specks, for instance, you are going to
get very few. Some knives that were mint in 1970 have now been in storage
for over 30 years–and they are starting to show some neglect spots here and
there as well. I look for this to get worse in the future, since few
collectors pay the attention they should to the maintenance of knives in
their collection–and at that point the value of even rarer pristine mint
knives will increase. Important exception: Case knives still must have no
rust to be mint. An old Case knife with a rust speck is not a mint knife.
Case collectors are stricter in their grading than other knife collectors.
Nothing
wrong with the knife, sharpened but no blade wear, some original polish
still visible, carry scratches on the outside, walks and talks, no deep
rust pits, full blades. (A mint knife that has rusted and been cleaned
back to near perfect shape is near mint.)
5-10% blade wear,
blades snap, some tarnish, and light pitting possible. A good solid
lightly used knife. On a multi-blade knife, some of the smaller blades may
still be near mint. Tang mark clear. Master blade not over 10% short.
More blade wear
than excellent, 15-25% wear, some blades may be slow, stamping readable
but faint, some distinct cracks but no chips out of handle that have not
been repaired. Blades still sound but may be slow. Some rust pitting and
tarnish. Master blade may be short.
NKCA
standards refer to this as Fair, which I always confused with poor. Simply
Good is worse than Very Good. 25%-50% blade wear, maybe a chip missing,
replaced handles or blade is evident, but still able to identify maker,
still useable as a working knife. Blades may be very slow. Deep pits and
rust. Still has all the blades, even though worn and short.
(Not priced–no one I
know collects them, but you do see them traded for $1.00-$10.00 each)
Blades broken, one handle missing, all that is useable is bolsters,
liners, and back spring. Maybe an old name or style.
Our master list of past Blade
knife magazines for sale.
Looking for a back issue or year?
Blade
knife magazines.
What
does new, used, vintage, antique and rare knives mean?
New
knives: Never sold to a customer and never
used. New as shipped by the manufacturer or distributor with all original
packing (box, sheath, etc.) and instructions. Knives or any merchandise
sold as "New" must be eligible for full warranty service from
the officially authorized importer, distributor, or factory in the USA.
New is what most knife stores and knife websites sell and they are generally current
production knives. CutlersCove.com does not normally sell new
knives.
Used
knives: Any knife that has been owned by a
customer, even if it is like new. Used knives may not have the sheath,
accessories or box that they came with. They vary in condition, from like
new to completely worn out. By this definition most knives are used,
including vintage and antique. This is what CutlersCove.com sells.
Vintage
knives: Knives made after World War II (1945), but not still
in production. They are no longer made. A vintage knife will usually be higher in cost than when it was originally produced, but many times it will not cost any more than a similar made knife today if you can find one.
This is what CutlersCove.com sells.
Rare knives: A very
uncommon knife, unusually great, unusually excellent, admirable, fine. Very hard to come by or find. Not many knives
are rare as most can be found if you are willing to pay the price and take
the time to look. We feel the word rare is over used today by too many
when they describe their knife. There is a difference between uncommon and a truly rare knife.
A good way to look at this is the difference between
Pristine Mint and Mint. Both are not common but to a different degree.
This is what CutlersCove.com sells when we can find them.
Browse our
Knife Article Library™ for some helpful stuff and take a minute to submit
your own tip or hint that you've picked up. You'll get credit for it
on the page if we use it. Looking for a little
exposure? Want to beef up your internet presence? Have a site you
think other knife enthusiasts would find valuable?
Send your articles or site links to us for inclusion in a future
CC-Newsletter issue or to be used on Knife Web Guide
site.
*. Because Mr. Voyles book is for
