after years of continual use and ... misuse (being used a prybar, chisel, punch, and hammer) today after putting a razor edge back on it I pulled it out to show the blade, went to put it back in my pocket and heard that gut wrenching SNAP!

Now I'm gonna have to get my wife to send it in to BM since I'm not active duty anymore... but she's mad at me right now, so I'll have to wait for allmost 2 weeks to send it in for a new spring

What a bummer, we were all just bragging how the autos never die!

I've never seen an OTF die...

Knives like the 3550 can only take so many thousands of openings and closings, I think this one is about 8 years old, so I'm in no way displeased.

8 years 1 broken spring, not too bad of a track record..

my "nato" OTF auto is almost dead, but it's more than 15 years old.

i've had a couple broken springs on different benchmades. the first one to break just slowed down and stopped firing the blade, but had no noise. the second one that broke had a small "tink" noise ( it sounded like the click from the safety ).



Skimo - i have a couple of aftermarket springs that i can send you if you want to pay for the shipping. pm me with your address and i'll send them out to you. i don't think they're as good as the springs that benchmade uses, but they should last you until your wife is no longer mad at you.

Couguar PM sent.

The springs wouldn't happen to be from a place that sells KITS for KNIFE(s) would they?

pm replied to. i think one spring is from there, but it came with a used auto that i had bought.

anyone have a 3550 with measurements for the spring?

new spring.... insane power.

thanks for the info on the web sites!

I had to chop a segment of the spring off and compress the spring with my bare hands, not an easy task, but after doing it once before many years ago it was a ton simpler this time.

wish I coulda taken pics, but there's no way I'm re-compressing that spring again without the tool

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Skimo,