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Old 11-16-2013, 10:13 PM
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Jacknola Jacknola is offline
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Join Date: Feb 2012
Location: New Orleans
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The beautiful package above was the catalyst for publishing the use of the stamp change to identify age. The combination above has a pre-1963 brown button sheath with a knife that is post ?66 from the blade stamp. This is an example of the value of recognizing the date of the stamp change for those collectors who are most interested in the Vietnam era.

As far as the date of the stamp change, I think we can get to a pretty precise date even without knife documentation. But there are some caveats, the most important being the reliability of conventional dating techniques. Thanks to Rod, we can be sure that all the "low S" stainless knives had the ?old? stamp. The change to the ?new? stamp occurred during in the the ?separate S? period for stainless knives, which is commonly thought to have lasted from about 1965 to 1969 or so.

But of course that period spanned several years. We can do better. Below are three pictures scanned from Sheldon?s book, of knives he identifies with pretty precise dates of manufacture. The first is a model 17 Astro that he says is closely dated to late 1965. It has the ?old? stamp.



The next two knives have the ?new? stamp. The first is a model 5 with what he identifies as the last phase of brown Micarta that he attributes to first half of 1966. The second knife is a 7-spacer model 19 that he identifies as having a blade grind unique to late 1966.





If the dating in Sheldon's book is correct, then early ?66 is a good date for the stamp change. What is remarkable is how the "new" stamp was used seemingly across the board. All models, even bowies exhibited the font geometry change about this time.

Last edited by Jacknola; 07-28-2017 at 01:56 PM.
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