Vintage Model 14's

[Jacknola]

Bill, I'm pretty sure the Solingen 14 teethies were simply ground down Solingen 14s. Gaddis says that original teethed knives were developed for the experimental model 18 using re-ground Solingen 14s....he also shows pictures of two of the first. It was almost one year after the development of the Attack-Survival 18 before a model 18 was made using an Orlando blade. And his narrative seems to make it clear that no teeth were cut into Randall knives before the development of the model 18 in 1963.

Let's do some interesting math. How many teethed Solingen model 14s were made during the Vietnam War, say... 1963-1972?

Adding the original 500 carbon Solingen 14 blades, a total of about 2200 carbon Solingen 14s and about 3200 stainless Solingen 14s were imported. Let's assume most of the original 500 were slowly sold off before 1963 and the introduction of teeth. That leaves about 1,800 carbon blades and 3,200 stainless.

We can guess that perhaps 40 percent of the Solingen 14 blades were recycled and became Solingen model 18 blades, This would mean about 1,100 carbon Solingen 14 and about 1,900 stainless Solingen blades, a total of 3,000 blades, were available to be made into model 14 knives.

Let's say that some small percent of the Solingen 14 blades were not sold because of damage during finishing, or were not up to standards, used for experimental purposes, etc. And some Solingen 14s were sold after 1972, post Vietnam, handled with the brass lanyard liner, thus are not really Vietnam era knives.

A reasonable estimate would be that less than 2,800 Solingen model 14s were made and sold during Vietnam time period. How many of those Vietnam era Solingen 14s had teeth?

Teeth were not available until 1963 and were not catalog listed until 1965 or so. Just for grins let's guess that about 20 percent of the Solingen 14 blades sold during Vietnam period were converted to teeth grind. That would mean that at most 500-600 Solingen model 14 knives were made with teeth. My brother carried one of those in Vietnam 1966-67 and lost it in combat in 1968... which reduces the possible surviving Solingen teeth model 14s to about 499. Add in 50 years of attrition, and we have... how many left?

These numbers are just estimates... but they are directionally accurate because the base numbers are factual...from Gaddis. And.. they are pretty interesting to those of us who like Randall knives of the Vietnam era. Regards.