Some of the best Randall knives ever made had feint, half visible, irregular, upside down, or double struck stamps.

There are machines involved all over that shop. Grind a blade.....machine involved. Polish a blade.....machine involved. Sand a handle.....machine involved......and yes stamp a blade.....machine involved. All handmade. Including the stamp.

Both of these stampings, I believe are from the late 1960's. Both #1-8, One kit blade, one fighter. Stampings are totally different.

The one above seems to be polished. Both clear stamps!

I'm not trying to add fuel to the fire,BUT every Randall shown but two have been carbon steel.I don't care if my Randall's have a shallow or deep stamp.I'm just Happy to have have every one I own!!
In the immortal words of Forrest Gump.That's all I got to say about that.I'm going to bed and dream obout the Randall's I have on order.

Yep, some of the older "irregularities" in stampings are really attractive. I recall reading the Bo would (during war years?) let any blade with a portion of a stamp that made it identifiable as "Randall made", out of the shop since there were bigger things to worry about than perfect stamps. Randy Whiteman has a great WW2 APFK with a stamp nearly halfway down the blade! Just recently I saw an upside-down stamp on an oldie, cool as could be.

I meant a machine involved in the blade stamping process.

Eric -

the top knife is etched, not stamped. This happens generally if the stamp strike was very light and with grinding and polishing the stamp is lost, or if the stamp was really boogered up in some fashion so intentionally removed - at the shop of course.

The sheaths are stamped by HAND.

Apologies in advance for the slight derail but this issue of the meaning of "hand made" is interesting to me and something I've thought about before. Here are a couple of definitions from different e-dictionaries: "made by hand or by a hand process" and "made by hand, not by machine, and typically therefore of superior quality". The second definition supports the notion that "hand made" does not involve machinery but the first doesn't really address that aspect. I do a little wood working and sometimes people ask if what I have done is hand made. I use an power saw to cut the wood, not a hand saw. I use a power sander sometimes in addition to hand sanding. I also use a power carver and not hand carving knives. But, I direct all of the power tools myself, by hand. So, is my work hand made? I think some would say no and some yes. Eye of the beholder thing I suppose. But I can certainly understand the different views.