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The BladeForums.com 2024 Traditional Knife is ready to order! See this thread for details: https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/bladeforums-2024-traditional-knife.2003187/
Price is$300$250 ea (shipped within CONUS). If you live outside the US, I will contact you after your order for extra shipping charges.
Order here: https://www.bladeforums.com/help/2024-traditional/ - Order as many as you like, we have plenty.
Bark River knives?
- Thread starter Mykke
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One needs to scratch that itch every now and then. I own more Dozier blades than something made by Bark River. I get that itch every time I visit the Dozier tables at Blade. BRKT have been absent from Blade for a long time. Don't know if they ever had tables. With KF closing down (at least for now), BRKT has lost what I believe is their dominant marketing tool to us regular folks.
KingMC
The Pun-isher
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Can I assume if Mike Stewart posted his side of the story and said everybody was wrong except for him, his knives are perfect and all of those bladeforums members are just out to get him, that you would believe his side wholeheartedly?
By saying that 'there's two sides to every story' and that you can't judge BRKT until you hear both sides, it appears that you're admitting you don't want to believe any of the negative press you've seen so far.
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A few months ago. May?
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Ah, thanks. I only frequented there when bf was down.
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That place was a zombie apocalypse. Maybe Fallkniven will setup a bladeforum sub-forum. I got the vibe that Fallknivens owners would rather do personal stuff than deal with the internet, so I don't think they will restart their forum.
If?!?
Ultimately it seems that some people will buy knives and, in general, not pay attention the the character of the makers. 'Scool.
And some, in general, do pay attention the the character of the makers. 'Scool (I'm in that group)
Whether or not that affects someone's buying is up to them.
And some wont accept that the history happened, or blame "haters" for it. That's fine too, I guess, but this stuff all did happen. I'm way out of the loop, but with this "mystery metal" thing it sounds like it continues to.
The last sentence. That suggests that the reputation for poor behavior may not be based solely on a past misunderstanding. I have the impression from another forum, right or wrong, that you know Mike Stewart rather well. Maybe better than anybody posting in this thread.Which part?
(Even though everySuggests that the re part of any post of mine is interesting.
By the way, those high priced fixed blades are outside of my budget.
The last sentence. That suggests that the reputation for poor behavior may not be based solely on a past misunderstanding. I have the impression from another forum, right or wrong, that you know Mike Stewart rather well. Maybe better than anybody posting in this thread.
By the way, those high priced fixed blades are outside of my budget.
Thanks for the reply.
Like I mentioned earlier, there is more than enough publicly documented stuff on Mike Stewart/BRK (where did the "T" go to, by the way?
), so that going into more "private" stuff isn't really necessary. (And nobody would probably believe where any of my private history came from anyway. Though I think you might. ) As for the last sentence, I was implying that there have been some "us vs them" models around here of late that rival, if not exceed, Bark River's. And they are working well. Done right, that strategy can be bulletproof.
Skrapmetal
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I really don't give a crap about what Mike did as far as all the drama... I mean, it sounds lame, but it's in the past.
What I do care about is the high amount of Bark River knives I purchased in the past and the high number of issues I had with them. Edge stability/weak heat treat on a couple, two warped blades, a few uneven grinds, several with asymmetrical handle shaping, even one with a stacked leather handle that was so loose the leather disks could be spun around like loose washers on a bolt.
Some of the designs are neat and I admit to this day that they sometimes tempt me, and the vendors always took them back if I complained... but the way Mike and his fans would treat anyone who complained about the types of issues I had as if they were the users problems and not Bark River's was the icing on the cake for me. I no longer own any Bark River knives, and won't again.
Yeah, I'm sure some of you have never had any issue and you're gonna tell me all about it. And that's good, when I managed to get a good one it really was good (My Bravo 1 was a great knife that took a ton of abuse) and I'm sure it's the same for you. But I'm done with the gamble.
What I do care about is the high amount of Bark River knives I purchased in the past and the high number of issues I had with them. Edge stability/weak heat treat on a couple, two warped blades, a few uneven grinds, several with asymmetrical handle shaping, even one with a stacked leather handle that was so loose the leather disks could be spun around like loose washers on a bolt.
Some of the designs are neat and I admit to this day that they sometimes tempt me, and the vendors always took them back if I complained... but the way Mike and his fans would treat anyone who complained about the types of issues I had as if they were the users problems and not Bark River's was the icing on the cake for me. I no longer own any Bark River knives, and won't again.
Yeah, I'm sure some of you have never had any issue and you're gonna tell me all about it. And that's good, when I managed to get a good one it really was good (My Bravo 1 was a great knife that took a ton of abuse) and I'm sure it's the same for you. But I'm done with the gamble.
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This line pretty much sums it up for me. I don't have the time or desire to research and filter through the Mike drama from the past. If I like a Bark River knife I'll buy it. If I don't like it, I don't. If I stopped buying products from jerks and people with shady pasts, I would own one pair of shorts and live under a bridge.
I've owned four Bark River products (Bravo 1, Gunny, Bumblebee, Little Carver) and they were all very nice with no major problems. One could've used a better sharpening choil and there was a slight recurve, but I fixed that and it works great. I've sold two that I didn't use and I've kept two. sure, they're overpriced, but I enjoy using the ones I've kept and I don't really think about it much.
My only issue with BRKT moving forward is the saturation of Bark River produced knives with other makers name on them being cranked out of Escanaba, MI. They all look just about the same and it's obvious that they're BRKT knives. Seems like they're aiming at collectors that must own all models coming out of all manufacturers in Escanaba. At some point, I think it's going to get long in the tooth and hurt all of those designers and makers including BRKT. Probably won't help the resale value of knives I already own and use, but they're all scratched up anyway, so I don't really care about resale value.
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I'm sorry you had such bad luck with the knives from bark river. what I am curious about is the way you said mike handled these problems. Did you try to get them fixed and he was an asshole about it and still did it or didn't do it or what?
Skrapmetal
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Back in the days when Bark River had a forum on Knife Forums (which is gone now), many times people would get attacked/insulted by Mike and the regulars when they would bring an issue to them.
If it was edge damage, even if it was something the knife should have been able to handle without issue, the answers were basically "You're an idiot, but I'll take care of the knife anyway". Some responses were more or less colorful than that.
If it was asymmetrical grinds or handles, the answer was usually "There's nothing wrong with that whiner, these are hand ground knives." no matter how bad the grinds were. If you persisted that it wasn't acceptable, you would get plenty of insults.
This was quite some time ago... 8-10 years maybe? But that behavior compounded the quality issues for me. In fact that's how I found Blade forums... I was sick of the poor quality control and the toxic attitude presented to anyone who questioned them so I went looking for something better.
Things might be different now. Maybe the quality control is better, and maybe blame is accepted when mistakes happen.
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I bought a limited edition bowie from them that was not even ground symmetrically. They would have had to notice it was improperly ground considering that it was a special run. I think they simply choose to ship product because they have a volume-centric manufacturing philosophy. Culling out defects and increasing QC both reduce output relative to input.
The other issue is that they are high volume and don't have good ergonomics for their workers.
I've heard that before but damn am I crazy to think that is retarded. I mean I believe you but I would think he'd know better then to attack ppl like that or come at any customer any negative way especially when it's about the quality of his product. wish I could've been around to see how ridiculous some things got
Skrapmetal
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Like I said, maybe that is the past and they've matured in their customer interactions. But back in those days any issue was usually met with either being told you were using the knife wrong because you didn't know what you were doing in the event of damage, or you had unreasonable expectations when it came to grinding issues.
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You're just scratching the surface. Other companies have owners that do the same and even worse!
Yea your right but I would still expect better from someone who is doing that good with business. Then again that tells me again the quality of the knives has to be there.. yes I believe he's gotten better I've talked to him before and I've heard about other polls interactions with him so maybe he has changed. Sometimes ppl can be taken the wrong way when texting or messaging too. Not to say that's the answer for all the forums problems but just sayinng
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The regulars would attack people. M. Stewart could be a prick, but he preferred to play stuff off and tell people to send it in, mentioning on more than one occasion that the appropriate course of action was to not post issues on the forum and instead anonymously call their dealer or BRKT directly.
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They were given a formal invitation when the son showed up one day. Many people tried to talk them into it and they never followed through, even with extensive explanation. Oh well.