Bark River- who’s fault?

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The standard you walk past is the standard you accept.

At work I tell apprentices that character is important.
Your reputation arrives before you do, and lingers after you've gone.
Hence it's your most valuable asset.

In everything.
 
Copied this post from a different thread because of the links provided.

tltt said:
First guy in this thread is Tom Maringer, famous swordsmith and Kydex maker - https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/blackjack-knives.124519/ . Scroll down to #6, it's Will Fennell, who was in charge of Camillus. Post #12, a very nasty story, is Schuyler Lovestrand, longtime knifemaker. Post #35 is another nasty story of Stewart.

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The time Mike was indicted on Bank Fraud - https://www.bladeforums.com/threads...knives-i-could-not-talk-about-til-now.132141/ , Post #18 is knifemaker Jerry Fisk relating how Mike did him dirty.

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The guy that had to chase Mike around for months for his $16,000 - https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/bark-river-has-taken-16-000-of-my-money.585934/ .

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Another dealer that had to chase Stewart around -

https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/mike-stewart-the-brk-t-gang.394517/ .

https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/ripped-off-by-bark-river.403520/

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Another guy that had to chase Stewart around for decent money -

https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/general-update.1436280 .

https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/general-update-2.1482621 .

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Also other makers / designers alive and dead that haven't had nice things to say about him over the years - Ethan Becker (KaBar/Becker Knives), Pat Crawford, Rex Applegate, Chris Reeve (Stewart was a very early importer), Randall knives, etc..... Those are just the known guys.
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Wasn't there something with those little Evans Companion knives some years ago as well? I forget exactly what the kerfuffle was.
 
shane45-1911 said:
And you other guys with your cute little "like" emojis when ever someone defends BRK, obviously don't even know what you are liking.
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This isn't pertinent to the current topic of discussion but what I quoted above is a good example why emoji reactions are a terrible idea for discussion forums. They are too easy to "weaponize" without the accountability of standing by and/or articulating one's position.

Great for acknowledging someone's kind compliment or nice picture but terrible for the purposes of involved discourse and heated debate.
 
shane45-1911 said:
Considering you choose to defend a known fraud on a knife forum dedicated to raising the bar and educating people, perhaps you are on the wrong forum.

It's not about who is right or wrong - it is about morals and truth and ethics and who we choose to support in this hobby.

Having a good knife from a bad person is nothing to brag about, let alone defend.

Carry on wallowing in your ignorance. You do everyone a dis-service when you support fraud in this industry.
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I am always open to learning. Can you elaborate on this fraud? Something beyond writing "He is a fraud" would be good. I promise I will read it. And as I said in a previous post, I WILL test that new Michigan Bowie, and if it fails or passes I will damn sure post the results.


EDIT: I have seen your story posted above as well as a link to another thread (which I will also read). I am sorry you went through that. Off to read that other thread.

EDIT 2: Looks like I have even more to read than I thought.

EDIT 3: WTF?! Still reading, but done for the night. Shady shit and injustice always pisses me off.
 
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Chris_Texas said:
I am always open to learning. Can you elaborate on this fraud? Something beyond writing "He is a fraud" would be good. I promise I will read it. And as I said in a previous post, I WILL test that new Michigan Bowie, and if it fails or passes I will damn sure post the results.


EDIT: I have seen your story posted above as well as a link to another thread (which I will also read). I am sorry you went through that. Off to read that other thread.

EDIT 2: Looks like I have even more to read than I thought.

EDIT 3: WTF?! Still reading, but done for the night. Shady shit and injustice always pisses me off.
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I'm sue there's even more to read. All those links above also have links!

Looks like you might be turning the corner on bark river. Hopefully other defenders take the time to do the reading like you have :thumbsup:
 
trevitrace said:
Wasn't there something with those little Evans Companion knives some years ago as well? I forget exactly what the kerfuffle was.
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Classic Mike Stewart : asked a 10 000 $ deposit from Evans to manufacture the Companions Gen2. Took the money, sat on it and made nothing for over a year. Lots of unanswered mails and calls, false promises, excuses, classic scammer tactics, Evans told the whole story here. While he got his money back in the end, the second run of Companions was delayed by two years. And the deposit was financed by GoFundMe... Some people asked a refund, some stuck to their (pre-paid) orders. The Companions were finally made by Metallinus Synergy of Escanaba. The whole ordeal was an absolute shit show. It's all on the Evans Knife & Tool forum (the General Update threads). I can't even consider using one of my Bark River knives now, they only remind me of MS's disgusting behaviour.
 
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herisson said:
Classic Mike Stewart : asked a 10 000 $ deposit from Evans to manufacture the Companions Gen2. Took the money, sat on it and made nothing for over a year. Lots of unanswered mails and calls, false promises, excuses, classic scammer tactics, Evans told the whole story here. While he got his money back in the end, the second run of Companions was delayed by two years. And the deposit was financed by GoFundMe... Some people asked a refund, some stuck to their (pre-paid) orders. The Companions were finally made by Metallinus Synergy of Escanaba. The whole ordeal was an absolute shit show. It's all on the Evans Knife & Tool forum (the General Update threads). I can't even consider using one of my Bark River knives now, they only remind me of MS's disgusting behaviour.
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That Evan's saga is one of the things I read last night. Two threads of updates and broken promises from Mike Stewart.
 
Here's the thing that gets me about Bark River knives themselves, the owner and his shady past aside.

With literally every single brand out there, you can find some varying number of negative reports and failures. Some with few and far between, some with a lot. The problem I have, is when you properly do the research you will find the sheer number of negative reports and failures from this brand is extraordinarily high, far outside the realm of normalcy. Not to mention the convincing evidence that many blades they sell are not the advertised steel they claim. I'm convinced that defenders of the brand have never actually taken the time to read for themselves on how bad the quality control truly is. But as always, when someone's 5 samples are defect free, so all the negative reports should be discounted.

For a good example of their incompetence and lack of QA, see this video for example.

 
Called bark river today and explained the issue to them, and how I thought it could be a HT issue. They did not offer to replace my knife, and they said it was likely ground too thin. They said some of the same kind around the same time had issues as well because of someone new on the grinder. They told me to send it in so they could thicken the edge up to make it stronger. That is last thing I wanted to do. I don’t want to lose my blade height, and I don’t trust them on that grinder especially considering the grind that came on this knife. Plus I could do edge work myself for free. I mentioned the HT once or twice again but they were set on it being the grind— which I do believe it could be, but idk if I’ve ruled out HT either. Thickening the edge up could cure the rippling problem even if the steel is bad IMO. Even if the steel is junk as long as you make it thicker and thicker it’ll eventually hold up so who knows. I guess if it holds a decent edge after I rework it then it’ll be alright. Bottom line the guy I talked to was polite and willing to help, but they did not replace the knife and I’m not fully convinced it’s not HT or something else. I’ll do the edge work myself and see if it helps.
 
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