Normal 20CV behavior?

In my opinion that is not 20CV. Possibly 3V or even A2.

I sure hope you have better luck with Bark River CS than I did when I had an issue with an obvious mistake that they made. There is a reason I will never buy another BR knife.
 
Sorry to hear you had a less than pleasant experience, lambertiana. I'm really hoping I don't have to go through too much hassle.

Some more observations. If you go to KnivesShipFree's page for Mini-Canadian in 20CV (click here), you will notice two things:

1. Some of the knives (like mine) are horizontally stamped on the blade, while others are vertically stamped on the choil area
2. All pictures of blade-stamped knives have a distinctly different background from the choil-stamped ones

As such, one might reasonably assume those were two different runs. Furthermore, if you look at the spine shot of a blade-stamped knives (example here), they appear to be somewhat thicker than the choil-stamped ones (example here). As noted before, the specs on KSF indicate the A2 Mini-Canadians have 0.150" blade stock, while the 20CV Mini-Canadians have 0.125" blade stock.

My calipers have shipped today and I should be able to add more information to this discussion by the end of the week.
 
ForgedMaple said:
Sorry to hear you had a less than pleasant experience, lambertiana. I'm really hoping I don't have to go through too much hassle.

Some more observations. If you go to KnivesShipFree's page for Mini-Canadian in 20CV (click here), you will notice two things:

1. Some of the knives (like mine) are horizontally stamped on the blade, while others are vertically stamped on the choil area
2. All pictures of blade-stamped knives have a distinctly different background from the choil-stamped ones

As such, one might reasonably assume those were two different runs. Furthermore, if you look at the spine shot of a blade-stamped knives (example here), they appear to be somewhat thicker than the choil-stamped ones (example here). As noted before, the specs on KSF indicate the A2 Mini-Canadians have 0.150" blade stock, while the 20CV Mini-Canadians have 0.125" blade stock.

My calipers have shipped today and I should be able to add more information to this discussion by the end of the week.
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Just call Mike and Derrick, no need to hire Dick Tracy to solve the case, mistakes happen, I am speculating that someone slipped up and put it in the wrong pile of blanks when it was being made, but who knows. Not us

So just give them a call :D
 
DeadboxHero said:
Just call Mike and Derrick, no need to hire Dick Tracy to solve the case, mistakes happen, I am speculating that someone slipped up and put it in the wrong pile of blanks when it was being made, but who knows. Not us

So just give them a call :D
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I'm sorry, but if that is indeed the case, I don't feel such a slip up is something that should be so casually shrugged at... I can only imagine the level of backlash bigger companies like ZT or Spyderco would face if they were ever found to have sold 8Cr13MoV knives with S110V stamps, whatever the reason behind the mistake.

And once more, I will not call Mr Stewart for several reasons. My spoken english is awkward at best, the charges from my service provider would be more than I'm willing to spend on this issue, and lastly, I would rather not have this seemingly common problem where, following the call, both the customer and Mr Stewart (through proxies) post very contradicting accounts of the same conversation. E-mails, unlike phone calls, have permanent records and tend to limit the number possible misunderstandings. Bark River has a Contact form on their website, they should be able to answer my request just fine through that channel.
 
So I got replies from both KSF and Bark River. In brief, the KSF rep said thank you for bringing up the issue, but I really should just deal with Bark River instead because their warranty is excellent. BRKT said patina is completely normal when cutting fruits, just use steel wool to clean it off. The rep said I could also send it in for warranty, so they can scrub off the patina for me, I assume.

The fact that both companies are willing to so easily dismiss what is, to me, an enormous oversight in manufacturing, is quite simply frightening. Let's not forget this is a $200 knife, after all.

Honestly, at this point in my life, I neither have the time nor patience for this stuff. I also have no intention of investing a single additional dime on shipping or warranty only to receive another defective product. I've done more in depth research on this matter and it appears to be far from an isolated event. I've re-read everything that's been said about Mr Stewart, and in light of my own experience, I now have a very different impression of the kind of man he is. I'll be taking this to GB&U and take the hit, money-wise. I will also stop taking any of my business to Escanaba.

At this point, I am so appalled by this event and how most seem to just brush it off as "normal" that I don't even want to take another look at the knife. Rather than sell this off at a loss and pass the burden over to the next poor soul, I'll probably just throw it off in an active volcano on my next trip out of town.

At the very least, I'm extremely thankful this incident happened on my first purchase. Lesson learned.
 
Wow, excellent read, ForgedMaple, and while I'm dearly sorry for the treatment you have received from both KSF and BRK, please be assured that it is a lesson to me and hopefully others as to with whom it is wise to engage in business.
 
To be clear, I've had very good experience with KSF in the past. I'm a little disappointed at how the rep is handling the issue, and perhaps Mr Bohn would've responded differently, but I truly don't know what are their options or how much responsibility they should be expected to bear. This matter aside, I believe they are an excellent company.
 
I'm sorry to hear that you are going through such issues ForgedMaple. For what it's worth, your experience has crossed Bark Rivers off of the knives I'd consider buying so I'm glad you posted this. I think you should sell the knife at the very least and just reference the issues you saw here to minimize your losses. The knife is perfectly functional it just doesn't exhibit the behavior you'd expect from the steel.
 
I'm sure the knife would perform just fine for light EDC. However, I do have a problem keeping or selling something I knew profited a crook. I would rather see it destroyed. I live in one of the world's fraud capital, and have come to care much more about integrity than money.

Read about Mr Stewart. Read about his time in federal prison. Read about Blackjack Knives. Read about Marble's Knives. Read about Bark River. I know there are always two sides to a story. I try to be fair and objective. I try to give both parties benefit of the doubt. However, my recent experience being in line with everything negative that's been said about Mr Stewart, I now find it really, really hard to believe anything that came from his side.
 
Interesting read. You seem to be a very level headed person that went through a very thorough process to determine you didn't get exactly what you paid for. It's unfortunate to see that the manufacturer's representatives just brushed your concerns aside like that. I don't know much about BRK or it's owner, but that's not a very good showing in this instance. I've always thought of KSF as a top notch retailer and from everything I've seen of Mr. Bohn here on the forum, I'm sure he'd do his best to make it right if he knew the circumstances. I honestly don't think that burden should fall on him, but if the manufacturer won't step up and make it right, maybe he will.
 
I would have to agree with you Corey. I bought a Microtech LUDT from Blade HQ, spring broke after return allowance. Couldn't get a response from MT. Called Blade HQ. They sent a shipping label and returned the knife to MT for me.
Very surprised with KSF. I would try calling them again and asking for Tyler. Excellent customer service from him.
Good luck FM!!
Joe
 
ForgedMaple said:
To be clear, I've had very good experience with KSF in the past. I'm a little disappointed at how the rep is handling the issue, and perhaps Mr Bohn would've responded differently, but I truly don't know what are their options or how much responsibility they should be expected to bear.
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From my perspective, they're liable for some resolution. KSF advertised a 20CV knife. You bought a 20CV knife. KSF sent you something else. It doesn't perform like any other 20CV knife I've ever heard of. I don't care about their policies at this point, they're in breach of the purchase contract. I'm no lawyer, and international transactions are tricky, but there's no way a retailer can sell a product that isnt what they said it was and claim no responsibility.
 
I hope this gets brought up to Mr. Bohn. I will have to think twice from buying from them again. If this is not resolved I dont think I will.

If I was KSF I would want to have the knife tested...
 
I'm going to message a link to the GBU thread to Derrick. This isn't the kind of CS we're accustomed to seeing from KSF.
 
Dangerously said:
From my perspective, they're liable for some resolution. KSF advertised a 20CV knife. You bought a 20CV knife. KSF sent you something else. It doesn't perform like any other 20CV knife I've ever heard of. I don't care about their policies at this point, they're in breach of the purchase contract. I'm no lawyer, and international transactions are tricky, but there's no way a retailer can sell a product that isnt what they said it was and claim no responsibility.
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I don't know, I'm torn on this one. Both the box and the knife were labelled 20CV, they couldn't have known. I do wish they took the issue a bit more seriously, or at least requested some additional information before referring me to BRKT. After all, they may still have defective units in their inventory that they'll want to inspect. I'm willing to take the blame if my e-mails to them were not clear enough.

If I remember correctly, I also believe KSF recently went through a little bit of staff shuffling, involving the photography and CS departments. Maybe the guy I contacted was new. I've been there before and mistakes do happen.

I really don't want this issue to be deflected to KSF. Maybe they screwed up a little, maybe they didn't. Whatever the case, it's tiny in comparison to BRKT's actions. Something else to keep in mind, and why I feel significantly more lenient toward them, is that KSF has a pristine track record, while BRKT has one of the dirtiest in the industry. That's got to be worth something.

flowfaster, I hope you won't let this deter you. If I said anything that implied I was angry at KSF, it was either in jest or poor communication on my part.
 
ForgedMaple, I want to see how this pans out. You did not imply you were angry and seem like a level headed cool guy.

See the recent Knifecenter Ken Onion debacle. KC jumped all over that so quick it was awesome. That to me set the bar for a dealer manning up per say and holding the manufacturer accoutable.
 
HappyDaddy said:
I'm going to message a link to the GBU thread to Derrick. This isn't the kind of CS we're accustomed to seeing from KSF.
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I agree with you HD. I have had excellent customer service from KSF......just excellent! Each time I called, I spoke with Tyler. Every e mail I sent, was answered by Tyler. He has even sent me to different companies to find something KSF didn't have in stock.
I can't see their CS dropping the ball here.
FM has been very level headed and I can't see him losing his cool and screaming at anyone.
Try another call to them and request to speak with Tyler.
KSF has to be one of the largest dealers for BR and I'd expect them to jump all over this.
Again....good luck FM!!
Joe
 
There's no way that is 20CV. It shouldn't stain at all let alone in 10 minutes from regular white vinegar. Somebody screwed up at Bark River.
 
I'm confused by this whole thread. The vinegar soak doesn't seem to have created a patina, but cleaned the surface, as Bluntcut mentioned in an earlier post.
 
Twindog said:
I'm confused by this whole thread. The vinegar soak doesn't seem to have created a patina, but cleaned the surface, as Bluntcut mentioned in an earlier post.
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Doesn't look like it to me. Admittedly, all we have are pictures, but the soaked part looks dull and grey, like a patina, instead of silver and shiny like the rest of the knife.

31496129294_8996683475_z.jpg
 
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