Protecting knife designs?

dartanyon

dartanyon

Joined
May 10, 2002
Messages
705
I have made several knives and want to share them with this forum so their design can be appreciated. I believe my designs are original and I have never seen their shape before. I understand I can apply for a design registration here in Australia but I camnnot afford an international registration. I don't think its worth it anyway ... Is there any other way I can share my knives with this forum and not fear them being ripped off?
 
Every good idea will be ripped off. End of story. Protection of ideas kills more ventures than not. Patents are largely worthless unless you have really deep pockets to enforce them. Mostly, they're fancy padding for one's resume.

If you're making a commercial offering, the best bet is to establish a reputation among enthusiasts. They not only provide word of mouth advertising, they also keep abreast of copy offerings from competitors and often willingly play attack dog for free on places like this forum. Mind you, this is no real legal protection, but it may preserve your name and reputation as the sought after gold standard for your design.
 
There is an incredibly unique design that is common to the three that I have made already. This feature is what I'm trying to protect and its frustrating not being able to share with anyone. The first I made 4 years ago and posted myself the drawing. the second I made two weeks after the first and the third I made yesterday.
This is a design protection since I am protecting a shape rather than a process although the unique part of my design could be considered a process ???
 
dartanyon said:
Thanks ... whats RC?
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RC is rat cutlery (which stands for Randall's Adventure Training) ... a very well respected group of guys who designs outstanding knives. You might hear it around here (recently too) knives like the Rat line which were produced by Ontario Knives. Recently the Rat guys moved away from ontario to start their own independent line of knives which you may know, now known as the RC-3 and the RC-4.
They've been having some conflict with Ontario over their designs and such. Just do a bit of googling and youll get the whole story -
(?????? site:bladeforums.com)
 
I'm thinking It'll be hard getting input from the RAT guys on this thread I started ... nice knives and sturdy look'n sheathes ... they dont need to waste their time on a guy who recons he's got a knife design and wants to keep it to himself
 
Knives are some of the oldest tools known to man. Lots of threads in the makers section about designs and whether or not they're new/unique. Maybe try there.
 
First, it might be more approriate to post this question in the makers' subforum.

dartanyon said:
Is there any other way I can share my knives with this forum and not fear them being ripped off?
Click to expand...
Seriously, look at what happened to Tom Brown Tracker design (apart from its actual value). Unless you have some serious legal background I doubt an individual person can realisticaly enforce a particular patent. And even if you have a patent, it is generally quite easy to get around it by doing some minor modifications.

Look at what Cold Steel did with Grohmann (Canadian belt knife), Okapi (kudu) or Striders (GI Tanto), and got away with it.

If you fear copies by custom makers, those are probably too elusive for legal actions.
If you fear competition from established makers, their legal counsellors can probably out smart you and have back up for long procedures.

In both cases the best strategy is probably to hurt the maker's reputation (based on actual facts of course).

If you really believe in your design you could alternatively submit it at some established maker that could take in charge the legal part.
 
I thought I would chime in and say that pretty much everything under the sun has been done when it comes to knives/knife designs, so I'll be interested in what you've come up with. :thumbup:
 
Ok, good advice thankyou. You will eventually see my design here in the wilderness survival forum because its the only place I post on. I believe the USA and Canada have very high standards for design and manufacture and also I have learned to respect the collective opinions on this forum. And yes you will know its my work because I designed the unique feature through necissity and I've been inventing and designing for twenty years now. The design shape really is unique. I've seen a lot of knives here and while researching my wilderness survival interest, I have NEVER seen anything like the unique shape I came up with. It will be a trademark of mine and seeing anything like it will be a copy. Yes ... I can be just blowing hot air ... so I will put up ... soon.
As I've said, I'm looking forward to sharing it with you all here :)
 
Well there you go ... I don't have access to the makers forum ...
I'll need to join up to show you all the pictures and to access the makers forum.
Gotta spend money to make money I guess.
Hard to spend money without the stuff coming in ... as usual I'm back to my 3 inch angle grinder and a pair of safety glases ... yep no vice and about 12 knives so far ;)
 
You should have access to the makers forum. I'm not a paying member and I used to post there a lot.

Looking forward to seeing your knives, but I doubt that they are truly unique. However, if they are, don't worry, it will be impossible to keep people from copying you, but you always have the advantage of advertising as "the original"...
 
:) The more doubts of my originality ... the bigger my smile when I show you.

Post yes, start a thread - no. So I guess I try and get someone to start my thread for me.
 
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