Question about prototypes...

Based on the number of buy and sell threads you have created, I think we should be all be asking you for your opinion. Seems you have handled a lot of knives both new and used

 

Show us a picture if you can. Idk to picture a trestle pine or a tc etc

 

Not much information to work with. Maker? When made? Pictures?

 

You have told me all I need to know. Will recuse myself since it is a competing dealer and a maker of which I have little good to say about their last few years production.

But I will say that prototypes are only genuine prototypes if they are made before general production and should come with a COA and in factory fresh condition. There are those that will etch a blade prototype simply to increase the value. Matter of fact, I have known people to pick two knives of a tray of randomly sequenced knives and etch them prototypes just to make a bit more money on them. Even had a well known 1990's knife purveyor tell me that by etching a knife "1 of 29"; he made it unique to those 29 even though 50 of them were actually made. So, don't put more money into a prototype than any other knife unless it is a variation that was never made in general production; or you have a COA that it was made well in advance of the general run. I have seen too many knives with small defects etched prototype just to help them move.

 

That’s one way of recusing yourself, but not what the term ‘recusing yourself’ ordinarily means.

The dealer in question is fantastic, and shouldn’t be judged adversely just because he doesn’t buy a spot and a voice on these forums.

I would be very pleased to have one of these rare knives, among the last made by Queen, a great company.

 

There are thousands more knife "prototypes" that are faked, than actually really exist!!
I have it on good authority that Queen's most famous maker made enough prototypes to fill two cupped hands for Case Classics (Jim Parker) yet hundreds of these so-called Protos have hit the market! Give me a break!!
Only exhaustive research will verify one of these knives. Most, if not all, on the open market, are not real "prototypes!!

 

The only knife I have that might be a prototype. A four blade Camillus that so far eludes me as ever having been put in production. Bought from a Camillus/Schrade employee who claimed it was a gift from Albert Baer's drawers full of samples!!

 

I have a prototype "Black Widow" stockman made by Fight'n Rooster in the late 1970s. It is marked on the sheepfoot in block letters, and I've never seen another one, proto or otherwise. Maybe it's a one-off, maybe not, but I paid a price for it commensurate with the quality of the knife, so I'm OK either way.

 

Hmmmmm... Same day

 

I'm glad GEC got away from the protos, serialized and other hinky bs they used to do. Make great knives and they market themselves.

 

Got a knife once marked 1/1000 once and I was super excited to think that somehow years after the run I got the very first one off the line.

Then a long long time later the other shoe dropped and I realized all the knives in the run were in fact one of one thousand and they were all marked with that etch.

Where I work we use lots of prototypes in product development and without exception they're wrong, not that great and no where near as slick as the later production versions. Unless they're super special they just get used to pieces and that's the end. We'd never sell one.

 

What do you make @Danke42 ??

 

I am legion.

 

I don't know what you paid, but for that clip blade etch alone it was probably worth it

 

I have also wondered about this, while I dont have any prototypes, i do have this Schatt and Morgan "factory sample". It seems to me that it is slightly unrefined, and possibly meant to be a sort of a rough idea of what would eventually be produced at the factory, with a few changes here or there. As you can see ( hopefully in my poor pics) the bolsters are different lengths pile side to mark side. Its my guess that the prototype would be the first piece made after all the refinements are made and before production actually begins??