Resurrection of JBF Champlin & Sons........

Jim,
thank you very much for this thread, and for the little lesson: I always enjoy learning more about the history of American cutlery :)
Oh, and by the way, that is one beautiful knife!

Fausto
:cool:
 
Great thread. I don't know why, but anytime an old manufacturing company is re-introduced (be it knives or guns), even if being manufactured by some one else, it makes me happy.

I feel like a piece of history is being saved.
 
Thanks all for the posts Derek and I have alwys thought that he needed more praise for the work he did to get Cutlery started in Western NY. If anyone is interested in them send me a PM or email me at galvanic1882@yahoo.com, I will say that they are going fast and are due to be done within the next 10 days. I am also waiting on the wiping cloths, we are putting one in each tube with the knife.

Again thanks for the comments, Mike
 
I can't think of anyone more important in this part of the country? If he hadn't married a Case girl, there wouldn't have been Case brothers or W.R Case, and quite possibly, Platts/Western and Brown/Union/Kabar may never have gotten started either, since those families married into the family, and worked for JB before starting their own companies.
 
I recieved the knives yesterday and got most of them ion the mail to those who pre-ordered them. They cam out great and the bone handles are just the way we wanted them to look. Thanks for all the support and I would love to hear feedback once you get the knives.

Thanks for all the support and we are in the planning stages of our next offering, all the best Mike
 
Do i understand correctly that "JBF Champlin & Sons" will not be manufacturing knives but will ask GEC to make knives marked with the Champlin name ?
Will these knives all be patterns already being made by GEC ?
If the only difference is the markings this does not seem overly exciting to me, hence i hope there is more to it.
I would like to see a large (3 3/4") Dogleg Jack with the frame shape copied from vintage USA Manufacturers.
Perhaps i'm getting ahead of 'things' with this idea ?
Mike are you able to answer my questions about what the future plans are for JBF Champlin & Sons ?
roland
 
Hi Roland and thanks for the question. We will not be making our own knives at this time but who knows what the future will bring. JBF started out as a salesman and then I believe a jobber, which is what I guess you would call us at this point. We will be having GEC make some of our knives using their patterns like the 85 but with our specs. This first knife has all steel hardware and is deep etched and satin finish on the blades which I don't believe that they have done on the 85 pattern to this point. We are also adding a wiping cloth to all of the knives we sell which is another thing that GEC does not do now. Our goal is to have knives made with the way older pre 1900 knives were made by a class company like GEC and to keep the price down.

The next offering will be a knife that is not a GEC pattern but somethuing that I have in my collection that they are going to reproduce, again with our specs.

Please understand that Derek and I are doing this because we have an afffection for all that JBF Champlin did in the cutlery industry. I have many knife collecting friends that really like what we are doing but will not buy a knife because they are new and they only buy old knives that is good with us. I will tell you that I am almost sold out on this first offering and welcome any and all comments about it and what we are doing.

Sorry that what we are doing does not work for you and wish you luck on all you do with knife collecting. I will tell you that putting all this together has been great for both Derek and myself.

I hope that this answeres the question. If you would like to talk more email me at galvanic1882@yahoo.com or call my phone number on our website.

All the best Mike
 
galvanic1882 said:
Hi Roland and thanks for the question. We will not be making our own knives at this time but who knows what the future will bring. JBF started out as a salesman and then I believe a jobber, which is what I guess you would call us at this point. We will be having GEC make some of our knives using their patterns like the 85 but with our specs. This first knife has all steel hardware and is deep etched and satin finish on the blades which I don't believe that they have done on the 85 pattern to this point. We are also adding a wiping cloth to all of the knives we sell which is another thing that GEC does not do now. Our goal is to have knives made with the way older pre 1900 knives were made by a class company like GEC and to keep the price down.

The next offering will be a knife that is not a GEC pattern but somethuing that I have in my collection that they are going to reproduce, again with our specs.

Please understand that Derek and I are doing this because we have an afffection for all that JBF Champlin did in the cutlery industry. I have many knife collecting friends that really like what we are doing but will not buy a knife because they are new and they only buy old knives that is good with us. I will tell you that I am almost sold out on this first offering and welcome any and all comments about it and what we are doing.

Sorry that what we are doing does not work for you and wish you luck on all you do with knife collecting. I will tell you that putting all this together has been great for both Derek and myself.

I hope that this answeres the question. If you would like to talk more email me at galvanic1882@yahoo.com or call my phone number on our website.

All the best Mike
Click to expand...

Hi Mike, good luck to you and Derek on this worthy endeavour. It sounds like Fate had a great deal to do with the founding of a number of the early greats in knifemaking. IMO the 85 has the look and feel of an early knife and is a great place to start your new line. All the best.

Regards

Robin
 
Mike, you say the second offering will be a pattern that is not a current GEC offering. Well that does work for me and i'm sure it will work for you too. Being able to buy a JBF Champlin knife that is not offered by anyone else sets you apart and will get you buyers that otherwise may have stuck with GEC branded knives.
roland
 
rprocter said:
Mike, you say the second offering will be a pattern that is not a current GEC offering. Well that does work for me and i'm sure it will work for you too. Being able to buy a JBF Champlin knife that is not offered by anyone else sets you apart....
Click to expand...

Agreed!

Mike, does JBF Champlin have any agreements in place that the knives you design will not subsequently show up in GEC's own line(s) at any point? (If this question goes beyond the bounds of what can comfortably be discussed "in public," I understand.)

I look forward to seeing what you have in mind, either way. :thumbup:

~ P.
 
~P, the way it works is, If you pay for your own tooling and development costs, you get to own the pattern - and it is not cheap! Thousands come to mind!
The reason GEC gets to make more variations on our BF knife patterns is that they paid for the tooling etc. sparing us the costs of starting the pattern up!!
 
waynorth said:
~P, the way it works is, If you pay for your own tooling and development costs, you get to own the pattern - and it is not cheap! Thousands come to mind!
The reason GEC gets to make more variations on our BF knife patterns is that they paid for the tooling etc. sparing us the costs of starting the pattern up!!
Click to expand...

Ah, okay. That last point was a little murky to me, given some of the mid-point discussions (perhaps never fully clarified here, as resolved) regarding the 2012 Forum Knife:

Spark said:
Thus far I've heard back from Great Eastern and Canal Street.

  • Bill @ Great Eastern has said that because they do not make a model at all similar to this, the tooling will cost $5000, which / 200 = $25 extra per knife. That said, he's working on putting together pricing and alternatives.
Click to expand...

Perhaps forum members got the pricing "alternatives"? ;)

Regardless, I appreciate your additional information above.

~ P.
 
It's great to see people resurrecting traditional patterns.
In the past I've only been involved in the stock removal portion of the process in making traditional folder patterns so I wonder what all is involved in a $5000 tooling package.
 
I think the money is to tool up for a frame shape or size that is new to the knife manufacturer.
roland
 
I received my pair in the mail yesterday. Both serial #10. The all steel construction looks great especially on the ebony. The etching isn't like the normal etching, these you can feel like they've been stamped in the blade. I know GEC's done that with some NF's before but these are the first I have with that done. I also like that the serial number is on the pile side of the knife instead of the mark side.
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