Rough Rider, Indian Head, Steel Warrior origins

[woodsroamer]

I suspect this has been discussed before but I can't locate any such posts so please excuse the redundancy. Question: After careful comparisons it seems that Rough Rider, Indian Head, Steel Warrior, Boker Bonsai (perhaps others as well) are all made in the same factory or factory complex in China. They are well-made knives and judging them on a qualitative basis (as opposed to quantitative comparisons which in a world market are essentially meaningless) I've concluded they are on par with folders produced in high-labor-cost countries. Or at least the cost differentials do not translate to corresponding quality differences. Anybody know for sure if the above mentioned knives are indeed produced at the same factory?

 

[iandh]

It's very difficult to define "same". Speaking from personal experience, Chinese manufacturers will generally produce a product to a certain budget, and to certain specific quality instructions. In some cases they supply the materials, but in others, the company that contracted production will supply some or all of the materials. This means that many times you can have products that appear to come from different factories, coming from the same factory, or factory complex.

I picked up a rough rider just to check out, and have seen pictures of the Indian head and Boker knives, and it's very hard to say whether they originate from the same place, other than the fact that they are all of the same reasonable quality. Perhaps if I had one of each in front of me, I could inspect for manufacturing marks that could hint at their origins.