Thank You!

[Roemer1]

Congratulations my friend. Best wishes always from my family to yours.

 

[Mistwalker]

Brian,

Congratulations on turning adversity into success!!! It takes a lot of courage, determination and hard work and you have done it. I have seen the same scenario unfold with my brother who went on to create a market leading product from basically scratch.

These are wonderful blades and I for one would be getting a few. I wish you the very best.

Thanks for sharing.
Abe

Thank you Abe. The first part of it happened so fast there wasn't time to be intimidated by it, I just saw the opportunity and went for it.

I know my TOPS and Schrade knives that have been out for a while sell online in various countries. So if you do end up buying some let me know and i will hook you up with the guys who make the micarta and wooden scales if you like.

Great to hear of your success. Well deserved!

Thanks man, much appreciated!

Awesome! Glad to hear things are working out for you.

Thanks man me too, and that reminds me, I need to talk to you about some more custom ferro rods

Congratulation, Brian!! Well done, Sir! Very inspiring!

Thank you sir. It was such a push for so long that once I realized I was up the steepest hill it was rather stunning.

Really really nice designs. I hope the work has been as profitable for you as it has been fulfilling. The EDC model is just right.

Thanks man, a lot of thought went into all of them with emphasis on different tasks in each. I's definitely getting there. I am really liking the edc model. I'm looking forward to checking it out with micarta. I wish micarta were an option in Taiwan, but alas not.

That's awesome brother! I personally know of a few people that use these knives and are very happy with them! I still have the first knife I started out with many years ago, an old Gerber. Damn, am I really that old!?!?!? Yeah, I guess I am!

You know, I'm pretty sure that MTJS Blog on twitter did a write up on one of these. It seems like I saw a tweet about it not long ago but I can't say for sure. They have done quite a few write up's on different Schrade models as of late.

If your on Twitter, look me up and I will follow you back & share your knife tweets. My twitter acct is linked here in my signature, if your interested...

Thanks man, and I am really glad to hear that. I wish I still had my first Gerber from the 70s.

Really? I have never done twitter, I thought it was all just text and not any reviewing. I do Instigram and have thought about doing other social media. I'll look into it.

I became aware of these knives through this forum and and have since seen a few owners proudly sharing pics of them in r/knifeclub or r/knives over on reddit.com. An inspiring story and very worthy goal fulfilled. Congratulations on your success with these projects Brian! Cracked open a beer to drink to your future success too.

Cheers!

Wow, that is really cool to hear! Thanks for sharing that, I had no idea. And thank you sir, that is very much appreciated!!

Congrats Brian, you are a true inspiration in sticking with your dream through the tough times. I hadn't seen your designs before, but I will definitely be picking up a few! Thanks for sharing, and continued success to you!

~Jim

Thank you Jim. Once it was started I just wasn't going to give up on it as long as there was hope. I am very glad I was able to see it through. If you try them, I hope you like them, and I hope they serve you well!

You design a damn fine knife.

Thank you sir, I appreciate that. Knives and their functional aspects have been a passion of mine as far back as I can remember.

Dude that's awesome. Guess I need to contribute to your retirement fund

Thanks man. Yeah I won't lie, any and all contributions to my retirement fund will be very greatly appreciated! And I hope the knives serve you well

:thumbup: Congrats on your success Brian! I like your designs, and would like to get a couple.

Thank you Gus! I hope you like them

Looks like some very usable and good looking designs Brian. Congrats on getting some many of them into production.

Thank you sir. It is a bit surrealistic at this point because we also have a few more designs tentatively scheduled for next year. It's all pretty exciting.

Congratulations. I was not aware of your background, so thanks for sharing! Best of luck going forward.

Thank you sir, I appreciate that very much. It's actually a very complex background lol.

I'm inspired by your tenacity, and dedication! Well deserved rewards for all of your efforts, man! By the way, I grew up on Signal Mtn. If you ever get over that way, there is a pink Virginia brick Cape Cod house at 111 Stratford Way. My Mom and Dad had it built in the 1960's. That's where I grew up. Best wishes for your future endeavors!

Thank you very much man, I appreciate that a great deal! I grew up here also, so I will have to go by and check it out

Great stuff Brian! Congrats for overcoming the obstacles and on your achievements. Really digging all the models, especiallly the neck knives, my foavorite would be the wooden handle one to the far right....looks like buckeye burl or something.

Thanks man! Very good eye. That one is Buckeye burl made by a friend in England. He does some beautiful work with wood.

I am unable to find the SCHF42D on line. Has it hit the shelves yet? I really took a liking to it!

Me too

Thanks guys, the 42D is supposed to be available at dealers around the end of this month, and I haven't heard of any delays.

Congratulations my friend. Best wishes always from my family to yours.

Thanks man, very much appreciated!!

 

[Brumby53]

Great outcome from a shaky start - congratulations!!!!
After a lot of research looking for an all round Bushcraft/Survival knife I settled on the SCHF9 and bought on-line but unfortunately my pudgy fingers didn't match the finger grooves and I felt it uncomfortable to use. Great knife for the price unfortunately; just didn't 'fit' me so passed to on.
Some of these new designs look great - I will watch with interest to see if they start filtering through here "Down Under"

Cheers!

 

[HogWylder]

Mist,

You would be surprised as to what you will find on Twitter, trust me! There are MANY people like us on it and doing reviews all day!

 

[Adam Eklofe]

Congratulations, Mist! The knives look wonderful, I am definitely going to order one here soon. Thank you for sharing so much valuable information with us, my friend.

 

[Mistwalker]

Great outcome from a shaky start - congratulations!!!!
After a lot of research looking for an all round Bushcraft/Survival knife I settled on the SCHF9 and bought on-line but unfortunately my pudgy fingers didn't match the finger grooves and I felt it uncomfortable to use. Great knife for the price unfortunately; just didn't 'fit' me so passed to on.
Some of these new designs look great - I will watch with interest to see if they start filtering through here "Down Under"

Cheers!

Thank you. One of the main things I learned from the 9 was to never do multiple finger grooves that same way again lol. I think the biggest problem with them is they were designed for gloved hands, but multiple finger grooves is iffy territory anyway. I'm always curious to know where they have traveled to and how they did there. Though it is an odd feeling hearing people talk about me and my knife designs in languages I cannot understand lol

Mist,

You would be surprised as to what you will find on Twitter, trust me! There are MANY people like us on it and doing reviews all day!

Thank you, I will definitely have to look into it when I get a chance.

Congratulations, Mist! The knives look wonderful, I am definitely going to order one here soon. Thank you for sharing so much valuable information with us, my friend.

Thanks man! If you do I hope you find that you like it, and that it serves you well.







Just to throw it out there. If anyone is interested in the stainless Tibo, those have all been done in small batches that do not sell through TOPS or online. Those only sell through me directly. I still have a couple I can sell from this batch of 154CM, you can PM me if you like. But there should also be another batch next year some time when we have the time to sort out the steel we will be using next round.

The carbon steel version has been out for a few years and is pretty easy to find. Whitty sells them, as do several others.

 

[Texas_toothpick]

Great looking knives I'll have to check a few of them out.

 

[Mistwalker]

Great looking knives I'll have to check a few of them out.

Thanks man.

 

[Skystorm]

I just face palmed myself when I put together you and the Griffin logo on my Schrades two seconds before I read you designed them. I literally just finished 3 sheaths for the Schf9 today for various people. Small world sometimes, Congrats on the success!

 

[Tekton]

Brian, where would I find the edc/ youth size model?

 

[Comprehensivist]

I am very happy for you Brian. It makes sense that your vast experience using, testing, and reviewing knives would lead to a strong sense of what makes a good design. It is gratifying to see that a corporate executive was willing to take you seriously and tap into your ideas. It started slowly (which is a wise thing) and has taken off from there. I am glad to see that both you and Tops have benefited from this partnership.

Appreciation for what you do is nice, but it can be fleeting. Ongoing appreciation for your contributions leads to respect. I am glad that you have achieved the level of respect you deserve for staying true to your beliefs and showing that they have commercial value. Congratulations on your success.

Thanks for all your contributions around here. You have always been a major influence on me to call it like I see it when it come to knife reviews. Thanks for being a model of steadfast integrity.

Phil

 

[Kirkwood]

Brian, many congrats! I'm glad to hear of all of this. It is well deserved. :thumbup: Keep on brother.

 

[Mistwalker]

I just face palmed myself when I put together you and the Griffin logo on my Schrades two seconds before I read you designed them. I literally just finished 3 sheaths for the Schf9 today for various people. Small world sometimes, Congrats on the success!

Lol, yeah with my obvious bias with these I haven't said a whole lot about them until now, and I still don't review them, or post any photos from my personal tests here on Blade Forums due to the ethics involved. So not a lot of people know of my involvement with the designs since the only post I have ever done on them was in the "what's new" section about five years ago. This will be the first year that the Griffin Design logo will be figured prominently in the Schrade catalog.

Thanks for chiming in man. I think the fact that a lot of people are having custom leather and custom kydex made for them says something about how well they are made. Maybe I should send you a 42 and have a custom sheath made for mine. If you want you can tell your customers that there are two different people making custom scales for the 9, 42, and 42D now. One makes his own phenolics and the other uses several different styles of phenolics including Shadetree.

Brian, where would I find the edc/ youth size model?

Sorry man, for now I have the only one there is so far. The one I have is the first prototype sent for me to check out. I sent an email detail a couple of slight changes a few days ago, and so it is in production now. It should be ready before the official release in Feb 2016. The Tibo with scales is not bad for a youth model. It has almost 3 inches of blade, and I get 3-2/3 fingers on the handle. I have one scale maker who is making prototype scales for it more like the 42 and 55, but those will not fit the factory sheath. Once we get the scales sorted out, then I will be sending a couple to custom sheath makers in kydex and leather so they will have them in house for sheath work.

 

[Fiddleback]

I'm happy to see this thread Brian. Thanks back to you my friend.

 

[Mistwalker]

I am very happy for you Brian. It makes sense that your vast experience using, testing, and reviewing knives would lead to a strong sense of what makes a good design. It is gratifying to see that a corporate executive was willing to take you seriously and tap into your ideas. It started slowly (which is a wise thing) and has taken off from there. I am glad to see that both you and Tops have benefited from this partnership.

Appreciation for what you do is nice, but it can be fleeting. Ongoing appreciation for your contributions leads to respect. I am glad that you have achieved the level of respect you deserve for staying true to your beliefs and showing that they have commercial value. Congratulations on your success.

Thanks for all your contributions around here. You have always been a major influence on me to call it like I see it when it come to knife reviews. Thanks for being a model of steadfast integrity.

Phil

Thanks Phil. It's funny how it all started, the reviewing that is, as a distraction from the tensions of the economic situation here in the city I live near. The housing bubble bursting caused a tsunami of a ripple affect, crossing all levels of manufacturing here. Being laid off right before Christmas, along with several thousand other people, coupled with the influx in migrant workers over the preceding several years left me trying to negotiate a very much saturated job market. I didn't have a lot of money to spare for gas to get out of the house so I turned to the internet for escape. It was something new for me to explore at the time. Before then, if I wasn't at work I was usually in the woods or somewhere wandering. I haven't been much on television in decades.

It was writing a man named Allan Beauchamp, a man whom I have developed a lot of respect for over the years, and asking some questions on the subject of tinder fungus, and his introducing me to Rick Marchand, that led to me getting into the forums and joining Blade Forums back in 2007. With all of the free time I had on my hands I started going through the wilderness and survival skills section, and found myself inspired to do some posts of my own. With my background, and the father I had, and our lifestyle in my youth...commercial fishing and trapping, hunting, and a lot of primitive living in camps on various rivers in the southeast, and my time spent alone in the woods and on the streets surviving from my mid-teens till adulthood, and my knife(s) being my number one tools through I started to realize something. That I may have some unique insights into knife uses that could maybe be worth sharing, that could maybe come in handy for other folks some day. From there one thing just sort of led to another.

Early on I was still hung up on tactical designs because of the mentors I had in my youth, and the men I respected most most at critical times in my life, were all combat veterans. The skills they taught me were done so with issue knives. After one series of traumatic events, and entering another, I would spend so much time with an issue pilot's knife as my main tool that I actually formed somewhat of a traumatic bonding with that model. Even though I have several knives that are much better made by skilled craftsmen whom I admire a great deal, I still have a collection of those knives today. Most of them from the 50s, 60s, and 70s, including one of the very rare 6-inch blade versions, and one made in November of 1980, the last relatively normal month of my youth before all hell broke loose. I also have a custom made version of Ben Baker's SOG Bowie made by a close friend of Ben's and made to his original specs, out of nostalgia for one of he men I admire most in life who luckily took a personal interest in teaching me how to stay alive in the face of adversity in extreme conditions starting when I was thirteen years old. It wasn't until I met Rick and Andy that I started to really remember and miss the perspective I had in my youth. The times when I more lived with nature than fought against the world at large like I had for so long.

It was my first Fiddleback, the prototype Bushfinger, and the time I spent using it that really started opening old memories of better days. By then I was already doing R&D work for RMJ Tactical which is a local Tomahawk manufacturer, and for TOPS knives, due to my understanding of how to apply tactical tools to survival situations. In fact I am currently working on a survival manual based on the use RMJ hawks, for RMJ Tactical. The conversation with Morgan Taylor and subsequent designing of the SCHF9 had already happened as well. But Andy's work had a completely different energy than the other tools I was working with at the time, and the tools were made from an entirely different perspective. The use of Andy's knives in the woods became an escape and form of therapy for me. It allowed me to see how limited in function the tactical designs were in the field. It allowed me to reconcile the two halves of my life together, and blend the knowledge gained from both, in order to grow both as a person and as a knife designer. So far most of my designs still incorporate a defensive / offensive aspect, I guess Pandora's box really is hard to unsee. I do hope to change that in the future, but for now with the current geopolitical and economic environment, I am actually ok with doing designs that could be considered bushcraft-tactical in nature. I suppose we all have to play to our strengths.

Any and all contributions I have made in this forum were a labor of love. An attempt to give back in return for all that I have gained from my time in this forum and the friendships I have developed here. Thank you, it's always nice to hear that I have contributed something worthwhile.

Brian, many congrats! I'm glad to hear of all of this. It is well deserved. :thumbup: Keep on brother.

Thank you Kris! I appreciate that very much man.

I'm happy to see this thread Brian. Thanks back to you my friend.

Thanks Andy, and thank you for all you have done, and all that you continue to do for so many. You are an amazing individual, and a true inspiration. My life is a much better place for having met you and having gotten to know you.

 

[Rick Marchand]

Love ya, brother... keep on keepin on!

 

[Mistwalker]

Back at ya brother!

 

[Redbird777]

How Awesome is this! Congratulations Sir, this is most deserving! Thanks for all that you do in your teachings and wisdom.

 

[knutelut]

Great stuff Mistwalker, Not my cup of tea but I definitely respect the ideas and thoughts put into these designs.
All the best for future projects and to the reception of these.
K

 

[hasco]

Brian,

That is an incredible line of knives you have created! I knew you had designed a few knives, but I didn't know the full scope. I especially love the looks of the 42. Thank you for sharing your knowledge of knives with the knife world and also some of your stories with us. I never spent any time on a forum before trying to obtain a fiddleback. I think it was your posts that helped me see that the forum had a lot more to offer than just scoring a great knife. Since then I have learned a ton and got a lot of enjoyment out of connecting to the community.

Thanks for continuing to be a great inspiration to this community and the larger knife world.

- Tod