Whoa Nellie!!

I smell something fishy, starting with the 'secret' auction. Wonder how many of the 8 bidders were shills?

And this is wrong: THE CERTIFICATE of Authenticity is signed by both surviving Company PRESIDENTS.
I'm familiar with the Certificates of Authenticity and they are not signed by anyone related to Schrade; they are signed by the presidents of the two companies who bought the leftover Schrade inventory and the factory collection.

I'm not saying the knife isn't a one-of-a-kind photo prototype, it probably is. But my initial impression is the seller is not someone I'd want to do business with.

Best Wishes,
-Bob
 
Signed by Kevin Pipes of SMKW & Phil Martin of Blue Ridge: "both surviving Company PRESIDENTS." Hummm..........I wonder who died at SMKW or Blue Ridge? :confused: Or, I wonder if someone is planning on bumping someone off? :eek:

You are right Bob, neither of them have anything to do with Imperial Schrade.
If you need to start a fire I have a few of those COAs you can use. :D

Dale
 
The thing about it is that knife isn't so rare that it should be worth near that much. I've seen quite a number of them pop up for auction, I believe made some time before the close. Of course they didn't have the magic zeros, but is that worth the extra four hundred bucks or more??? This guy's just got some incredible knack for sucking people in with his drivel. Gee, I wonder what I can get for my blue bone PH2, hold on, let me etch a bunch of zeros in it first, and then cover all the bases by calling it a prototype and a photo sample. Heck, why not just sell the whole set, what do you think he'd get for this with his descriptions?:
4lekqrd.jpg
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Wow, I really sound like a grump, don't I?:grumpy: :D I just hate to see folks get ripped off when it seems they're being misled, although by the same token no one twisted this person's arm to bid so high.
Eric
 
I wonder what is so special about this particular knife, I have seen other knives with the same blank serial numbers so to speak go for a lot less than this stockman, and they were a higher grade of Schrade model altogether.
It must be the certificate that makes it worth the money :D

Rusty1
 
Eric, I don't know about the knives but does the sheath come with a C.O.A :D

That is a nice set though.

Rusty1
 
I would prefer a certificate from someone seniour from within Schrade to authenticate it as a prototype not from the external purchaser of the item at Schrade closure.

If they are done externally to Schrade then what do they use to determine authenticity as a prototype? Do they just check for the zeros and then do a certificate, if thats the case then anyone external to Schrade could buy a pretty certificate and do the same, that includes me and others it really doesnt mean much to me unless it from someone in authority at Schrade.

Im not sure if this one is signed by the Schrade Presidents or not but I would trust Bobs judgement on it as its not typical for a Certificate.

I dont understand the sellers listing, I thought he was saying the knife was made in China, its certainly not a clear or well written listing.
Regards Tim
 
I dont think you paid too much, think Ive seen one the same or similar go for around $165.
Regards Tim
 
Im not sure if this one is signed by the Schrade Presidents or not but I would trust Bobs judgement on it as its not typical for a Certificate.
Click to expand...
OK, here's how these certificates worked: Schrade closes, employees canned, factory locked. There's an auction for the remaining inventory and the factory collection. Two knife retail companies, SMKW and Blue Ridge Knives, buy the inventory. Semi trucks come and haul off the knives.

SMKW and Blue Ridge begin retailing the factory collection; SMKW sells their portion on eBay while Blue Ridge distributes their share to smaller dealers who resell them on eBay and perhaps elsewhere.

The certificates in question are signed by Mr.Pipes and Mr. Martin, the presidents of SMKW and Blue Ridge.

Now here's the trick: the knives sold by SMKW have a certificate that was filled out by SMKW. The Blue Ridge knives were distributed with blank certificates, left blank for the individual dealers to fill out. This resulted in some certificates being incorrectly filled out, some knives resold again with blank signed certificates, and even some fraud.

The certificate in the linked auction was one of the Blue Ridge certificates, meaning the blank spaces were filled in by who-knows-who and who-knows-when.

The certificate appears to be authentic and unaltered, but that's not saying much given the circumstances.

---------------------
As to how the folks at SMKW or Blue Ridge knew what the knives were? Beats me. Guesswork? Many of the knives may have been in labled boxes or in display cases with lables? Is it possible, but unlikely, that someone who used to work at Schrade assisted with the sorting?

As Bernard Levine would say, "Buy the knife, not the certificate."

For what it's worth, I think this knife is legit. Call it a "photo sample," "prototype," whatever.

I dont understand the sellers listing, I thought he was saying the knife was made in China, its certainly not a clear or well written listing.
Click to expand...
I think he's saying, "Buy this knife, because the new ones are made in China." Of course that's either beyond his grasp of English, or it was blotted out by all of the "!!!!"s.

-Bob
 
At this point in time, I would be very, very wary of buying a low serial knife from a seller who has many, many knives from several brandings with lightly stamped "000" on the bolsters. If a seller did actually specialize in such knives, I would think they would know the difference between a prototype, a sample, and a photo sample. Or an early limited edition. If I considered spending that kind of money for a "rare" knife, I would want it authenticated first, by Mr. Gardiner or Mr. Swinden. "It does come with a Certificate to document the Authenticity." In any case, the cert which the seller touts and shows in more detail than the knife is toilet paper.

Michael

PS- Be cautious of knives with unheard of handle materials... again... unless you plan to personally contact a former principal of Imperial Schrade for worthwhile documentation.
 
Codger,
To make things even more difficult, Mt Gardiner and Mr Hufnagel (I'm not sure about Mr Swinden), aren't permitted to discuss anything Schrade related as part of the deal with the bankruptcy. By the way, I was over at Canal Street the other day and there was Mr Swinden himself working on the knives. Seems you can't keep an old pro in retirement for long!

Eric
 
Hey Eric,
This is a little off-topic but in your travels to Canal Street, do you know if they have or have any plans to make a knife that is similar to the LB7? I was just wondering. Since Tim turned me on to them with his pics, I can't seem to find enough of them.

Thanks!

DB
 
Good posts, thanks.

Part of Bobs post:
The Blue Ridge knives were distributed with blank certificates, left blank for the individual dealers to fill out. This resulted in some certificates being incorrectly filled out
Click to expand...

Yes I have at least a couple of these certicates that are incorrectly filled out.
Tim

Some of Michaels post:
I would think they would know the difference between a prototype, a sample, and a photo sample
Click to expand...

Does anyone know what the exact differnce between them is I tend to lump them all together as pre-production models??

Ill continue this post under a new thread titled: Protoypes or Photo Samples??
Regards Tim
 
D&B,
I haven't seen anything in their pipeline that resembles an LB7. What they've got coming out is
1. A stag handled set consisting of a drop point hunter and a new large trapper. There will be 200 of these sets made.
2. An integral bowie hunter, I believe it's a D'Holder design, but I'm not positive.
3. A new canittler
4. A new D'Holder drop point that is larger than their current offering, I believe this one is in the early stages of development, but the other's should be out very shortly. The bowie is absolutely gorgeous. Had buffalo horn handles.
5. Another drop point hunter with leather handles. These are regular scales made of a dark brown leather that's been stabilized to the point of being like wood. This was a very nice looking knife, esecially with the gold shield embedded in the dark leather. Quite different.

Eric
 
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