Bark River Knives closing?

[VandymanG]

DLT has some info posted on the DLT - Bark River Knife page. Always wanted one but not sure I’m willing to risk getting one, especially at the price they’re still at. Their will also be some doubt unless an individual has the ability to test the individual knife they purchase.

[eventhorizon]

[sal]

Hey Eventhorizon,

Thanx for the video. Though I take issue with some of his conclusions, it was an interesting point of view.

sal

[kennethsime]

No one can see that link unless they join the Bark River Boys on Facebook.

You can probably guess what's not gonna happen.

No Facebook for me either, would like to know the results though!

Ah my bad, should have worded that better. The Mini Kephart was confirmed to match up with the expected chemical composition of 3V - within a reasonable margin of error.

Most of my BRKs are stamped 3V, hopefully that’s what they are lol.

[_centurio_]

That's why you go with Spyderco ....

[kobold]

Dear Spyderco, please make a full convex Rock Salt in Magnacut?
:-)

[Flash]

Poor old Wako (Virtuovice) must be sitting on a million Yen worth of BRK landfill.
I suppose that’s what you get for bringing in scores of customers and loyal patronage from himself over the years.

There must be a way that scoundrel can be legally persued. No way he can be allowed get away with this.

[steelcity16]

I have owned a few BRK over the years, but their f&f was always off. They were actually my first >$200 fixed blade purchases and I just wasn't impressed. That, combined with the rumors swirling about Mike and his practices back then made me sell all my BRKs and I moved on the LT Wright. A few years later I discovered Carothers Performance Knives made here in NC not far from me and they are the only fixed blades I buy now. They are the Spyderco of fixed blades for me!

[GarageBoy]

With there being so many nice fixed blade companies out there, combined with Mike's sketchy past from his Blackjack/Ek/Marbles days, I never got into Bark River knives.

Didn't Mike also have a falling out with Chris Reeve back in the day?

I'm just sad he was willing to throw away any gained reputation by relabeling Chinese steel/kit knives as American made. It's like rolling back the odometer of a car

[TkoK83Spy]

Just a bad look for the entire community and possible effect on it's enthusiasts. Are people going to start questioning steels origins on all knives now since a big name turned out to be a fraud?? I certainly hope not!

[benben]

Pretty damning writeup this morning on GlockTalk.

https://www.glocktalk.com/threads/bark- ... t-33508342

[JoviAl]

I thought it was bad enough that I’d lost a knife to their warranty dept (sent a Bravo 1.25 Cruwear in at the end of November as it arrived with what looked like grains of black sand surrounded by pitting on the flat surfaces of the blade. Still no sign of it being returned and not expecting to anymore ) but if the allegations of sexual misconduct with a child are true then the rest of them will be going in the bin. I don’t get angry about much, but paedophilia, grooming and sex offences are where I draw my line in the sand. Deeply disturbing and disappointing doesn’t even begin to cover it.

Wish I’d bought a Zoomer instead.

[jdw]

I find it kind of odd that KSF doesn’t address these issues at all on their website and one of the primary advertising banners on the site is a new BRK release. That seems kind of deceptive to me. There are a lot of average knife buyers who would have no knowledge that all of this is happening.

[kennethsime]

I find it kind of odd that KSF doesn’t address these issues at all on their website and one of the primary advertising banners on the site is a new BRK release. That seems kind of deceptive to me. There are a lot of average knife buyers who would have no knowledge that all of this is happening.

To be fair, I believe Jeff @ KSF pulled the "known effected" models from the site and is sending one of each of the other knives to Niagara for testing.

That said, I agree that the disclaimer DLT posted is helpful.

[PStone]

I find it kind of odd that KSF doesn’t address these issues at all on their website and one of the primary advertising banners on the site is a new BRK release. That seems kind of deceptive to me. There are a lot of average knife buyers who would have no knowledge that all of this is happening.

I’m in agreement with you 100%. They need to address the situation on every BRK listed on their site. “Cannot guarantee blade steel”, “sold as is”, “no warranty”, something to let the uninformed customer know what is going on. Every single one. Old or new.

What I also find extremely fishy and suspect, is all the recent sales on BRK at a few retailers. One in particular had all the models admitted by Mike to be fraudulent, on sale, two weeks before this all came out. Not pointing finger at the vendor. But maybe their supplier knew something and had what appeared to be a crazy good deal on those models.
I’m concerned with who knew what and when. I have a gut feeling some suppliers and/or dealers knew this was coming well beforehand and tried to cut their losses to a minimum at our (the knife community) expense. Which to me is the most disappointing and disturbing feeling I have about the whole situation.

Of course I can’t prove anything. Only speculate. And we will all probably never know for sure. Sucks for sure.

[fixall]

I find it kind of odd that KSF doesn’t address these issues at all on their website and one of the primary advertising banners on the site is a new BRK release. That seems kind of deceptive to me. There are a lot of average knife buyers who would have no knowledge that all of this is happening.

What are you talking about? The response from Knives Ship Free about this situation has been among the best in the industry.

[jdw]

I find it kind of odd that KSF doesn’t address these issues at all on their website and one of the primary advertising banners on the site is a new BRK release. That seems kind of deceptive to me. There are a lot of average knife buyers who would have no knowledge that all of this is happening.

What are you talking about? The response from Knives Ship Free about this situation has been among the best in the industry.

If that is on their site, then my apologies. I did not see it there.

[raygixxer89]

Poor old Wako (Virtuovice) must be sitting on a million Yen worth of BRK landfill.
I suppose that’s what you get for bringing in scores of customers and loyal patronage from himself over the years.

There must be a way that scoundrel can be legally persued. No way he can be allowed get away with this.

Yes, I feel bad for him (Virtuovice). I used to watch many of his videos back when I was interested in BR knives. I have many BR knives that I bought but never really used them. I stopped supporting them after reading about Mike's shenanigans in the industry. He took down many good brands and fleeced a lot of people.
Let's see if he finally pays for all of his wrongdoings.

[cjk]

.... Looks like the prices on secondary will jump

I'd expect the opposite to happen. I wouldn't touch one. I'd expect secondary prices to tank.
Retailers will blow them out as discontinued/no warranty for whatever they can get to try to limit their losses as much as possible.

[lambertiana]

I won't comment on the experiences of others, just look at the threads on Bladeforums and you can find a lot. But I will comment on my personal experiences.

It all went downhill when I used a mini-Canadian to whittle, after Mike had repeatedly said it was a great knife for whittling. In very little time I noticed that the knife just wouldn't cut any more so I stopped for a look. The entire edge had crumpled like a sheet of aluminum foil. So I sent it in for warranty repair. When it finally came back, I noticed that the scrimshaw on the handle had been buffed off, so I sent it back again. After a few months with no word, I tried contacting Mike via PM on knifeforums, where he was very active. No answer after repeated attempts. Finally I posted on knifeforums asking what I should do, given the lack of response from BR. That elicited two immediate responses - an attack by all the fanboys, and then finally a reply to my PMs to Mike. At that point he acted like a two year old throwing a tantrum. He told me that he had sent the knife to the scrimshander who did the original work and it was out of his hands; it was my responsibility to follow up with the scrimshander. When I did that, the scrimshander told me that he received the knife with no instructions from Mike and assumed it was partial payment for what Mike owed him, because Mike had stiffed him and not paid for his services (this theme has repeatedly cropped up with Mike Stewart over the years, so the current problems came as no surprise to anyone who had been paying attention). So I went back to Mike Stewart, and finally, after a lot of tantrum throwing on his part, he finally sent me a replacement. This whole exchange soured me on anything Bark River, so I sold all but one and never looked back.