Prototype?

[just bob]

Prototype? I suspect there is another explanation.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/CASE-XX-YELLOW ... SwHDdcdafc

[Gunsil]

Really no such thing as a "prototype" knife. Knives are made on machinery that is made from mechanical drawings, there is no need to make a "prototype". Parker started the inane "prototype" business when he purchased the Case company. All these knives one sees marked "prototype" are merely marketing ploys. Same with "first production run", etc.

[JohnR]

I don't know enough about Case to comment but I do know that some manufacturers did make prototypes or samples, whatever you want to call them.

This Queen made Winchester Barlow is one I have in my collection and generated some comments when I posted it.
viewtopic.php?f=61&t=46647

[Chase]

In my Opinion: A Protoype knife is a New Knife that is made to determine it's usability, design and whether it will be a seller or not

In my Opinion: A Sample Knife is a knife that is an established pattern that may have a new blade configuration or Scale/Cover

I bring this topic up because I have many knives that are engraved as PROTOTYPE, from the factory, that are really nothing more than "Samples" I also have a few knives that are truly PROTOTYPE Knives that were the first of a pattern that went into production or maybe it never did go into production for whatever reason.

Here is an example for Two Prototype Knives that I own:

Canal Street Cutlery made the "Carry the Football Knife". They produced a lot of these and even branded one for MooreMaker. I have an example of each. They were considering two additional knives to compliment the Carry The Football Knife. They were a fixed Blade Hunter of which only two Prototypes were made. I am fortunate enough to own one of them.

They also made a Prototype (Only one) Carry the Football Letter Opener. I am again very fortunate to own that as well. These two are actually Prototypes (In My opinion) because they were made up to see if they would be suitable for use and see if they would be a seller or not. As it turns out the Original Carry the Football Knife did not go over well and the additional knives (Fixed Blade Hunter and Letter Opener) were shelved and never produced.

This makes the Fixed Blade and Letter Opener, PROTOTYPE Knives, In my opinion.

I Also have many patterns of Canal Street knives, like the Pinch Lock Backs, Boys Knives and Barlows that were produced with different scales/covers and yet they are marked PROTOTYPE, when in my Opinion, they should be marked as Samples.

Just my two cents worth when it comes to Prototype versus sample knives.

Tom

[deo-pa]

I find this an interesting discussion and would like to get some further clarification. In general, I've always thought as Gene (aka Gunsil) says, prototypes are pretty much a marketing gimmick.

However, Tom (aka Chase) makes a case for having several knives which he considers true prototypes. Let's assume for a moment Tom is correct and let me ask some questions about his "Carry the Football" prototypes. (If you are like me and have never heard of this knife you can see a picture below. I stole this picture from Amazon.)

The knife is for sale on Amazon and probably elsewhere so clearly this football knife went into production. Tom says that Canal Street was planning on at least two more variations, a fixed blade hunter and a letter opener and made prototypes (2 of the former and 1 of the latter) to test usability and salability. I accept that explanation but here are my questions:

1) A quantity of 2 and 1 seems like an extremely small production run to test usability and salability. For usability don't you have to subject them to some testing? For salability don't you have to show them around or send them around to your dealers and say, "We are planning to make these. What do you think of them? How many do you want to order?"

2) How did they get out of Canal Street and into the market where Tom could buy them?

I'm not being critical of Tom and I'm not expecting him to answer my questions. But to use Tom's example of the football knives it would be great to hear from someone at the old Canal Street or the new Canal Street Co-Op to tell us the story of the football knives and the two still-born variations so we could get some clarification of exactly how at least this one company (Canal Street) handles prototypes for new or planned productions. Until I hear it from "the horse's mouth" I remain a prototype skeptic. (By the way Tom, I'd love to see photos of the hunter and the letter opener variations. If my mental picture of the letter opener is correct I think I might have bought one of those if they had produced them.)

Maybe if Mike (aka galvanic1882) reads this he can tell us about how he handled prototypes for his new JBF Champlin knives. Maybe other makers could chime in too.

Dennis

[Mumbleypeg]

OP knife looks like regular old stag. The rest of the listing sounds like seller BS.

More opinions about “prototype” knives: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=56700&p=641028&hili ... pe#p640943

Ken

[espn77]

I'd never seen that football knife till a couple weekends ago at a gun show. A guy had one and it had a Moore maker stamp on it.

[philco]

I'll let Tom explain how he came to own the two Carry The Football prototype knives if he choses to do so, but since I do know how that all came to be let me assure you they are exactly what he says they are.

[Chase]

I talked with Wally about the Carry The Football knife and asked if he had any plans to produce other knives with that type of handle material (Football Leather). He stated that they were looking into it and would possibly make some others. As it turned out, the Custom/sample guy (Harold Buley, who happens to be my Uncle) did in fact make a sample Letter opener and a Fixed blade hunter. He started a second fixed blade hunter that was unfinished and they (Canal Street) scrapped the plan to make any additional knives because the Carry The Football Knife did not catch on like they hoped. The thought was that they could make a knife that appealed to both Knife Collectors and Football Fans. Unfortunately it didn't fly.

I was fortunate enough to purchase my two knives (Letter Opener and Fixed Blade Hunter) from Wally once he decided to close the Factory, along with a multitude of other knives.

Now having said this...I can see where and how both of these knives could be considered either a PROTOTYPE...First Letter Opener and a First Fixed Blade of this style/pattern or might even be a Sample because it was a standard type of knife, already available on the open market (Although not by Canal Street) with just a different handle material. I also have some others that were not produced by Canal Street.

Tom

[peanut740]

Has someone who has had knives made by both Queen and Great Eastern,we never seen or received any prototypes.To me a proto would be a concept knife,not anything that would be exactly like what would be go into production.At least 99% of so called prototypes are complete BS, and a marketing angle to sell a common knife for more money.
Case for at least the last 25 or so years marked protopypes on the inside of the liners.

[deo-pa]

Thanks all for the replies here. This topic seems to be getting a good airing of facts and opinions.

Case for at least the last 25 or so years marked prototypes on the inside of the liners.

Roger, I assume that what Case does is take a certain number of the knives from the first production run and mark them as prototypes to give them more cachet and to boost their selling price, is that your understanding? If that is the case then I'd tend to agree they fall into the BS category. Any idea Roger if the number of prototypes that Case creates is a handful? dozens? hundreds?

That said, if someone wants to acquire prototype knives more power to them. While I wouldn't go after them it's not my place to judge the collecting habits of others. In fact as long as the mystique of prototypes exists they may be better off financially collecting those versus those of us who purchase non-marked regular production knives.

Dennis

[just bob]

This is my knife. I have always thought Bear & Son or another company worked up a few of these and then pitched the knife to Case. Apparently there was no interest in the knife and it never went into production.
As far as the knife in the OP goes. The pictures are so bad it is hard to see what is going on there. I thought it had a glue in shield and copied the photo to my computer. I enlarged it with photo software and still can't tell for sure. Those rub marks on the blades look more like machining marks. but I had no luck in enlarging them to get a better look. Let's hope the high bidder is happy.

[peanut740]

Thanks all for the replies here. This topic seems to be getting a good airing of facts and opinions.

Case for at least the last 25 or so years marked prototypes on the inside of the liners.

Roger, I assume that what Case does is take a certain number of the knives from the first production run and mark them as prototypes to give them more cachet and to boost their selling price, is that your understanding? If that is the case then I'd tend to agree they fall into the BS category. Any idea Roger if the number of prototypes that Case creates is a handful? dozens? hundreds?

That said, if someone wants to acquire prototype knives more power to them. While I wouldn't go after them it's not my place to judge the collecting habits of others. In fact as long as the mystique of prototypes exists they may be better off financially collecting those versus those of us who purchase non-marked regular production knives.

Dennis

Dennis,I think Case prototypes are extremely rare. Case Classics no,they are a sham,has many as they could sell.

[JAMESC41001]

Interesting subject. This comes down to a companies decision making process for introducing new patterns. Mostly in response to market trends and feedback from distributors. In an effort to respond to these a companies board of directors will review concept drawings and give the nod to the ones they would like to move on. this means producing a hard sample ie a physical knife.(prototype) This gets presented and reviewed. If acceptable two samples are made. One goes to the art/marketing dept for pictures, advertising, press releases ext. the othe goes to production so parts tang Stan’s can be ordered and machinery can be tooled up. A short production run will be take place. Sometimes interrupted to make sure everything is cool. With any luck the knife will run for many years. For a smaller company a knife that is not a success the pain is harder to absorb. In the case of the football knife it did hurt them quit a bit. There are true prototypes and samples out there but there is a lot more BS. The temptation to mark more then one knife prototype or #001 or #000 exists. Mostly for pain in the ass associates. This is how it goes down with some variations from place to place.