I think the Contender has been out long enough that the patent has expired. Also, if Bergara can make Encore barrels, what would prevent them from making Contender barrels?
Not to single Grumulkin or anyone else out..., so please don't take it that way.
Sometimes I don't get my point across when trying to have brevity in my posts. Most know here I normally don't do that for exactly that reason. So me bad!
It's a given that custom shops have been making and selling aftermarket Contender barrels for way over 30 years that are "similar" to TC design.
Speculation on my part, but I seriously doubt any of them infringed on TC patents even in the early years. TC may not have cared anyway, may have wanted the extra versatility to help promote their platform before they had a so called custom shop.
Concerning patents, I was only speculating on what known facts I was aware of and am certainly no patent expert. I based my comments on TC's
last Contender design actually produced by them. If patented it would probably have been in 1997/8, the time period when they changed the easy open version to include a renewable lower breechblock. If patented then as a design patent it would run for 14 years, as a utility patent for 20, and patents can be extended. How long they can remain on the books if extended I have no idea, but TC would have to continue to pay patent maintenance fees on them. Utility patents protect designs better and longer because they allow for revisions, so are the most common. That's the unknown in this case as the last design change Contender may have been protected on a previous "utility" patent already on the books instead of them applying for a new patent on it. While the G2 Contender was a twinkle in their eye then under normal R&D of a company, I doubt they would have produced that last Contender version at all unless
at that point they had planned to continue making it (and thus would have wanted patent protection on it). Leaves the possibility that if a new utility patent was done at that time it wouldn't expire until 2017/18 even without extension. Again, ONLY speculation on my part. Discussions of this nature are ALWAYS just speculation at best without confirmation by TC themselves.
I've rained on the parade of the OP's intent of this thread long enough over what is really just moot points anyway that may have little to do with this new company.
Back on track, IMO only time will tell if the new company really have something innovative in a new rifle, or just another also ran knock off of what was nothing special from TC.
