Eagle and Blackhawk Industries

[Stinkyshoe]

I have a question regarding the relative quality of these two companies. I talked to a gentleman at a show who claimed that Blackhawk stole many of the ideas and designs for equipment they sell from Eagle. This guy also said that Blackhawk is made in Vietnam, where Eagle is made in MO, USA. Just curious if any of this is true and which company produces better products. Thanks
Ss

 

[oh blanky]

I have experience with Blackhawk, Eagle, and Spec ops.

Eagle and spec ops are top notch in materials, quality and design, with my nod going to Eagle. Both are made in USA.

Blackhawk has reasonable designs, reasonable quality, lower quality materials than the above and it is made in Viet Nam.

If you can get what you want from blackhawk cheap, go for it.

Other wise go with the others.

 

[NMshooter]

On another forum questions like this are a bit of a can of worms...

The short version is all of the manufacturers seem to steal each others ideas constantly.

You can generally get what you want at varying levels of quality and price depending on what manufacturer you buy from.

Made in the USA generally equals better materials and workmanship, but the other stuff can be decent too. When looking at Blackhawk keep in mind there is a difference between the STRIKE labeled items and everything else.

The most important thing to remember is that no one manufacturer will make everything you want, so be willing to shop around and think real hard before making a purchase.

 

[dfariswheel]

I bought a Blackhawk 5-5-10 fanny pack about 5 years ago, and I've been totally satisfied with the quality, which is higher than most everything else I've seen.

With that said, I did notice that the 5-5-10 is a virtual line-for-line copy of the Eagle, to the extent that I wondered if both came from the same supplier, or the companies were related.

 

[Onmilo]

As for thigh carried holsters I second the Spec-Ops Vapor as being one of the best available ballistic nylon rigs.

It is extremely well made and has the advantage of interchagable Kydex inserts that allow the basic carrier to be used with a number of popular battle pistols.

The big disadvantage is the inserts are not available sized for pistols with weapon mounted lights and the nylon carrier isn't sized to accomodate them even if they were.

Spec-Ops also produces some of the very best ballistic nylon magazine carriers.

http://www.specopsbrand.com