As most of you know, since April I have been fighting a patent lawsuit in federal court. The lawsuit was filed by SB Tactical, a company that makes a product that, like the Blade, attaches to an AR buffer tube.

Without boring you with the details, the lawsuit is a design patent infringement lawsuit. I am told that the test for design patent infringement is whether an ordinary observer would think the patented design and the Blade look so similar that it’s confusing.

My attorney created these composite images showing the design patent drawings overlaid on the Blade. What do you think?

So what do you think? Are the patent drawings and the Blade so similar that you’re confused? Personally, every time I look at these drawings I am amazed that this lawsuit even exists.

Although my attorney says we don’t need it, one way we can show the court how different the patent and the Blade are is by comparing the patent to earlier products. For example, the Plaintiff thinks that Fig. 5 looks like my product. But Fig. 5 looks at least as much like an M4 stock:

Since the patent drawings look like an M4 stock, which has been around for many years, the Plaintiff’s claim is moot.

So here’s where you come in. If you would like to help us fight this lawsuit, we welcome your input. Please send photos of gun parts that look like the patent drawings to this email address: shockwave_f7fd@sendtodropbox.com. The photos have to be older than January 28, 2013. It’s helpful if you can describe the photo or where you found it. And if you could share this blog post on forums and social media, we would be very grateful.

Thank you for your continued support of Shockwave.

Thank you and God Bless,
Marty Ewer