FireClean sues blogger over "smear campaign"/scientific studies

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FireClean has filed a complaint on Mar 17, 2016 against tuohy (vuurwapenblog) and e.baker (NH fellow) because of their tests back in Sep 2015, showing similarities between FireClean & crisco vegetable oil.

e.baker later ran his own tests in WPI labs with similar findings. FireClean complaint states that e.baker "contacted Tuohy for the express purpose of conspiring with him to further defame and damage FireClean."

FireClean is claiming that their "revenues have fallen by over $25,000 per month since Tuohy's first tortious act, and FireClean will continue to suffer losses in the future, and likely permanently, due to Tuohy's and Baker's public and malicious campaign against it." [emphasis mine]

in Bose vs. Consumers Union case, SCOTUS ruled that "proof of actual malice was necessary in product disparagement cases raising First Amendment issues".

my feeling is that the case will be dismissed, settled, or lost with fair representation. however it will still be a financial drain for the defendants and may discourage honest reviews/opinions elsewhere. this is a desperate strategy. unfortunately the state of Virginia where the complaint is filed does not have protection against such burdening lawsuits (SLAPP).


reference #1: FireClean Sues Over VuurwapenBlog Articles
reference #2: official complaint
reference #3: bose vs consumers union
reference #4: strategic lawsuit against public participation
 
So - drama aside, does it work? Anyone done any long term testing? (I tried some, but haven't had a chance to shoot the guns much)
 
"If they hired as many engineers as lawyers"...hm, where have I seen that before??
 
After FireClean filed the lawsuit against blogger Andrew Tuohy of Vuurwapen Blog, the reaction online was quick and viscous. The company took quite the Public Relations hit. Many have believed that the suit was an attempt to silence bloggers and reviewers online.

On the other side of the coin, those who supported the suit believed FireClean to be taking legal action to right a wrong. To clarify why they filed the suit, and circumstances surrounding it, FireClean has released a statement. In it, FireClean asserts that they are not attempting to pursue action on an opinion, but what they feel was an unsubstantiated attack on their company by someone who ignored attempts by the company to educate them. They claim that FireClean is not a big bad wolf against bloggers and reviewers.

The statement in full:

http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/...ent=2016-04-12&utm_campaign=Weekly+Newsletter
 
FireClean's view is that the testing that was performed was not enough to support the blogger's claims, and that he was told that but continued to make those claims.

My understanding of chemistry is slim, but it is my understanding that mass spectrometry is rather limited in what it can tell you. Perhaps we have a chemist who can explain the limitations of mass spec.

That said, I think FireClean is every bit as much of a joke as FrogLube. This is FrogLube's business model:

- buy a 55 gallon drum of industrial lubricant.
- repackage into 2 oz containers
- increase price several thousand percent
- make outlandish claims about the product's effectiveness
- create a bunch of sock puppet accounts on social media to push the product
- develop a creation story about how they discovered this miracle lube and how it was tested "down range" by some tactically bearded tier 1 operator.

I haven't followed FireClean much, but I suspect their business model has some similarities.
 
"If they hired as many engineers as lawyers"...hm, where have I seen that before??

I believe that FireClean has stated that they have two employees. In which case, I suspect they buy their lube from a third party, having that third party package it into their proprietary packaging.

In other words, their value-add is likely to be little more than marketing.
 
I believe that FireClean has stated that they have two employees. In which case, I suspect they buy their lube from a third party, having that third party package it into their proprietary packaging.

In other words, their value-add is likely to be little more than marketing.
one guy goes to all the Costcos to buy up the crisco and the other guy packages and mails it.
 
one guy goes to all the Costcos to buy up the crisco and the other guy packages and mails it.

I believe their rebuttal claimed that they have a patent and that they have two or three ingredients. So it is a bit more complicated than that. My guess is that they add an ingredient or two to an industrial lubricant, and that they have a contract manufacturer do all the production, packaging, and shipping for them.
 
I believe their rebuttal claimed that they have a patent and that they have two or three ingredients. So it is a bit more complicated than that. My guess is that they add an ingredient or two to an industrial lubricant, and that they have a contract manufacturer do all the production, packaging, and shipping for them.

Question is whether those special ingredients actually do anything. MSDS is mum on the matter -- "proprietary formula." If there is in fact a patent, that would likely reveal the ingredients.
 
I believe their rebuttal claimed that they have a patent and that they have two or three ingredients. So it is a bit more complicated than that. My guess is that they add an ingredient or two to an industrial lubricant, and that they have a contract manufacturer do all the production, packaging, and shipping for them.

That's what Froglube/SealOne does. Off the shelf industrial meat cutting machine/rollercoaster track lubricant made from a coconut oil blend with firearm specific additives to modify viscosity in a desired temperature range and a surfactant to remove heavy metals.

Oil is really just oil at a basic level.
 
I believe their rebuttal claimed that they have a patent and that they have two or three ingredients. So it is a bit more complicated than that. My guess is that they add an ingredient or two to an industrial lubricant, and that they have a contract manufacturer do all the production, packaging, and shipping for them.
i bet crisco would do the same thing. i threw a large candle into a fireplace once and it cleaned it up nice, had some flames shoot out of a twenty foot chimney, i checked the flues and they only had the hard shiny creosote left, no sooty flaky stuff left.
 
I believe their rebuttal claimed that they have a patent and that they have two or three ingredients. So it is a bit more complicated than that. My guess is that they add an ingredient or two to an industrial lubricant, and that they have a contract manufacturer do all the production, packaging, and shipping for them.

What a conspiracy!

What a hoot!

They have workers sworn to secrecy knowing full well that they are peddling crisco.

Pouring from a barrel into little containers and not saying a peep.

Frog Lube at least admits they use a vegetable oil. It works great too and the ladies love the scent.
 
Fireclean should sue themselves for being dumbasses and pissing people off. This is the real reason why their sales dropped. So essentially, instead of suing, they need to go **** themselves.

Even in the best case scenario they will not recover any damages, this is just a strategy to shut people off. **** those *******s.
 
Question is whether those special ingredients actually do anything. MSDS is mum on the matter -- "proprietary formula." If there is in fact a patent, that would likely reveal the ingredients.

No argument there. All that FireClean says is: "The patent application, on the very first page, describes a product that is composed of at least three substances, which may be plant or vegetable-based oils, and which make up between 25 and 100 percent of the formulation."
 
Mass spec can be a very powerful tool and provide a great deal of data provided you see the whole picture. It can certainly identify and match compounds down to a purity level. If the blogger used a high res MS and properly separated some key components as an identifier of sorts, ran both samples and produced equivalent spectra then they are without a doubt the same ingredients in the same proportion.
 
Fireclean will claim that few drops of magic ass-juice added to the gallon of Crisco is making all the difference (not seen by spectrometer) They are full of shit.
 
I actually bought some of this stuff when it first came out and people were claiming it was the greatest thing since .... well, since Froglube. I suppose that should have been the tipoff.:) In any event, since I have the bottle I've been using it and it seems to work about as well as any other lube out there. It also doesn't have the same chemical smell as some lube (I guess because it's mostly Crisco) and it does seem to clean up pretty quickly.
 
What's more interesting to me is that Fire Clean doesn't seem to grasp why the blogger in question didn't decide to put their statement of how the test should really be done on his website- Bloggers don't have any duty to truth or impartiality, he can simply just decide not to represent the other side of the argument. With that said, the evidence is pretty heavy and damning outside of just the IR results, up to and including the patents and proposals for alternative uses for Crisco which includes military grade cleaner/lube.

In this case, it is not the one spectrometry result that damns the brand, but a compilation of the evidence. The proper response to fire clean for this would be to discredit the study, not sue the messenger.
 
FireClean sues blogger over "smear campaign"/scientific studies

Fireclean should sue themselves for being dumbasses and pissing people off. This is the real reason why their sales dropped. So essentially, instead of suing, they need to go **** themselves.

Even in the best case scenario they will not recover any damages, this is just a strategy to shut people off. **** those *******s.

All of this

I am always leery of "the next best lube" since ultimately lube is lube, they're all for the most part petroleum based, even manufactured by the same people and individual brands just toss in an extra ingredient and put it in a fancy model. I'm perfectly happy with my TW25B, and I can't find that, LucasOil Red n Tacky #5
 
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I've seen Finish Line Ceramic Grease and Mobil One Synthetic Grease on the bench at a big name smith. Both are in the same general category as Enos Slide Guide (Mobil One is even the same color).

Generally speaking, there is no way two guys are going to have the lubricant background, chemistry knowledge, and lab equipment to do any serious R&D to develop a new lubricant, any more than a random NESer is going to come up with a "better load" by coming up with a secret blend of off the shelf powders.
 
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Given how well it stands up to use and abuse when I use it to season my cast iron pans and grills I may start using flax seed oil to season my barrels. Oil up and a quick string of shots to get it up to temp should do nicely.
 
Given how well it stands up to use and abuse when I use it to season my cast iron pans and grills I may start using flax seed oil to season my barrels. Oil up and a quick string of shots to get it up to temp should do nicely.

There you go. Package it, give it a tacticool name, and watch the money roll in.
 
Given how well it stands up to use and abuse when I use it to season my cast iron pans and grills I may start using flax seed oil to season my barrels. Oil up and a quick string of shots to get it up to temp should do nicely.

Don't. Read up on flaxseed oil. It's a drying oil (like linseed). It polymerizes into a film-like finish.

That's why it's good for seasoning pans.

That's also why it's terrible to use on guns.
 
Typical of a patent. You try to be as broad as possible so that someone else can't start using Canola because ou specifically said grapeseed oil. So the patent is for an unspecified mixture or a pure vegetable oil, so if you start selling M1911 SuperKleen, you violate their patent if you are using a mix of veggie oils.
 
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