A story about a good rifle ruined by a bad gunsmith...

Status
Not open for further replies.
Sorry to hear about your rifle.

Just visited their fb page. It will be interesting to see what their reputation is in another 6-12 months.
 
My good friend had his scope mounted by a local gunsmith and after the first shot, it fell off. These guys have some nerve calling themselves gunsmiths.
 
Here is all you need to know about gunsmiths.
1) No licensing or professional certification needed. Anyone can start a business and call themselves a gunsmith.
2) Most are self taught or have a small amount of education in some sort of shop type classes.
3) Most are tinkering types that think they can fix anything even though the fix is a bubba job.
 
I'm blessed by proximity with an incredible talent pool of smiths for any revolver, pistol, shotgun or rifle work that needs done. The trust I place in them was built, in some cases over generations and decades because I would sooner know I'd fired my last round ever than to take needless risk of appendages due to shoddy work.

Moving forward, I'd suggest a very inexpensive bit of work with every rifle you own; have the chambers cast. You'll have proof before firing of its dimensions and can, through subsequent castings, determine when things change.

Truly sorry for your loss, I know the feeling. Mine was thanks to some reckless driving on the part of a guide who turned my Model 70 into a take-down stock. Got a "never seen that happen, hey! That sucks".
 
I've cut off a few mounts through the years, a dremel with a cut off wheel can split them leaving the screw in place. Usually there is enough screw proud of the receiver to get them out.

As for the "gunsmith" if he didn't see a hole as a problem, I'd of asked him to step outside and fire the rifle.....

A good smith could mill the screw holes out and weld the holes up solid and then align and re tap. A top shelf aftermarket barrel and you are back in business.

Glad you shared with us, sucks to have to in the first place though.
 
I wouldn't question someone who wanted to have their rifle done right without further repairs to fix something that shouldn't have happened.

There is a concept that guns, and especially barrels and receivers are heat treated, however. In a lot of cases that isn't what is being done. Guns are expected to get a lot of heat loading from the cartridges, in self loading actions it can be so excessive the barrel droops and the round penetrates it. Even with a bolt action, enough ammo could be cycled thru it to raise temps beyond their tempering.

The example of heating a receiver to 575 degrees is exactly the case in point. Application of heat in that range of temps can relieve metal of their tempered quality. And that is why many guns are NOT tempered or rely on it for additional strength. Because they can be heated past the tempering point of a steel alloy, many actions and barrels aren't tempered, they are annealed dead soft and the design engineered to be sufficient in that condition.

Not suggesting anyone should accept a chamber drilled thru as a compromise, but it's not impossible to weld up, and for those willing to consider it, a workmanlike repair.
 
That type of error of drilling through into chamber is not unknown. My gunsmith use to take in guns that no one else would fix. He does not do that any more. But one day he had a gun in the shop that someone had tried to drill and tap holes for a scope mount. One of the holes went through to the chamber.
Most of you will disagree with his solution, but he put a some sort of plug in it IIRC. He claimed it worked. He has a complete machine shop with common reamers and can do everything except bore and rifle a barrel. I do not know if he removed the barrel to fix it. The caliber was an inexpensive center fire, but I do not remember which one and it was not a tack driver like the rifle that the OP had damaged. The owner wanted a simple cheap fix.
IMHO and not being a gunsmith of course, A better way to fixed it would be to ream and insert a threaded sleeve in the chamber. Then follow up with a chamber reamer etc, but a new barrel is probably the best solution. It use to be common to put a sleeve in the 30-06 to shoot .308s, but these could come loose since they were not secured with threading.
It would have been an interesting experiment with the OP's gun tied down and fired remotely to see how 30-06 military ball would have behaved in the holed rifle barrel as is. I suspect the the case would not have been pieced, but extraction might have been hard. Brass is a lot tougher, especially for a small unsupported section than some people might assume. The head of a cartridge in many guns is not supported and normally holds up quite well. The gun was already ruined in the eyes of the owner so there would not be much to lose.
 
Very sad story and one that is consistent with any service industry. I've been burned by shoddy workmanship as well and it stings mightily. Just have to move on and make the best out of it. Hopefully you can re-construct another rifle and add in some special parts or quality fitting to make it even more special for you.
 
I sold the action ($150 with messed up threads), the stock ($400), and the bottom metal ($75)...and have ordered a Nosler M48 Custom in 280 Ackley....slate grey Cerakote, grey Kevlar/Carbon fiber stock, 24" barrel...

No idea when it will be finished though...the work order says October 23rd...not sure how accurate that is, and don't really care...as long as its "right" when I do get it (and I'm confident it will be).
 
Don't get me started again about gun smiths. I've had more than my share of bad to ruined firearms from less than qualified gun smiths. I'm dealing with problems created by one just within the last week or so, this one is a reputable, and seasoned one, who has a 40+ yr. positive history.

My recent post about him not crowning the barrel, after claiming he didn't even touch the crown, was resolved. However, last weekend the scope he had to remove wasn't tightened back down to spec., so it ended up getting jammed into the bolt shroud the result of recoil. But that's neither here nor there, as that rifle has been nothing but a nightmare to start with. But it didn't help that his poor attention to detail, and a failure to check his own work has created additional variables for us to deal with.

We take our firearms to them with confidence that they know what they are doing, and will perform the work correctly. Additionally we expect that they will treat our firearms with the same regard as if it was their own personal firearms.

I wish you the best in resolving your nightmare.

GS
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

H
  • Locked
Gunsmith liability concerns
Replies
3
Views
511
Hal Romberg
H
N
  • Locked
Recommend gunsmith/stockmaker to lighten stock?
Replies
0
Views
313
nyrifleman
N
S
  • Locked
kudos to the local GM gunsmith
Replies
9
Views
540
Brian Dale
B
O
  • Locked
Henry Arms
Replies
4
Views
1K
El Tejon
E
K
  • Locked
Gunsmiths of color
Replies
10
Views
953
Larry Ashcraft
Larry Ashcraft
Back
Top