I used to work at a large-volume LGS that ordered a bunch of Christensen Arms firearms. Here's my experience with them.
At SHOT 2013, our owner ordered a whole bunch (scores) of Christiansen products; mostly ARs in .223 and .308, but also a few bolt actions and a few 1911s. More than half of them had some kind of problem. And even most of the ones without actual problems had fit-and-finish issues:
- Several of their ARs had crooked handguards, and on one the dust cover wouldn't stay closed.
- The overall fit of their ARs was not that great. Especially for what they cost.
- A customer wanted us to change out the buffer tube and stock on his new Christiansen AR with a different set they offered on their website, so we ordered a new stock set from them. They sent us a buffer tube where the threads were too short, so we sent it back. Then they sent us one where the threads were a little longer, but still not quite long enough, but our gunsmith was able to modify it to make it work.
- I've handled two of their 1911s and I was not impressed. The trigger, slide fit, bushing fit, and lock-up were worse than any $1000 1911, and these were priced well over $3000. Heck, they each even had a MIM mag release. OK, so they had titanium frames with tungsten carbide slide rails, but is that worth paying over three times more than a similar steel-framed 1911?
- In the process of installing a different muzzle device, our gunsmith discovered one of their bolt-action rifles had a really weird thread pattern: All the other ones had the normal 5/8x24, but one had a proprietary thread pattern that was way too short: If it had been fired like that the original muzzle brake would have probably been launched downrange. His best guess was they screwed up the original barrel threading, and so they just made a custom muzzle brake to match and figured no one would ever notice.
- A customer brought back one of the 1911s, apparently the tritium front sight was starting to burn out. So they must have used a really old sight they had lying around.
- Heck, even the catalogs they sent us seemed nice at first but had terrible quality control issues: It had big, beautiful close-up pictures but when you looked closely there was stuff like holster wear on the sights and corrosion or carbon build-up on the barrel crowns. And you could see the 1911's MIM mag releases in the pictures too. I know they make MIM parts pretty good these days, but if I'm paying more than $3000 for a 1911 I don't want MIM parts.
We had to send back so many of their guns due to defects that we just ended up sending them all back to Christiansen for a refund. It's really amazing how their materials were so high-end but their fit, finish, and quality control were so bad. I've heard that gun-making is just a side business for these guys; I don't know if that's true, but it might help to explain their low quality.
That was our shop's experience with Christiansen Arms. Maybe we just got unlucky or maybe they had quality problems that they've fixed by now (this was in 2013). But personally, I wouldn't buy a Christiansen firearm for $500, let alone for the multiple thousands they charge...
