Opinion about rebarreling

[MikeS]

Hi All.

Back in January I took my Cimmaron Thunderer 44 Special 3.5" barrel with a birdshead grip to my local gunsmith who regularly builds Colt SA clones and asked him to rebarrel it to 45, with a 45LC cylinder, and a 45ACP cylinder. Well, he finally finished the job about a week ago, or so. I finally got down to him to pick it up, and he's put a 4-3/4" barrel on it! Unfortunately he wasn't in when I was there, only one of his gunsmiths, so I didn't get a chance to talk to him yet, but the smith said that it was probably the only 45 barrel he had to put on it.

So, I'm curious, what do y'all think, should I be upset that he put a longer barrel on it than it had originally, or should I just take it as he made it, and not worry about it?

I really wanted to keep that gun a 3.5" barrel, as I already have a Ruger Old Army with a 7.5" barrel (with a 45LC conversion cylinder), and a 4.5" RBH in 45LC, and the birdshead grip kind of looks out of place with that long of a barrel, not to mention it makes the gun which was supposed to be smaller than the RBH and makes it about the same size, or even larger, which I think looks out of place. At this point, I'm considering asking him to just put my original barrel and cylinder back on the gun, and just pay him for his time, as the original intent was to keep all the SA's 45, so I wouldn't have yet another caliber to reload for, but since that time I've gotten into reloading 44 Special for another pistol I have, so it wouldn't be any hassle to reload for it as well. I don't really want to wait another 8 months for him to put a 3.5" 45 barrel on the gun. So, what do you think?

I'm pretty sure I want to keep the revolver's barrel at 3.5", so I guess the real question is should I wait for him to get another barrel, or should I have him reinstall the original barrel/cylinder? I guess he could cut down the barrel he installed on it, and just use the ejector from the original barrel, and be able to get the job done quicker. If he does that, should I pay for the labor to cut down the barrel, and reinstall the ejector/sight, or should he take the hit, as it was his screwup in the first place? As it sits right now, he's charging me $450.00 for the new barrel, both cylinders, and labor, a price which I don't know if it's the going rate, too high, too low, etc.

[btroj]

What length did you specify up front? If you saidFTP 3.5 inches and he went longer then I would tell him to fix it. The barrel should have been the length you specified up front.

As for the cost, sounds pretty reasonable to me. Almost even cheap.

[Bret4207]

Unless you told him to stick with 3.5" then it's your fault as much as his. Unclear instruction are no instructions. These $450.00 seems very reasonable. If you want the 3.5" barrel have him cut it.

[Char-Gar]

I am with Bret on this one.

[frkelly74]

Shoot it first. Maybe you will love it. But I suppose that constitutes acceptance of it as is. Maybe talk to him and say you are going to try it and see if it is acceptable to you, and that you might be bringing it back if it isn't.

But if it were mine and it felt good and hit where you expected it to, I would be good to go.

[williamwaco]

Unless you ordered the 3 1/2 inch barrel up front, I think you should grin and bear it.

I think you will like the longer barrel better and if he does quality work, I think the price is more than reasonable. Two cylinders and a new barrel for $450.00? He is working for about $10.00 per hour.

If this guy does good work, you need to stay on his good side. You may need him again and good smiths are hard to find.

If you don't like it after you shoot it, wait about six months then take it back tell him it doesn't feel right to you, and ask him to shorten it.

[scb]

Unless he's using barrels with the front sight pre-installed, cutting and crowning the barrel before it is installed is maybe a 10 minute job, at most, if you've got a lathe. It really doesn't make any sense not to do it unless there was some sort of miscommunication.

[MikeS]

Unless you told him to stick with 3.5" then it's your fault as much as his. Unclear instruction are no instructions. These $450.00 seems very reasonable. If you want the 3.5" barrel have him cut it.

I'm pretty sure I told him to use the same size barrel, but to tell you the truth, I really don't remember. can't imagine telling him to just use whatever length he wanted, as this was the 'Sheriff's Model' (I think that's what it's called) that has the birdshead grip, and the shorter barrel. I don't think I've ever seen the birdshead grip used on anything but the short barreled revolvers.

[btroj]

Pretty sure? Don't mean to be rough here but if I was having work done on a gun I would make darn certain the expectations were spelled out clearly.
I would talk to him and see what can be done about cutting down the barrel.

[W.R.Buchanan]

Here's the deal guys. If you are going to have a gun modified, and you have specific requests and details then you really need to write it all down and give the guy a copy and go over it with him so everybody understands what everybody wants and what everybody is going to do. This usually results in you getting what you want.

Verbal instructions get lost real easily and people tend to do what they "think" you told them to do.

I run into this all the time with subcontractors in my machine shop. You have to specify everything or else you don't get what you want. And even then sommetimes it doesn't work.

If your smith put a 4 3/4" barrel on your gun, he probably thought that's what you wanted.

If you talk to him he will probably make it right. Most gun people are pretty easy to deal with.

Randy

[MikeS]

Just wanted to say that I spoke with the gunsmith, and he acknowledged his mistake, and he will have it ready with a 3.5" barrel on Monday! This is good, because I have a hand tooled holster that my father made for this gun, and it will only fit with a 3.5" barrel!