Not Bartlein Barrels

Frank Green

Frank Green

Sergeant
Full Member
Minuteman
Oct 27, 2006
2,663
6,356
wisconsin
www.bartleinbarrels.com
#1
Guys I cannot tell you how many now this year but just had another customer send in barrels that are not ours. In the attached pic....the customer bought components (along with actions) and think the shop he bought them from did all the gunsmithing work. Shop recommended our blanks and customer went with it. Guns don't shoot. So customer calls us up and sends the barrels in for inspection.

The 30cal barrel is a button rifled barrel. Has 5 grooves but not 5R rifling.

The 7mm barrel is a 6 groove. We don't do 6 groove rifling on 7mm's. 4 groove or 5R only.

If you are buying guns sight unseen and or components and getting the machined work done before you receive the components. Especially if you are dealing with a shop you've never dealt with before......ask for the s/n of the barrel. It's stamped on the breech face of the barrel and gets lost when the threading and chamber work gets done. If you know the s/n you can always call us and confirm if it's ours or not. Also if you buy the barrel from us the s/n will be on your invoice as well. Record the s/n for your records.

Also most barrel makers don't s/n they're barrels. If the shop says there is no s/n tread lightly.

I bum for the customer because he is out money and has guns that don't shoot and we've got to be the bad guy to break the news to the customer when this happens.

I've even received complete guns in this year where the customer complained they wouldn't shoot etc...and upon inspecting the gun and trying to figure out what is going on we find out not our stick on the gun.

One shop and I won't mention names sent me not one...not two but six 30cal barrels all chambered in 300wm and the complaint was they don't shoot and need the barrels replaced. So when the barrels got here and I looked at them.....and I called the guy up and told him I'm not replacing them! He asked why? I said for starters they are button rifled. Second... I said they are all 6 groove 30cal barrels. We don't make 6 groove 30cal barrels. I looked up his past orders and they only ever bought 4 grooves from us and not a lot of them. Not a steady customer. So either they kept the barrels for themselves and bought cheaper 30cal 6 groove barrels from another shop and tried to pass them off as ours and tried to get them replaced.

Later, Frank
Bartlein Barrels

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#7
Like I said, "I bum for the customer/end user!" Doesn't matter if it's intentionally done or not. He's eating it.

Then we got time invested in it as well now which we don't get paid for (and I would never ask the customer to pay for that as I feel that's just another poke in the eye and it isn't right).

One of my guys spent time inspecting the barrels as they where received, cleaned them and then inspected them again. He knew something was wrong but couldn't put his finger on it and then came and got me to look at them and I picked it up right away that they were not ours. All in all as other guys in the shop noticed us looking at them...we had like 6 guys look at the barrels.

To help the customer I/we also measured the bores and grooves to give more info. to try and help him and answer his questions. The 30cal barrel in the cfw area the bore/grooves got bigger. We told him...it's never going to shoot. Being button rifled and the steel getting turned down so small the bore more often then not will open up on you. When it does...you cannot make it go back.

Gonna measure the 7mm today as we didn't have any bore gauge equipment set up for 7's as we are not running them right now. Will be interesting to see what the bore and groove sizes are on that one as well.
 
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#8
This is bullshit. I’ve only had two of your barrels but I love em and yours would be my preferred choice for anything in the future. Now I am hesitant about where to purchase for anything in the future. I definitely appreciate the heads up.
 
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#9
Oh, man, it's too bad you have to put up with this crap.

I just got my barrel back from the gunsmith I like to use and after looking at the throat the chamber is not lined up with the bore. I'll be sending him an email today with a video of what I'm seeing.
 
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#10
It really sucks you have to deal with that kind of stuff from "customer".
It happens to us fairly often and people seem to be rather brazen about it.
Of course we have to deal with our share of folks just plain stealing from us and returning empty boxes and demanding full refunds or doing charge backs claiming we wouldn't refund them after they returned empty boxes or such.

I blame it on people being entitled and having no fear of consequences for their actions.

If it's the gunsmiths doing this kind of B.S. that's a pretty slimy business move on their part trying to pass off stuff to the customer or to you as being yours when they got cheap junk somewhere else.

I applaud you for taking a firm stance on the fraud as if you give in to "be nice to the customer" when it's clearly fraud, your losses quickly escalate as everybody tells their brother how they got a "free" item and they all come running.
 
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#11
Terry Cross said:
What a bullshit move to pull. Can't believe it was "an honest mistake" on their part.

Those guys need a 100 bags of dicks mailed to them
(not the tasty gummy bear dicks but the inedible Chinese plastic dicks....)

.
Click to expand...
I thought all dicks were inedible. How tasty could they be? Inquiring minds want to know!
 
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#12
W54/XM-388 said:
I applaud you for taking a firm stance on the fraud as if you give in to "be nice to the customer" when it's clearly fraud, your losses quickly escalate as everybody tells their brother how they got a "free" item and they all come running.
Click to expand...
I had a customer mid summer and he's also here on the hide. Had a gunsmith build him a gun, custom action etc....gun wouldn't shoot good and had chamber issues. I posted about it here before.

Long story short he asked to send it in so we could look at it. When I got it and looked at it and called him...I said I'm pretty sure we can fix the chamber issue but you have to give me the o.k. He said ok. but...I said are you sitting down? I said it's not our barrel.

We fixed the chamber and sent it back to him and it's now reliable and shoots ok. Didn't charge him anything for it.

We help where and when we can....and at times best we can say is Sorry but don't know how to help you. Like I said, "I bum for the customer!"
 
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#13
Fig said:
I thought all dicks were inedible. How tasty could they be? Inquiring minds want to know!
Click to expand...
Well, . . . . when drinking with buddies anything is edible.
When drinking a lot with buddies, almost anything can be tasty.. . . at least as best as one could recall by the next day.

.
 
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#15
Frank Green said:
I had a customer mid summer and he's also here on the hide. Had a gunsmith build him a gun, custom action etc....gun wouldn't shoot good and had chamber issues. I posted about it here before.

Long story short he asked to send it in so we could look at it. When I got it and looked at it and called him...I said I'm pretty sure we can fix the chamber issue but you have to give me the o.k. He said ok. but...I said are you sitting down? I said it's not our barrel.

We fixed the chamber and sent it back to him and it's now reliable and shoots ok. Didn't charge him anything for it.

We help where and when we can....and at times best we can say is Sorry but don't know how to help you. Like I said, "I bum for the customer!"
Click to expand...
Good on you for helping someone out that is in that position. Although, most manufacturers wouldn't work on someone else's product. But again, kudos to you.

One of the shitty aspects about someone slipping in fake/counterfeit barrels is "how much money can you make by doing it ?". Certainly not enough to make it worth the bother. Or, maybe it is to the worst of the worst greedy scheisters.

Can't remember any numbers, but I've bought directly from Bartlein and from Greg/SPR. Easy peasy. Of course, no issues, ever.

Frank, thank you and your team for really nice products.
 
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#16
Frank Green said:
Being button rifled and the steel getting turned down so small the bore more often then not will open up on you.
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That is an interesting statement. Does it open up from the stress of the rifling and swell up once its thinned down or from the actual pressure of firing it?

And best guess on who actually made the barrel? Only so many button CFW sticks out there...hmmm
 
#17
Frank Green said:
Guys I cannot tell you how many now this year but just had another customer send in barrels that are not ours. In the attached pic....the customer bought components (along with actions) and think the shop he bought them from did all the gunsmithing work. Shop recommended our blanks and customer went with it. Guns don't shoot. So customer calls us up and sends the barrels in for inspection.

The 30cal barrel is a button rifled barrel. Has 5 grooves but not 5R rifling.

The 7mm barrel is a 6 groove. We don't do 6 groove rifling on 7mm's. 4 groove or 5R only.

If you are buying guns sight unseen and or components and getting the machined work done before you receive the components. Especially if you are dealing with a shop you've never dealt with before......ask for the s/n of the barrel. It's stamped on the breech face of the barrel and gets lost when the threading and chamber work gets done. If you know the s/n you can always call us and confirm if it's ours or not. Also if you buy the barrel from us the s/n will be on your invoice as well. Record the s/n for your records.

Also most barrel makers don't s/n they're barrels. If the shop says there is no s/n tread lightly.

I bum for the customer because he is out money and has guns that don't shoot and we've got to be the bad guy to break the news to the customer when this happens.

I've even received complete guns in this year where the customer complained they wouldn't shoot etc...and upon inspecting the gun and trying to figure out what is going on we find out not our stick on the gun.

One shop and I won't mention names sent me not one...not two but six 30cal barrels all chambered in 300wm and the complaint was they don't shoot and need the barrels replaced. So when the barrels got here and I looked at them.....and I called the guy up and told him I'm not replacing them! He asked why? I said for starters they are button rifled. Second... I said they are all 6 groove 30cal barrels. We don't make 6 groove 30cal barrels. I looked up his past orders and they only ever bought 4 grooves from us and not a lot of them. Not a steady customer. So either they kept the barrels for themselves and bought cheaper 30cal 6 groove barrels from another shop and tried to pass them off as ours and tried to get them replaced.

Later, Frank
Bartlein Barrels

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Frank a carbon fiber barrel isn't something you could easily throw together in your garage, do you suspect that these 'counter fit' barrels are being made in a large Asian country and being imported into the US? Then sold to unsuspecting gunsmiths or not unsuspecting.
 
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#18
@Frank Green

as for using the serial number as a unique identifier, its only useful as deep as you want to push it from your side

scumbag smith buys 1 barrel from you

records the lot number/ date even keeps the cut off

he now buys "X brand shit barrels" and sells them with the same lot / cut off as the OEM

that "lot number" is now 2,000 barrels if he sells 2000 rifles

customer calls up bartlien and has "correct" information but barrel wont shoot, or confirms that the barrel is a bartlien so he buys the build

its now up to Bartlien to (because you are dealing with a scumbags):

keep track of how may customer contact/verifications per lot number for reconciliation or qty
..if the batch is 500 and you have gotten 600 inquiries something needs to be investigated
contact smith
smith tells you he bought them from XYZ (bartlien will not have any paperwork of the smith in system because he did not pay for them)
bartlien has to contact original supplier
etc

its a long paper trail if your not set up for it internally

not saying dont help the customer out and not saying that smith/scumbag should not be beaten to a inch of his life

but in my real job, i deal in lot numbers and batch quantities coupled with actual and fictitious customer inquiries enough that we have a few people in a department

to do it correct and make it repeatable its takes a pretty well though out process

but then you can start communicating smiths/names confidently which in turn slows down the counterfeiting

i hate people...
 
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#19
Take a look at the attached pic. This is the end of a button rifled blank. You can see how the steel gets deformed when the button goes thru. Button rifling displaces material it does not remove the material. So the closer you cut the o.d. of the blank down and get to where all this pressure/stress is....the machining operation will let it end up relieving the pressure and when this happens...you cannot make it go back.

I've seen it very common with button barrels when you thread the muzzles....the bore opens up and right where the shoulder of the threads are the barrel gets tight again.

I've also seen barrels where the shooters got it so hot during shooting the same thing happens. The bore opens up. This isn't as common but it does happen.

I have my guess as to how made the button cf barrels I posted pictures of but I'll keep that to myself. One it's a guess and two the point of the thread wasn't to hack on this or that barrel maker.

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#20
AllenOne1 said:
Frank a carbon fiber barrel isn't something you could easily throw together in your garage, do you suspect that these 'counter fit' barrels are being made in a large Asian country and being imported into the US? Then sold to unsuspecting gunsmiths or not unsuspecting.
Click to expand...
No made here.

It's not a counterfeit Bartlein Barrel per say...but customer was told he was getting a Bartlein and got something else. Doesn't matter if it was done intentional or not....customer is the one eating it in the end.
 
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#21
Terry Cross said:
Well, . . . . when drinking with buddies anything is edible.
When drinking a lot with buddies, almost anything can be tasty.. . . at least as best as one could recall by the next day.

.
Click to expand...
If you’ve got the taste for pulled pork, a little bird told me that a pellet grill is the only way to go.

I don’t know how you’re smoking it…
 
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#23
Before working in manufacturing I never would have believed the volume of either ignorant or deceptive requests that tech/customer support get on a routine basis. Competitor parts being returned for refund, mechanical failures blamed on our parts but investigation reveals not our parts being used but the same guy shotgun claimed with 5 different companies trying to get anyone/everyone pressured into "helping"... Returning 20 parts asking to be replaced with 200 parts but there's nothing wrong with the 20 parts. It's endless. Weekly if not daily there's a new attempt.

It sucks for the people with honest problems because the tech guy on the phone has to treat everything they say as something that will be used against them for some sheisty crap.
 
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#24
Half of my job as a Field Service Technician was Customer Service. I actually enjoyed a lot of that as I always liked being the hero - walking into a situation where a vital System that worked yesterday stopped working and I got to make it go again and see everybody smile. Unfortunately over the decades of doing it I watched the progression/evolution of the Service and Support Industry change in Ways the have not been wholesome, fun, or even tolerable in some cases.

In the last 25 years I have seen customer service go from people being thankful for the CS Rep's professional skills to them being treated like The Problem instead of The Solution. Lots of reasons why this has happened but it's still sad to see. One of the reasons I retired last January....people are taking advantage of other people just trying to help them or do their jobs. It has turned into a thankless PITA to a large degree I feel for guys like Frank that has to deal with people who have been fleeced by others and they used Bartlein's name to do it. That just sucks.

VooDoo
 
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#30
Terry Cross said:
I'm not tracking.
So you are OK with a rifle builder substituting a cheaper barrel for a requested Bartlein and not telling the customer, thus screwing over their own customer and indirectly Bartlein Barrels as well?

.
Click to expand...

No sir

Saying pain for those slimy lying shitbags vs just a bag of dicks.

This kind of stuff is easily sorted with a good ass whuppin.
 
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#31
Mr. Z said:
👆

As opposed to bags of dicks.
Click to expand...
I'm talking about bag of dicks being sent to the rifle builder.

Pretty sure context is getting lost here.

I think the rifle builder doing this type thing on purpose is a serious sin. My post was simply a jab as said builder(s).
 
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#32
powdahound76 said:
No sir

Saying pain for those slimy lying shitbags vs just a bag of dicks.

This kind of stuff is easily sorted with a good ass whuppin.
Click to expand...
See!
Fucking context!

I was reading this that my pretty knees were the target of said pipe.

I think torpedoing the offending builder/shop on public forums and sinking or seriously injuring their business or a good old fashioned ass whipping would be preferable to a bag of dicks any day but this is not my thread.

I'm just here to unintentionally derail the piss out of it obviously. (Sorry Frank)

Disregard and carry on.
 
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#33
Terry Cross said:
See!
Fucking context!

I was reading this that my pretty knees were the target of said pipe.

I think torpedoing the offending builder/shop on public forums and sinking or seriously injuring their business or a good old fashioned ass whipping would be preferable to a bag of dicks any day but this is not my thread.

I'm just here to unintentionally derail the piss out of it obviously. (Sorry Frank)

Disregard and carry on.
Click to expand...
You gotta know Powda like we know Powda........:rolleyes::ROFLMAO::ROFLMAO:
 
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#34
Terry Cross said:
See!
Fucking context!

I was reading this that my pretty knees were the target of said pipe.

I think torpedoing the offending builder/shop on public forums and sinking or seriously injuring their business or a good old fashioned ass whipping would be preferable to a bag of dicks any day but this is not my thread.

I'm just here to unintentionally derail the piss out of it obviously. (Sorry Frank)

Disregard and carry on.
Click to expand...
Gas leak in the shop is a bitch, wait, what?
 
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#36
Is it just me or do those barrels look like they were made to look like a Bartlein??? I have some CF Bart barrels and those look a lot like them, so much so that it seems to me that could be the idea? Am I way off here or what?
 
#37
Terry Cross said:
See!
Fucking context!

I was reading this that my pretty knees were the target of said pipe.

I think torpedoing the offending builder/shop on public forums and sinking or seriously injuring their business or a good old fashioned ass whipping would be preferable to a bag of dicks any day but this is not my thread.

I'm just here to unintentionally derail the piss out of it obviously. (Sorry Frank)

Disregard and carry on.
Click to expand...

Sorry
Was at my desk waiting on the whizbanger screen machine to spit some numbers at me for work dtuff and didnt proof read to make sure it made good sense to a normal person, and not a crazy old fart like me.

And yeah, I just called a Cajun gun plumber normal….. 🤣
 
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#38
I am in the process of helping a young man begin his precision rifle journey; his hope is to begin shooting matches with next spring's Guardian at Frontline. I am selling him the rifle I started with a few years ago. I bought it lightly used then - Stiller TAC-30 in an MPA chassis, with a Bartlein barrel in 6.5CM.

As of this morning, that barrel had 2,391 rounds on it. It still put Hornady factory 140 ELMDs into 1/2" at 100 and my handloads into 1/3". Nothing but Bartleins for me, from SPR/Bugholes.

The young man had never shot his Bergara 6.5CM past 400 yards, so, behind my rifle, he had a big grin when I told him to dial 3.1, favor right... and he put repeated rounds on a 10" plate at 540 yards. Then I took him up to the 1000 yard range and he grinned some more as I put head shots onto IPSC plates at 600 and 700 yards and, in ferocious mirage, put consecutive rounds on IPSCs at 800-900-1000. (He didn't shoot because he isn't qual'ed to use the 1k range but he could surely hear the impacts; also, I've made him very aware that barrel may die at any time and I have another Bartlein blank from SPR for him when he's ready).

Thanks, Frank, for all you do for this community.
 
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#39
I ordered two .260 Bartlein barrels for my AI from my smith and paid a handsome premium for them. Seemed to shoot well enough, sold the first barrel 1500 rounds later to someone who came back and told me I was lying because it was a button barrel and not a Bartlein. I looked a dick but I still don’t know if my smith screwed me or just made a mistake with my order. Either way, I don’t use him anymore.
 
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#41
Familydude said:
I agree with outing the gunsmith/shop publicly after 100% confirmation they purposely screwed the customer over. Might make others think twice.
Click to expand...

Has to be on purpose.

When you indicate a barrel and part off the chip, you chamber it. What it is is right there.
Busy shop has notes and tags on everything, and if they dont, they arent smart enough to work on my goods.

Chambering a 6 groove button over a 5R cut is NOT a mistake.
 
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#42
Holy shit bags. I can’t say I’m surprised though with the things I’ve seen some shops do over the years.

My company sells kitchen and bath hardware, on more than one occasion we’ve had customers order new knobs and pulls for their kitchen and put their 20 year old grease and shit stained hardware in the box and send it back to us demanding a refund. Stuff that isn’t even similar to what they ordered. They usually double down and file a CC merchant or Amazon A-Z claim when we deny their fraud.
 
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#44
It'd be a + if the barrel manufacturers had some sort of maker's mark engraved somewhere on the outside of the barrel rather than the breech where it's often lost. No more "I don't know whose barrel it was" on a resale, and the customer knows he's getting the blank from the manf he expected and paid for.
 
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#45
Wannashootit said:
It'd be a + if the barrel manufacturers had some sort of maker's mark engraved somewhere on the outside of the barrel rather than the breech where it's often lost. No more "I don't know whose barrel it was" on a resale, and the customer knows he's getting the blank from the manf he expected and paid for.
Click to expand...
Then the scumbags would forge the mark on their junk barrel
 
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#48
hlee said:
If a blank had a barrel maker‘s mark when new, it would likely be removed when the barrel is turned to final dimensions.

But, when ordering a new barrel, the customer could request to have the barrel stub returned with the completed rifle. There’s your proof- of counterfeit or genuine origin.
Click to expand...
Mile High sends you the stub with your new truck axle. Piece of mind.
 
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#50
This is so wrong, but why I'm so adamant on using a trusted and proven smith. I just built a batch of rifles for a project and made sure I went Bartlein. To be sure I got them from Bartlein themselves!

I KNOW WHAT I GOT!

You may can trick someone with the outside, but the magic is in the middle and the results always speak for themselves!
 
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