Self Assembly vs Smith

[bohem]

Do you see any bench rest competitions being won with say a patriot valley prefit?

People have, I even posted the picture and a screenshot with the thank you email from the customer about a year ago the last time this type of thread showed up.

The response from someone was "OK Boomer"

But it has happened and people win matches, place well in matches, shoot quarter MOA groups, etc very regularly with our prefits.



You want a Smith that uses your reamer.. no sweat. We offer that on prefits.


You want someone to hand fit a barrel to your action. No sweat we offer that too.

We even go one step further and provide all the critical dimensions of the fitting process to you, the action owner, upon completion of the first job. We can now make you hand fit prefits without seeing your action as long as you don't lose the tag. So can any other gunsmith with any machinist skills... if the guy cacan'you need to find another gunsmith. Believe me,, that accusation has come up too. And then the customer came back and asked me if I could fix what the other, cheaper guy boogered up.

Want to send your action in? Sure, we can do that too. Nobody does though because after 1 hand fitting I can hit the thread and headspace dimensions closer with my CNC equipment and 5 decimal place thread micrometers than your ever going to be able to repeat going "by feel" alone.

There is a reason that we pioneered the prefit market for the same reason Chad pushed on CNC equipment to make rifles. It is faster, more repeatable, and better consistency in the long run. @longriflesPiomeered CNC barrel fitting. Chad took shit from The Establishment saying that a CNC wouldn't be able to make a good gunsmithing setup. He has proven that Establishment wrong.

Similarly we have followed with CNC equipment and extended the practice to making prefits. In 2014 I took it on the chin from Naysayers on all sides. Now, the same gunsmiths who campaigned against prefits to their customers are making them.

Now I get competitors that call and ask me.for tye info to make a new prefit almost immediately after we begin offering it. They can put in the homework themselves.

The rifle you get built is your business. What is my business though is making exceptionally high quality prefits at prices that are hundreds of dollars lower than many others... and we do it while accounting for the things you state that we overlook.


Customer reamer - check
Custom throat via dummy rounds - check
Hand fitting - offered AND documented
Dialed in bores at both ends - check
Hand lapped barrels - check

I've got a Mausingfield from before ARC standardized the headspace to what it is today. Bought a used PVA Dasher barrel to give it a shot and see if I was lucky, but it turns out my action headspaces about 10 thousandths longer than the new ones. I've got the PVA barrel set aside in my closet marked with tape as a "6mm DasherX" since the shoulder's pushed forwards like that!

If you want to fix it hit me up with an email, that is an easy and inexpensive change to make for you.

 

[Rob01]

Having had hand fitted custom rifles for a couple decades I recently jumped into the prefit market for my TL3 action. I had never had one but spoke with friends of mine with them and they were getting great accuracy and reliability so I figured I would give it a try. I had PVA do a 6.5 Creed and .223 barrel for it. Both fit perfectly, are accurate and also feed perfectly. I am sold on it. Prefits will not put any rifle smiths out of business or cause costs to go up. There will always be markets for good smiths and you can see that from their waits now. But prefits will allow people to make easy changes at home while not giving up accuracy or reliability.

Oh and I have had PVA put on a few barrels on my Surgeon action and it only had to get sent in for one and then the others were made from the saved measurements and fit like the handfitted version. As Josh said there is a lot of ignorance in this and prefits now. Some people will learn and some will just stick to their baseless opinions.

 

[Mdfowlman2]

Just in the name of ruffling some feathers I might just order a PVA prefit 300prc tonight

 

[gconnoyer]

Taking the dive into the custom side, starting to get parts together. I'm getting a TL3 from another SH member, and watching for a 6.5 CM prefit barrel to pop up in the PX. A Bravo and a trigger and I should be in decent shape.

My question is, is there a compelling reason to send it all to a smith to put together, or is it pretty much llug and play? Seems like a lot of guys are moving components around all the time themselves, but I also see where some are buying assembled rifles direct from a smith that seem to just be assembled parts. Is this just a divide between tinkerer's and non-tinkerers, or am I overlooking something thinking I can put one together from parts as a first build?

If you are mechanically inclined and have the tools, there's honestly no reason you cant do it yourself or need a smith.

The reason to have a smith do it, is just for someone without the tools, or lacking knowledge. Maybe a few little tips/tricks that they've learned that you maybe have no clue you even would need to know or think of.

i.e. small little stupid tip for making barrel removal easier later, put a little antisieze on the shoulder of the action instead of JUST the threads.

Other than that or diagnosing some problem and making everything work correctly, its all super simple to do yourself

 

[spife7980]

Just in the name of ruffling some feathers I might just order a PVA prefit 300prc tonight

You won’t regret it, all 4 of mine so far are great and I never had to send in a thing.

 

[Rob01]

If you are mechanically inclined and have the tools, there's honestly no reason you cant do it yourself or need a smith.

The reason to have a smith do it, is just for someone without the tools, or lacking knowledge. Maybe a few little tips/tricks that they've learned that you maybe have no clue you even would need to know or think of.

i.e. small little stupid tip for making barrel removal easier later, put a little antisieze on the shoulder of the action instead of JUST the threads.

Other than that or diagnosing some problem and making everything work correctly, its all super simple to do yourself

Yup if you can screw a bolt into a nut then you can put together a shouldered prefit. It’s that simple.

 

[Win223]

Maybe we need a “Show Off Your Prefit” thread so guys can demonstrate how they’ve overcome the incredible handicap of having to use a prefit barrel to achieve accuracy.