doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Kody Kearcher's Restoration Job ""HEADS UP""

In the spring of 2015 I sent Kody Kearcher a Wm Sumners and an R2 Ideal Manufrance for some restoration work. Kody and his uncle Keith (now retired) are frequently mentioned on this site by board members as reputable restoration gunsmiths to send work to. I talked to Kody explained what needed to be done and he assured me he could do the work. Prior to sending the guns to him the wood on each gun had been stripped and soaked in acetone for 8 weeks. The work on each was to include:

Sumners
- Relay top rib and refinish to a brown finish
- Rechecker and refinish stock
- Make and install new firing pins
- Build up/repair right striker/cocking indicator
- Blue all screws except those on receiver, trigger guard, triggers and top tang
- Hone out pits in barrels


R2 Ideal
- Make and install wood extension to butt stock to measure 14 inches LOP and install provided retractable sling
- Make new butt plate and install
- Rechecker and refinish stock

I received the restored guns in November 2015. From the following pictures you will see what I got back.

Wm Sumners:

The top rib was relayed, seems solid and the barrels have a nice chime to them. However the bottom rib is now warped. If you run a finger along it is easy to feel and the flux from the soldering has somehow spread onto the underside of the barrel and shows up through the refinish. ( No picture of this.)

This is an English gun and brown to me means �English brown�. I have shown two pictures one with the �PURPLE� Sumners barrels that Kody refinished and newly browned barrels from a WC Scott & Son and another picture of the Sumners and newly blackened barrels from a Remington 1894. I discussed the Sumners barrels with the gentleman who refinished my Remington and he immediately identified them has having been done by Kearcher. It seems the Kearchers� have come up with a cheaper and quicker attempt to brown barrels with some type of dye mixture that is a bastardized american definition of �brown�. In hand they are purple. (No offense to any American reading this.) The etching process to bring the pattern back out on damascus barrels does not begin to compare with what the other tow barrels recently refinished show. Kody�s response was..�oh that is what you wanted. Most of my customers like it this way but send the barrels back and I will redo them�.

upload pic

imagehosting

I mentioned the manufacturer�s engraving on the top rib has been somewhat polished off. Kody said he never touched the engraving . However see the pic from before and after.
Prior to refinish

upload a picture

After refinish

windows print screen

After the return of the guns, Kody told me he doesn�t hone barrels but instead he �polished� them and charged USD$200. I honestly cannot tell any difference from before and after and in any event the barrels needed honing to take the pits out, not polishing. I think that is a discussion he should have initiated with me and made arrangements to sent them out to someone who could do the work. There is enough wall thickness to take out up to 10 thousands if needed. I don�t that is unreasonable as that is what other gunsmiths have done with me in the past.

Refinish of stock: There was no attempt to buffer out dings or scratches, no sealer or method to seal was used, no filling of cracks, escutcheon was left as sent and very difficult to photograph properly but the finish on both the Sumners and Ideal has blemishes, is not smooth, has bubbles and I�m not exactly sure what other language to describe it.

free uploader

photo host

image share

upload image online

You need to look at the recheckering to understand a true �hack job�. As mentioned this is an old English gun made between 1870 and 1880 with original flat top checkering although quite worn down. What I got back was pointed checkering, with uneven lines, over lapping lines, over runs, gouges and different depths of the cut. Not in one place but all over the checkering pattern on the butt stock and forearm! This I think is impossible to repair properly.


image upload no resize

uploading images
[url=http://postimage.org/]

Bad Checkering

upload a picture


When I purchased the gun there were no firing pins in it and the right side striker/cocking indicator was broke and needed to be built back up or replaced.
What I have now is two every uneven firing pins. The left side protrudes to approximately the right length but the right pin barely protrudes (it is just enough to fire a shell). From the front pictures you can see the pins are not finished the same way. The right pin is blunt and flat, the left seems to have proper contours. The pictures from behind the pins show the right pin is not finished flat and looking at the built up striker shows an indent from the pin. Why isn�t the pin finished flat and why is the metal of the built up striker so soft? (I have fired about one box of BP shells out of the right chamber) Even the rear of the pin on the left has a chip in it. I don� understand why both pins are not identical.


how to take screenshots

upload pics

image upload with preview

photo hosting

image hosting over 5mb

I asked Kody why the cocking indicators/strikers had not been painted yellow as they should be and as the left one was when sent to him. He insisted he never touched either the right or left cocking indicator/strikers!

Pic of yellow cocking indicator before refinish.

free photo upload

And after refinish

free photo upload

Kody was to reblue the top lever, triggers, trigger guard and all scews except those on the face of the side plates. He totally missed the screws holding on the butt plate on both the Sumners and Ideal. And the screw holding the top lever has new �bugger� on it.


picture share

R1 Ideal Manufrance


An extension on the butt stock was made and installed with the retractable sling installed. I asked for a 14 inch LOP and 15 inches from front trigger to bottom of heel. I got these measurements from another of my guns that fit well but I didn�t realize there would be a significant difference in the DAC and DAH between the guns. My amateurish mistake. The result is a dramatic pitch that I have never seen on any other shotgun and makes the Ideal unshootable. I talked to Kody and he said he thought it was wrong and said he should have called me to discuss but didn�t. He is the �expert�. He just made it as asked. The man clearly does not understand pitch on a shotgun stock!


picture share

The finish on the stock is the same as the Sumners. Not sealed, no attempt to buffer out dings and scratches, bubbled, rough finish. As well the butt plate to stock fit is very poor and the extension seam to the butt stock is not filled, and shows quite vividly.


image sharing sites

image hosting over 10mb

http://postimg.org/image/cptafh8tb/

Above is a picture of the back of the �new� butt plate in the condition that I received it from Kody.

The checkering is as �professional� of a job as that as was done on the Sumners�.uneven lines, overlapping lines, gouges and uneven cuts, over laps, you name it!

[url=http://postimage.org/]
free image host

20mb image hosting

And last there is a missing piece and screw that sits just behind the lunette triggers. Kody said he never received them. I have had this discussion with gunsmiths in the past about lost parts. Now I take a picture of everything I send to a gunsmith so I have some proof in the event something goes missing. This Ideal with lunette triggers is not common and it is almost impossible to source an original part, but I do have some helpful board members looking for me. Kody said he would make a new one. However, he has to match the metal and color, fit it properly and have it engraved to the same engraving that was on the original or as done on a R2 Ideal with lunette triggers. Judging from the work he has done I doubt he has the skills to do the job. I�m not sure what the cost of replacement in the US would be but I have a quote from a Canadian gunsmith/engraver and it is in the $400 - $500 range.

With the part

free upload

Without the part

image upload no ads

Kody has said he stands behind his work and in a phone call and through email says he had done a good job and doesn�t understand what I am complaining about. He said to send the parts back and he would fix them. I live in Canada and the technicalities and logistics of taking guns to the US to be repaired is a lot of work, time and expense. I do not believe Kody has the expertise to do a proper job and I would not in any circumstance send him any gun in any shape to do anything with ever again. I asked for USD$1500 return of the USD$2760 that I paid him to do the work. He told me to bugger off!

I�m really am not sure what to do. If I was in the US I would sue him for the replacement value of both guns as I don�t see how some of the damage can be repaired back to a value the guns should be at. And Kody has washed his hands. So my only option is to post this message on all the popular shotgunning boards on the net so all can be aware of the type of work that Kody does and his enduring customer service.

Heads up to all!

Wow! Sorry to hear and see your misfortune, what a shame. If he told you to F-off, guess there may not much you can do other than small claims court. But with you being in Canada, I don't know how that would work, if at all.

I used to send all my Smithing work to Keith, never had a bad job, always exceptional work. I recommended him to a friend and also his buddy, they sent their guns in to Keith and the work that was done was not up to snuff for Keith's normal work. One of the guys had a choke opened and the muzzle was all buggered up. Sent it back, was fixed up some, but you could still see the damage. This was just before Keith retired. I'll bet Keith didn't do the work, perhaps......someone else?

Again, sorry about your guns, what a shame and let down. Thanks for posting.

Best!

Greg

Holy crap! I knew that Oregon legalized medical and recreational marijuana use. I didn't know that they also legalized crack.

Wow; that's enough to make a guy sick.

This is the kind of thread that makes this bulletin board so valuable. The detailed photos fully make the OP's argument...Geo

In the early 2000s I sent a Pair of Parkers to Keith for some minor restoration work. I say "minor" because nothing was broken or cracked, the guns worked fine, but the finishes were very, very tired. One was a a VH with Infallible Trigger, and the other was a GH Damascus with fishtail top lever. When the VH came back, the gun looked good at 20 feet, but there were a lot of flaws. Lots of very minor pits in the bluing that should have been filed or sanded out, but that could be all be fixed with a proper reblue. The biggest problem on that gun was that the side of the buttstock had been sanded so much that it was noticeably dished, and that can't be fixed. I had some knowledgeable gun guys look at it and they agreed that it had been botched. The boys at Ivory Beads looked at it and agreed. My comment to Jim at IB was that the stock work looked like it had been done by a twelve-year-old. Jim said that Keith had a kid working with him and may have had the kid prep the stock. Kody? I dunno. I shot the gun once, put it away and have not looked at it since. I called Keith and had him send the GH back to me with no work done.

On the subject of Damascus refinishing, Keith used to offer browning and what he called "black and white." I saw some barrels at IB that he had refinished, and they looked OK, but the B&W was really pretty brown and not appropriate for most American classics. Jim at IB told me that he thought Keith was shortcutting some of the process to save time, and that was why the B&W came out brown. Finish was fine, but the color was wrong, so I never sent anything else for work.


Pretty much where I came down on the VH. Not to justify sloppy quality, but I had another nationally known double gun guy do some work on a couple of mid-grade guns. One is so botched that I have never even bothered to shoot it, and the other came back with chunks of walnut missing after a stock bending exercise. That one is still in pieces, gathering dust. If this clown had saved the chunk of walnut that blew out during the bend, it would be a fairly straightforward repair, but no such luck. Same guy did some work on another of my Parkers, and the result was so bad that it had to go to a different smith for a do-over. The second guy got it right, but it added hundreds of dollars to the cost of the job. Bottom line is that the truly good smiths seem to be few and far between.

Please note that it was Kody who did he work, not Keith. My understanding is that Keith is retired and no longer works on guns.

If so called Fine Gunsmiths send back crappy work, & you can prove it by before n after picks,or other means... I think it a best to mention names, as the OP did here.Others have posted similar stories,but names were not mentioned , or at least it was like pulling teeth to get them to tell.
Speak up, those who have been screwed over, we should know about it, don't you think?
franc