Humpty Dumpty,
Your assumptions about bespoke echo mine before I started asking awkward questions. Such as:
If I supply you the stock blank, taking the risk of any mishaps due to fualty aging, and want it delivered unfinished, uncheckered, can it be done?
Can I have it totally unenegraved?
Extractor not ejector?
The response invariably was yes, but it will cost MORE because it forces deviation from our normla production process. What normal production process is used in the making of "bespoke" guns? What adds to the cost by NOT doing costly work like building and timing ejectors, engraving, stock finishing? Why not credit the buyer with the cost of the stock blank at least!
After a few of these responses I got the idea. And it was about then I came across Bob Brister's comments that if you have not been diddled by a gunmaker you haven't lived. It was written in response to the comment "our clients do not close their own guns" he and some friends got at a London establishment when they pointed out that self openers tend to be hard closers. So I was in good company.
Something is not right in this bespoke game.
Comparisons are inevitable. A Ferrari is 2 tons of hand worked metal, with blue printed engines, and lots of specialised hand work. The upholstery has over a million hand stitches. Cost per kilogram 200 bucks, cost per kilogram of a bespoke gun 40 000 USD.
No way I will accept that the brazing and finishing of two shotgun barrels is anywhere near as complicated as the fitting of 12 cylinders in a bluprinted engine. Credulity has its limits.
Last edited by Shotgunlover; 08/16/13 06:43 PM.
