Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Empire rifles...worth the $$$?

Anyone had any dealings with EMPIRE RIFLES? They were mentioned to me and their rifles look very nice. They do a completely custom Mauser-type short action called the 98S that is just beautiful. It better be for $2700...just for the action!
I have an opportunity to purchase a like new "field grade" Empire rifle for around $4500. Looking at their website, their rifles start at around $5500, so this appears to be a good deal. When I did a little research on Gunbroker, the last one sold was a really nice wood stocked .300 Win Mag that sold for $3900(after being listed twice-no one bought it the first time it was on). Considering the market, is $4500 that good of a deal?

for $300 you can have a decent shooting rifle...

for $600 you can have a decent shooting, nice looking rifle...

for $1200, or a bit more you can have a decent shooting, nice looking rifle, and probably something lighter in weight, or a deluxe wood stock...

some people want more in a rifle, but the price follows a law of diminishing returns...

i've haeld 2 empire rifles in my hands and they were, indeed, nice rifles...
but only you can decide if they're worth 5 times the price of say, a new FN winchester...

JohnW: I think your right on. As I type I have a stainless Win 70 barreled SA action, a McMillan stock, NECG sights and some bottom metal sitting beside me. This makes me wonder why I'm even considering buying the Empire rifle. I like the idea of a no-holds barred "perfect" go-to rifle, but I think they are asking a little much, especially when the resale appears to be so low.

I guess if I made 6 figures I could justify it but I'm upper level blue collar and the truth of the matter is your getting a rifle that's 10% "better" than a Win 70 for almost a 500% price increase. Then there is the non-standard parts that come with a custom action, not that you would need them, it's just nice to know I can get most parts for a M70.

Empire Rifles are more art than work tools. Many many people are art lovers Wish I could afford to be! Hell, you don't go round but once....

You might want to check on AA with a poster "Fish3014". Don is a super nice guy and I think he's had a couple experiences with Empire Arms.

I called them to inquire about buying an action and they wanted full payment in advance and wouldn't specify a delivery time. hmmmmm

Be careful about ordering expensive custom rifles! Be prepared to wait twice as long as you suspect. If it comes in on budget and when they say you can be happy, if it takes longer it's what you really expected........................DJ

Which forum are you refering to when you say "AA"? I talked to George of Empire (the owner?)and he seemed like a nice guy. He was very knowledgeable. I think he mentioned that they have a bunch the actions sitting on the shelf in need of heat treatment. I'm guessing he gets an order for an action and sends it out to be heat treated. Another thought is they keep em' in the non-hardened state in case a customer wants engraving...but I was thinking the engravers did't do their thing until the action was hardened. Don't know much or care for engraving, just seems like you are asking for the rig to rust more.

I hit 6 figures left of the decimal in most good years... I have yet to lead off with a far left digit higher than a "1", though...
no empires in my safe....

sounds like a cool project that you've got in the wings.....

After some Google-fu I did find this not-so-positive review on the Africa hunting forums. I know the internet is not gospel, but this was posted a few weeks ago by what appears to be(by reading his posts) a gentleman who hunts regularly in Africa:

"I wanted to get a feeling out there for Empire. Great advertising and endorsements right. After purchasing a rifle 3 years ago at SCI Reno, I have had nothing but a battle with Empire owner George Sandmann, a snake oil salesman to say the least. The failure of the rifle could be witnessed on Tracks Across Africa where I was hunting lion on a show called "Search for Shumba". After the first shot, I cycled the bolt and the case ejected but did not load another round. You can hear on the video "click" as I take my second shot. It turned out my expensive made to order custom rifle in 375 H&H had a feeding problem when I got home. Well after having the rifle and "fixing it", the rifle again failed me on an elephant hunt in Zim last year. I have at least a hundred emails of correspondence with George Sandmann of Empire and he told me he would purchase the rifle back from me and then today rescinded the offer. What he was paying me was about 30% less than I payed for the defective rifle. He offered to fix it again, but would you trust someone who has failed to build or fix the rifle properly twice to fix it a third time? This is after it was personally tested and signed off by George Sandmann and guaranteed to be fixed. I figure I have 7 lives left after hunting lion, elephant and buffalo with a rifle that is defective. As I have done some investigation Empire does not have rifle makers on staff(they recently added one supposedly), subs out a lot of their work and pieces together their rifles. These gunsmiths that were working on the rifles will not work for him anymore because he owes them large sums of money for work completed. I have had a very reputable gunsmith go through the rifle and there is still major problems with the rifle. He has some great testimonials on the website, but it is a shame when you spend $10,000 on a rifle and it doesn't even work properly(especially when hunting dangerous game). I was at SCI and I witnessed George being chewed out by several clients with his failure to deliver rifles in a time frame promised. I am going to try to post the video for everyone to see the lion get shot and then the second shot failing to load. I can go on and on, but why bother. I am going to take Empire to the SCI ethics committee for fraud and I am in the process of putting together a report for the hunting report. Just want to spread the word and make sure no one else is taken advantage of."

My internet digging also revealed several other individuals who had luke warm experiences with Empire Rifles. For now my money is staying in my pocket and I'm going to stick with my Mod 70s.

My go to rifles for Africa and elsewhere are Model 70's or slicked up CZ's. You are on the right track.

Good advice.

What kind of moron goes to Africa without a proven rifle, anyhow? Shouldn't anyone, ANYONE, try out their rifles before going on an expensive trip? Kripes amighty, it sounds like this bozo DESERVES to be lion crap.

Not that I'm defending Empire Rifles, never heard of them, but the guy who was sniveling about them ain't no peach, either..... I saw a lot of that kind of stuff during my pistol-shooting days, guys got a fancy tricked-out pistol and didn't know how to use it right.

You could go buy a CZ and send it off to Lon Paul for a work over and when you are all done, you would have enough money left over to go shoot something. Or if you if you can afford it and the wait, Have D'Arcy Echol's build you a legend. You would not loose any money on one of those. As for Empire, Its a rifle a fellow builds, so take it for what its worth. Compared to a guy like Echol's he got ads all over and 24/7 that should tell you something. Another option is just call up Mel Forbe's at NULA and be done with it.

Funny and completely true....

This is a perfect example of why I always advocate the carrying of tooth pics as back up.

I feel for the guy, spending 10K for a rifle that won't work. That being said, If I ever went to hunt dangerous game, I'd dang sure have tested, tried and true rifles along for the trip.

And after the first failure, with a Lion no less, That rifle would have had to cycle about 200 rounds flawlessly, before it got another chance to fail me.

JM

I was thinking the EXACT same thing.
Thick in the wallet, thick in the head.

"Another option is just call up Mel Forbe's at NULA and be done with it."

Second that!

It's not that the author took an unproven rifle to Africa(he admits that he took it as a back-up rifle), it's that Empire failed to resolve the issues even after the rifle went back a couple of times. Everyone makes mistakes, but often it's how the individual/company handles those mistakes that make the difference.

If I waited for 2 years for a rifle and it wouldn't run, I'd probably just get my money back. I'm sticking to my Mod 70s and Kimber's.

Agreed 100%. It used to be if you had a bad experience with a company, it was generally held within a small circle of acquaintances. Now, the world can know in less than fifteen minutes.

Over the last week I have communicated at length with the owner of Empire Rifles, George Sandmann. He confirmed that he doesn't build everything in house and subcontracts out several parts of the rifle building process to trusted firms. He seems like a strait shooter, a guy that is just trying to put a high quality product in the hands of (higher) end users. According to him, he has a local guy fit and install the barrels but all other finish work is done in house. The 98S action, a creation of him and Bill Wiseman, are made by an outside firm due to the EDM machining involved. Since my first post, I have been able to handle an Empire Rifle first-hand and the fit and finish seems to be very good. George has also quoted a very reasonable delivery time, well inside every other high end smith that you can think of.

His 98S Mauser action, SHOWN HERE represents everything one could want in a rifle action. He is currently prototyping a version with a standard picatinny rail machined integrally into his action, which should be available shortly. It's very expensive at $2750 for the action, but Dakota's are up over $2K now so what's and extra $700(sarcasm!) I am also aware of fluctuations in the quality of Dakota's actions since the company was sold to Remington.

I'm still thinking about it. These Winchester 70 parts at my side are tempting me(my buddy wants them really bad) but I've always wanted a "no holes barred" custom rifle and I don't want to wait 3-4 years.

I didn't catch the caliber we're looking at (?)

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I've spent $2-2.5K a couple of times (everything's more work for a lefty, it seems) but I'd have a hard time spending much more than that on a bolt action. Any Ruger/Win/CZ could be made pretty spiffy for $3K.

If this is going to be a larger caliber gun, spending a little more for a double would be worth considering. It would hold value much better, not to mention be fitted to you .