I guess I was trying to say in a polite way that if you've never had a Burgess or similar floormetal then you don't know what you're missing. Please understand that I'm not trying to say in any way that what you have is not worth having. It is obviously worth the money you spent because you are very happy with it.
There is a moderator on another forum that flies off the handle any time a Dakota rifle is mentioned and he basically states that anyone who bought a Dakota is stupid for wasting his/her money and a factory M70 should have been bought instead. It just seams like a petty class envy thing.
I think those interested in custom rifles should subscribe to more of a class appreciation theory and not get pressured into thinking the rifles they currently have or build are the only ones worth spending money on. When I started gunsmithing school I was tickled that I might learn to build a rifle stock that was as pretty as a factory REM 700 BDL. At that time I thought the BDL stock was the cat's @$$. You know all those white line spacers and cool pressed checkering. I didn't know that there were many other classes of rifles and had no way of appreciating them. Now I do but don't have the attitude that the BDL is cheap junk. I think it serves its purpose very well and there's no reason to berate it.
As Terry and many others can attest, the more you study fine rifles and the more in depth posts like ForrestB's Rigby that show the detail and dedication of both customer and gunmaker, the more the bug starts biting.
I can think of worse things to be bitten by.
