Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats Rifle builder in the midwest/ East

Damn...

He never ever done anything he said he would. He was sent top shelf materials. He was asked to assemble them. After a long time he said he was busy. My fried was about to drive up there but he said he would get it together and shipped. That was BS too but he done it. I had to email him and pm him from here telling him to respond to my friend because I felt bad I recommend him. He did finish the gun but like I said he didn’t crown it and the bedding had to be rebedded. It looked pretty but rocked back and forth like a fat kid on a see saw. I hate to say this but I felt terrible dealing with a friend getting such a raw deal based on my recommendation

I'm not made of money,never will be. That said....
I grew up in the a time , a man's word and a handshake was all you needed to seal a deal. The older I get , the more I appreciate honesty and good customer service.

Get with Karl or Shaen

Karl is a straight up good person ! He did some bolt fluting and cerakote work for me. He called me after sending the barreled action back. Wanted to make sure I was 100% happy with the work done !

He was hours away,now he's multiple time zones away...
Dang you Karl !

Kevin Weaver does great work for me as well. I know the OP wants to hand the parts over, but if you call Kevin, he will email you an UPS shipping label to ship your parts to him. He also makes a build sheet and lists everything that is supposed to be worked. Makes it fair, since you can change or add things to the list.

And that's too bad. I know it happens, but on a recommendation is the worst.

I would use him in a second based on your recommendation.

Kinda confused about the fellers problem with Eddie. Myself and several friends have used him and were very pleased.
I've known John Pierce for many years. I have 2 customs built on John's receivers. One is a 6.5x47L with walnut from Australia and a 280AI on one of his Ti receivers.
John was in the high end engine building early on. He did experimental engine work for GM and others. He has a very nice CNC shop and has always been a great guy. John did the wire EDM work for me when I was doing CZ452 triggers.

Nothing confusing at all. I recommended him to a close friend based on his reputation here. My friend sent him all the parts and causally asked a ball park time frame. He said something like 6 weeks. My friend knowing things happen didn’t try to contact him until about 3 months and then it was just to make sure everything was ok. Eddie told him he was very sorry and had been busy. No big deal. He told him he would get it in the next couple of weeks. After a couple more months my friend tried to contact him again and he wouldn’t reply to him. I sent him a message asking him to contact my friend and explained my situation where I recommended him to a friend and how poorly things were going. He apologized again and gave another time frame which wasn’t met. The rifle finally arrived and it didn’t shoot like a 6BR defiance action brux or bartlien barrel McMillan stock NF scope should. After the whole bad experience he put the gun up and just forgot about it for a bit. After getting it back out we noticed the barreled action didn’t set right in the stock. The bedding looked amazing but it rocked and we determined the recoil lug was bottomed out. So we dremeled out some of the pretty bedding and skim bedded that. During all the trouble shooting we noticed the barrel didn’t really seem to be crowned. Now I’m not saying it was just chopped off flat. I also know some crowns are slightly different than others. With that said the crown was not like anything either of us has had before or since then. So he had the barrel crowned. After the bedding tweak and crown the gun is a tack river. I have absolutely no axe to grind and nothing against Eddie. I just wanted to share my experience. Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything about this but I would hate for someone else to have the same experience we did.

Thanks for the updates on info.
I did email Pierce with some questions.


Anyone can have a bad time or mistake with a project. To me it's all about it gets handled in the end .

I think you did the right thing. It’s good to know all sides before sending 1000’s of bucks worth of good stuff off.

I can also recommend Eddie... Top notch..

Redneck put a 280AI together for me that is top shelf. It was a pleasure dealing with him.

Bullshitting about the timeline/schedule is pretty much the norm for gunsmiths isn’t it? Honestly, I’ve only dealt with 4 or 5 but Shaen is the only one that kept his word and no BS. Melvin was delayed but told me that ahead of time. Had several blatantly lie about progress and excuses.

Dave at ITD was stand up as hell too.
Sucked when he quit.

Kevin has been darned good as well. The only delays with him is components. My brother waited a long time for a Legend for his last rifle, but that was out of Kevin's control and he told us about it.

Other wise he has been fairly quick, especially when he has all of the parts sitting there.

Full disclosure, I’m a building contractor and my industry is just as bad or worse for bullshitters….

We completely knew going in about times. We were not the petty new guys in any way. It was just that he missed his own given deadlines by triple the time. That wasn’t even as bad as not communicating. I don’t mean to imply that my fried called him and he didn’t answer. I mean my friend left messages and didn’t get a reply in a week. Normal communication with regular people would have changed everything.

I’ve never held anyone to a deadline at all. I understand things happen and I don’t want to use the person that’s setting around with nothing to do…haha.

I’ve used Mickey Coleman several times Lee/Redneck Dave at IT&D several times PacNor GAP and others that post here with great experiences.

Lots of good options to look into . Thanks guys for all the info, good ,bad or otherwise.

Now to just find a few more parts and talk with some people about the work !

Hope everyone has a great day.


Tim

I have used Eddie and he did a fine job but it was only cerakote work. Karl is absolutely top notch if he is building rifles. Also had Pacnor put a few together that I am happy with.

Bob Green was my go to for the last decade or so and he has built friends and I about 10 rifles total and is a true gentleman and an excellent gunsmith who had very good turnaround times and prices but it sounds like maybe he is done, been off the grid since Covid hit. I sent my last pile of parts to Shaen since I couldn’t get ahold of Bob and I am very impressed with the rifle he sent back, in exactly the amount of time he said it would take. Shaen will be getting my next project. Lots of good choices and a great time to be building rifles.

Eddie built three rifles for me, all first rate and fully in accord with my specs. Nothing lately (my gun safe is full) so things might have changed. But his past record is very good and you live in Michigan, so why not take a drive to Luna Pier and see Eddie in his shop?