Is gunsmithing a dying art?

[policerevolvercollector]

I needed the services of a 'smith recently & was surprised to find very few still around. Oh, you can find someone to replace a part on your Glock etc. But, a good revolver guy seems to be scarce. I guess it's something akin to a "real" stand alone barber shop. Now, we have to go to a place in a shopping center that mass produces haircuts.

 

[pawngal]

Yes, it is a lost art around here, the last smith passed away several years ago.
Same with real watch repair people.
Do still have a couple of real barber shops tho.

 

[cobra44]

Yes it is. There are still a limited number around here. Like mentioned above - some people replace parts on Glocks and people call them gun smiths.
There are a couple of barber shops still around. But, just try to find a shoe repair guy.

 

[Rastoff]

Yes, they are diminishing just like any true art form.

A long time ago, all guns required the services of a skilled smith. Many parts had to be hand fitted or the gun wouldn't work. Even the loose fitting and rattly guns like the original 1911, needed some hand fitting.

Time marches on and manufacturing processes improve. Now there are many guns made that need little to no hand fitting at all. This speeds manufacturing and increases reliability. Unfortunately, the cost of that is a loss of care in the assembly process.

What's worse is the gun owners. Because we have become used to things that need little maintenance, we aren't used to paying for quality work. I hear guys complain all the time about the cost of gun smith services or anything to do with guns. They think a rate of $65/hr is outlandish. Because of this, a gun smith cannot make a living as a smith anymore. Thus only the retired and hobbyist are smiths any more.

Many that call themselves gun smiths are really just glorified armorers. I can do a better job than they can. One smith I know of charges $35/gun for a cleaning and takes more than a month to accomplish it. That's horrible service in my book.

 

[Diamondtreo]

Maybe not "dying", but definitely close to old age. Almost 40 years ago I graduated from Oregon Institute of Technology with a 2-year degree in Gunsmthing.

At that time, making a living as a 'smith was tough unless you went to work for someone else or had deep pockets to see you through a few years of lean times while you got a clientele built up. The AR and AK designs were still new, but it didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out how easy it was to work on one of these new designs.

In order to graduate, we had to build our own rifle from either a military or commercial action; cut, contour, thread, chamber & headspace the barrel; finish the metalwork; and inlet either a semi-finished stock or fully carve & inlet a blank; mount a scope or sights; etc., etc., etc.. In those days, a nice Remington or Winchester could be bought over the counter for much less than a gunsmith would changer for building a custom & military surplus rifles were beginning to increase in collector value. The days of customizing cheap bring-backs or surplus were coming to a close.

Today, anybody with basic machining skills can build a "black" rifle from parts & most shops will follow the automotive industry's practice of just replacing parts until it it s fixed for most production arms. The cost of labor has done more to drive this trend, I believe, than anything else.

In my musings, I have asked myself the same question - and answered in this manner: Stoner's design of locking the bolt head into the barrel completely changed the ballgame in that now, chambering and headspacing were no longer a craftsman's task. Modern production techniques improved the tolerance envelope to the point where parts are truly interchangeable. Anybody who has worked on an M1 Garand, bolt action Mauser, Lee-Enfield, etc., and an AR variant will agree that with the change in design and production methodology came a new era in craftsmanship. Now, a "gunsmith" takes a plane jane M4 carbine, hangs a bunch of accessories on the rails & calls it a "Custom Rifle".

As far as pistols & revolvers go, the polymer frame pretty much did away with any opportunity for modification by non-factory personnel. Good revolvers are either in the hands of collectors who know how to work on them, or tucked away in somebody's safe collecting dust because the owners don't want to break them. I would guess that revolver work is the closest today to what gunsmithing was 50 or 75 years ago as function and design haven't changed over the years. Many of us do our own work, having learned either by trial & error or by watching videos on youtube.

Liability has become such a large issue that many smiths don't want the trouble or can't afford the added insurance. After earning the gunsmithing degree, I returned to OIT & earned a 4-year Engineering degree which basically fed, sheltered & clothed my family for the next 35 years. Along the way, another Engineering and an MBA degree saw me to the close of my working years. For the last 15, I was intimately familiar with the F-22 Raptor airframe design and production. Now I have time to learn the infinite nuances of real gunsmithing. LOL

A couple of the guys I went to school with stuck with it & are still in the gun business that I know of - One of them is recognized as the GURU of .22 ammo in the industry & was one of the designers of the SPEER Gold Dot ammo family. Everybody else went to work in other industries where they could count on a steady paycheck. Ok, I have vented enough......

 

[Skeet 028]

The cost of insurance is one thing that drove me out of the business... as well as the specter of getting sued. Actually I had to have a real job to pay the bills. Luckily worked in a fire dept with it's attendant work schedule. I did trigger work on S&W revolvers and realized that people sometimes wanted the unobtainable/unsafe so quit that. Much of my gun work income was derived from firearm cleanings and repair of guns that were "improved" by their owners. Also most of the work was on shotguns mainly because that was what the majority of the shooters used in my area. Oh a cleaning job was usually done within 2 days 3 at the most and cost 30 bucks for most. Some were a bit more due to complexity. I must admit at certain times I did acquire a backlog of repair work. Money earned really didn't make gunsmithing a lucrative endeavor. For some reason I just liked it. Without the income from my other work and gun and reloading sales I would not have stayed in the business for almost 40 yrs. My real enjoyment came from building rifles(and shooting them) though..in an area where I was one of very few using rifles. I did not care for checkering stocks. Lol

 

[Ray]

In Brazil, at least in Rio de Janeiro where I live I guess you can say so .As a matter of fact I´ve only knew one , a friend of my father, but he´s gone a long time ago.
Here the gun control crowd have absolute control. It´s hard to find a gun shop let alone a gunsmith.São Paulo is better, though.Think of Rio as something like California, the reign of the mindless lefties.

Regards, Ray

 

[Brian41]

They are tough to find here too. The guy that repaired a double shotgun for me several years back retired soon after. He worked out of his home with lower overhead and prices were good as well as his work.
Another good one a few miles from here had a gun store as well to help support his business. He did excellent work and built race guns back when they were popular for PPC. He has also retired although I understand his son has taken over and is good as well.
There also is a large gun shop here that does work as well. They butchered a gun I took there many years ago but have new owners now so can't judge them for that anymore.
I think a couple other shops still do some work but believe what they do is fairly limited. I've been fortunate I've not had need of gun smithing services often.

 

[cmort666]

The guy who used to do all the work on my handguns died last Christmas.

There however doesn't seem to be (or ever will be) a shortage of BAD "gunsmiths".

 

[chaparrito]

My smith is a personal friend. He retired from a Forest Service career and studied smithing at our community college, which has a program of pretty good repute. Good enough that only about half that enroll actually finish the certification. He does it for the love of doing it. He builds gorgeous, silky shooting highly reliable 1911s for a few select friends and charges next to nothing for them. He's gone thru all my revolvers and tweaked them for me, trouble-shot a couple successfully. I only know of two other full time gunsmiths in the area and neither professes any expertise with wheel guns.
I had to learn to do the valve adjustment on my 79 diesel Mercedes; a car built to last forever. No place to hook up a code reader so the teenagers who call themselves "mechanics" just shake their heads. Disposable cars. Disposable guns. Pretty sad.

 

[Bill Bates]

A good smith is hard to find if it is anything beyond replacing a part. Locally we have one guy that is pretty darn good. He can build a lot of parts and fit them. He can repair a broken stock and you'll be hard pressed to find the repair. He does things quickly and returns finished work as promised and not in what many think of as "gunsmith time". But he is even a bit older than this gray haired old guy. I wouldn't be surprised if he said he was going to retire soon.

If you really want a gunsmith that is tough to find; try looking for a good gunsmith you would trust a side by side shotgun. I can count on the fingers of one hand all the gunsmith in the county I would trust with a double gun and I would have fingers left over. Thankfully one of them is a youngish German gentleman that I hope will be around for years.

 

[Skeet 028]

Disposable cars. Disposable guns. Pretty sad.

Disposable mechanics too. I used to do some work on O/Us and doubles also. In fact when I go back east I have 4 of them to work on for a couple friends. One is a kinda high grade gun that I am going to service..the rest are pretty much easy fixes I think. When I moved west one of my friends bought a lot of my tools parts etc. He works on refurbishing older 22s and single shot type shotguns. He actually does pretty good work. He is patient and one of those who thinks before he tinkers. Gonna take him an old Craftsman metal lathe from my shop back there. He picks up my powders and primers and stores 'em for me so I have them to bring back west. I taught him rust bluing and he does well at it.

 

[WR Moore]

While CNC machining is good, the idea that you can drop any AR pattern bolt into any barrel and get acceptable headspace is dangerous. The FMs for armorers requires the use of headspace gauges to verify proper bolt fit.

What you have there is called "selective assembly". The guys building the uppers try a bolt off the production line with headspace gauges. If it fits properly fine. If not, it goes into a too loose/too tight bin for trial in another barrel.

Have people gotten away with it? Sure. People drive too fast also and we see the results on the nightly news.

It is hard to find a good 'smith. There have always been a bunch of folks around who were nothing but parts changers. There have also always been folks around known as gun butchers.

 

[Kinman]

Yes, in the same way nearly all of old school mechanical arts are dying off. Its been years since you actually had a mechanic work on your car, usually they are parts replacers. The same is true of many of those "professions", even driving used to be an art, shifting non-synchromesh transmissions required skill and let alone effort, not to mention the lack of power steering and power brakes.
I have a good friend who is in his 90's, he was "the" gunsmith we all trusted, he could fix anything. I have another friend that builds museum quality muzzleloaders, his work is simply amazing. As far as true gunsmiths go they are few and far between. We have a couple of decent AR mechanics in the area that do excellent work but thats not exactly gunsmithing. There are a couple of guys that are very good certified Glock mechanics but that ain't exactly gunsmithing either. A true gunsmith can make a gun from practically nothing but pieces of metal and wood. Gunsmiths can fix stuff that breaks, not just replace it and in the process make it look as if nothing ever broke. It doesn't take a gunsmith to install a scope, it does take a bit of skill to install some scope mounts. Its an art form if performed properly, I hate to see stuff that looks like somebody with backward mounted hands worked on it, some people should never be allowed to hold hand tools on penalty of a severe beating.
That friend of mine that builds muzzleloaders once entered one of his pistols before the Guild for examination, he had built it from scratch, lock and everything. In the end he was told "I'm sorry but I just can't find anything wrong."

 

[Kernel Crittenden]

Many that call themselves gun smiths are really just glorified armorers.

This!
............

 

[Old 44 Guy]

I agree. At my age all the old gunsmiths I knew & dealt with are gone. Kurt Hasse, Bruce Stevens, Frank Leaman, Larry Boal, etc. Just one remains in Oregon. I talked to him yesterday. He works from home & is retired so has time to rebuild old rifles. I did some gunsmithing years ago but age & eyesight stopped that.A real tough way to make a living.

 

[pmosley]

I wish @fastbolt was my neighbor.

 

[7shooter]

I have one who is retired from S&W who specializes in revolvers and still does work for S&W . I tell him we are both dinosaurs.

 

[Laketime]

The current generation likes disposable/ replaceable everything.A lot of things are fading around us.

 

[judge]

I started working on S&W revolvers around 1970, and I'm still at it. I found out a long time ago, you can't make any real money at it. I do it more as a hobby, and for the satisfaction of pleasing the customer. When S&W went from 3 basic sizes (J,K,L) frame, parts supply became a nightmare. It was always easy to stock the basic parts, and the factory shipped them out fast. I never had trouble with parts orders in the 1970's and 1980's. Too many different models today, and you have to have a HUGE parts inventory to keep up. I always let the factory do the bluing, and replace barrels if needed. The rest is not too difficult if you have some experience.