Thread: Hardy Custom Rifle Review

Originally Posted by .300 RUM Guy

I so pity you boi. I've been in pursuit of accuracy ever since I 'fatally' first read Greg Duley's write up about the Ultimate Handloads, back in 2008, around the time he first started his NZ Hunter magazine, and I may, 'MAY' (with no real degree of certainty) be only just starting to realize my dream about now.

Through personal experience I can tell you first hand, it's neigh upon impossible to find a good competent gun smith/builder within New Zealand, that can slap together a rifle with any degree of accuracy worth writing home about, and I've been through the best of them, believe you me, and 'yes' brother Dan's been one of them!

Advice: If you must go through the painful 'custom build' route, then 'do' build it out of, like you say, a Defiance or a Surgeon type 'American factory trued' Action. 'Don't' build it out of a trued Remington or other 'needing to be' trued action (especially a Hardy action if 'he' makes them from from scratch) Remember, the point of this exercise is to keep incompetent NZ hands that need to do such work, to a bare minimum. It is incredible 'nail biting' stuff knowing that you're at work all day and some NZer is doing 'ANY' work to your rifle, let alone any work that's vital to accuracy!

Second lot of advice: Make damn sure you have an "ENDLESS SUPPLY" of cash... Believe in me, you're gonna need it! With gun building even a "firm written quote" is 'ONLY' a rough estimate at best, always allow 2 or 3 'large' above what they quote as a bare minimum (that way you 'may' have enough change at the end of it to buy yourself a celebratory bag of fish & chips, or something of that nature 'SHOULD' , in the unlikely event, the build emerge a success) and remember, there are no accuracy guarantees, as, despite what 'YOU', 'the naive customer' may believe, you're only paying for their "time" and NOT quality of workmanship or accuracy guarantees. They may say there is a sub harf MOA guarantee (which seems to be the standard crap you tend to hear a lot in custom gun building circles theses days, it's what the customer 'wants' to hear) but at the end of the day there's not, you're totally on your own with regards to accuracy! If it shoots like shit, they'll simply tell you that it doesn't like that particular bullet, or that 'you' can't shoot for shit or 'you've' somehow pulled the barrel off the rifle, or grow a fuc%@kn brain, or something of that nature, rest assured that whatever happens, it is "NEVER THEIR FAULT"! Cash wise, in the past 9 years it has cost me inXS of some $40,000 in the name of accuracy, again, trust in me, it's true!

Thirdly: Before going ahead with 'ANY' custom rifle build, slip your hands down your underpants and have a damn good feel around first. If you feel a swelling, lump or bulge, that 'shouldn't' normally be there (other than perhaps the barr-on that you may be experiencing, over the thought of your new rifle build) then 'DON'T' whatever you do, go ahead with the build... you'll be dead before you see it! Be warned, a custom rifle build takes forever plus one day!

Follow these simple, basic principals and you shouldn't go too far wrong... Have fun

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