West London Glass & Pillar Bedding Recommendation?

Toxster

Well-Known Member
Anyone recommend a Smith that can do a good job of glass and pillar bedding my T3 Varmint into a GRS stock? I don't want to go as far as Bisley. I'm in Ealing.
 
Armalon ain't there no more I don't think. I believe there now purely based at the bunker. Mark Bradley would do you a good job he's inside the m25
 
How far can you travel? I would personally recommend Lee Butler, works out of the old EJ Churchill workshops at West Wycombe Shooting School. Highly competent, experienced, and very talented 'smith.
 
How far can you travel? I would personally recommend Lee Butler, works out of the old EJ Churchill workshops at West Wycombe Shooting School. Highly competent, experienced, and very talented 'smith.


Not far atm. WLG quoted £90 to £100 which is fine.
 
Any price that suits tradesman / customer is fine. I once built a 6MMBR for an RFD friend. The build involved : fitting in pre-threaded barrel to Surgeon action, headspacing ready for proof. Then after proof the barrelled action was bedded into a MacMillan stock. The curing of the bedding compound over night took longer than the entire job. The end 'client' was another RFD who was very happy with the rifle, and commented that ''it wasn't only Callum Ferguson who could build brilliant rifles''. A lovely compliment. Not wishing to **** on peoples parades, I only got paid about £80!!!!! Go figure. In reality, once you have a pot of Devcon, you are only using a very small amount when bedding the receiver, so overall with a couple of pillars the materials cost is quite low. Why should there be a problem with a low price?? There are many factors involved in business. Some people are happy to work for fair rates, then at the other end of the spectrum we have big London gun houses with massive overheads and wage bills charging out work at equally massive hourly fees. Jim.
 
The reality is though, if a gunsmith does not charge rates commensurate with the actual cost of a job they will not be gunsmithing for long.
I looked at what it took to pillar and bed a rifle in my own workshop: Measure up and turn the aluminium pillars to size and drill centre holes (1/2 hr), Remove old bedding material or wood from stock below barrel etc (1/2hr), set up drill press to correct depth and forster bit the main pillar hole and rear hole (1/2hr), introduce action to stock and pillars and make any minor adjustments (1/2hr), tape and dam the stock and action, check that all fit with the action, adjust where needed, coat action with release agent, mix bedding compound and assemble the components (1hr), break out action and trim and adjust where needed (1/2hr). That's 3.5 hours and I usually took longer to ensure a really good job. So lets say 4hrs labour plus materials. I don't know what a gunsmith in the UK charges per hour but I used to charge $40/hr (10 yrs ago).
So I'd say that if the GSs in the UK are charging 20 quid an hour then 100 quid for a pillar and bedding job is realistic.
I didn't include the checks done with a bore sighter to check for springing in the action when tightening the stock screws as that is me making sure it doesn't come back with a 'strung' target.
My first post didn't take into account the exchange rate between Stirling and Dollars Au.
 
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Turns out to have been a bit of confusion at WLGR. It's not a service they provide after all. Will probably leave it at Fultons this Sunday as they quoted £165.
 
Turns out to have been a bit of confusion at WLGR. It's not a service they provide after all. Will probably leave it at Fultons this Sunday as they quoted £165.

That strikes me as quite serious confusion, giving you a quote for a service they don't provide! Still, at least that way you need to go to Bisley on Sunday and we can do some shooting at last!
 
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