Lots of people complain about their guns being "held hostage" but what about the flip side of the situation?
How many pick their gun up promptly when it's finished?
How many guys try to beat up their gunsmith on the price because they
"already have too much into it" or they
"don't want to put that much into it" and expect the gunsmith to feel their pain. How many times has someone asked their gunsmith
"How much can you do for XXX dollars?"Personally, what someone has into the gun or what the gun is worth has zero bearing upon the value of my time.
Asking me to partially subsidize your investment is the fastest way to be shown the door. Any good gunmaker knows the value of his time and charges accordingly, good luck to anyone who shops gunsmithing by price, you'll need it.
If a gunmaker is truly good at his craft, he will have a backlog, no doubt. Accept it or go elsewhere but keep in mind that the "gunsmith" who as no backlog might not be the best choice to work on your prized shotgun.
Also keep in mind that your gun isn't the only gun on the rack.
Gunmaking is an arcane craft which is practiced
well by a damned small number of craftsmen in this country. Anybody who has a QUALITY gun in need of repair and is actually capable of discerning quality work probably already knows this.
In the interest of full disclosure, I am slow and "expensive".
On reason is that I do NOT do collaborative work.
Everything is done in-house, by me personally, because that is the only way to control the quality of the finished product.
Another is that I go to some great lengths to make certain that when a gun leaves the shop, it's right, because I never want to see it again for the same problem.
Here are excerpts from MM's Shotgun Technicana. The chapters entitled "of Time and the Workbench 1&2" should be required reading.
