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So Ted . . . you don't like Darnes? You don't like any American-made doubles? No disc-set strikers on any of them. Do you know of lots of Darnes with broken strikers? How come you sold those inferior French guns for so long? Or is the disc-set striker thing a recent epiphany?

And you're talking about anecdotes, Ted. How many American guns do you know that have broken strikers? SKB's? Mirokus? Probably good to get opinions from gunsmiths, but I've never had a broken striker on either an SKB, a BSS, or a Daly/Miroku-marked sxs. Can't recall ever hearing any complaints from any people who own those guns. So you know of a case or two of a broken striker on a 700. Something on the order of 30,000 of them were made. (Compare that to a particular Spanish model with comparable bells and whistles--like ejectors--like the AyA 4/53.) And a bunch of them were exported to the States.

As for what's needed to make a new set of strikers, most of us are not lathe operators. And you want to make sure that they're of steel of the proper hardness. Heck, you could make one from a nail in a pinch . . . but I don't know how long it would last. And you get the length wrong, you have either pierced primers (a little too long) or dimpled primers and no boom (too short). If I were you, I'd swap that spare pair you're proud of and try them out with a few boxes of shells. Just to make sure everything is good to go.

Re your evaluation of Kyrie . . . take a look at his interpretation of "the good, the bad, and the ugly". He describes a gun with a 12 1/2" LOP as "very good". OK I guess, if you're a midget or want to add 2" or so worth of extension to the butt. Likewise a couple with busted stocks and very poor repairs. Likewise with a single trigger that's nowhere near as good as on guns like the SKB and the BSS. His evaluation of used Spanish "bargains" speaks volumes. Take a look at his list again. Read the descriptions. Tell me which of those guns you'd snap right up . . . if you didn't already have your Uggie, which you'd be very lucky to find again for much less than twice what you paid for it.

And if you think there are no complaints about Uggies, I'll offer you a challenge: Start a thread. There are enough of them around that you will get complaints. Just like there are enough W&S 700's around that you will hear complaints. You will also hear them about SKB and BSS . . . although given numbers of guns produced, when I did articles on those two makes and asked for comments, both good and bad, I did not get very many negatives.