doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com “Sensibly priced”

If you read the article closely, you noticed "Grant is deeply knowledgeable about deploying modern gunmaking processes..." To me, this sounds like the new owner has more, or improved, CNC machining in mind, although I know that DMB was using CNC well before he sold. According to Dallas, David was a pioneer in the use of CNC techniques. Hand finishing was still required and took many hours of painstaking work, even with the CNC head start. Recently, Graham Mackinlay in Scotland sold a DMB SxS that was the "last of the non-CNC" SxS. The statement in the description implied that the early guns were superior. Both of my DMB's are pre-CNC and I must say that you can feel the quality each time you push the top lever (I have no CNC'd guns for reference). With the DMB action, the point at which the top lever lets the barrels fall with the energy from the compressed springs is definitely magical. The tolerances must be so precise. But, of course I am a round action nut and completely biased. If you go to the Southern this year, find one on a table and open it a few times and see if you agree with my sentiments. And ask the vendor, "is this one pre-CNC" and see what they say...

Who was the engraver on your early DMB guns? I know Charles Lee did quite a few of them.

New Best quality guns aren’t in the same ballpark as Perazzi because their clientele base doesn’t want such, nor is that the branding such manufacturers have built. Us po’ folk will just have to be happy with our Perazzi’s and second hand junk.

CNC is just another means that comes in an endless form of “completion”. CNC can create a product that is so far from finished you’d question why even bother, to a product that requires 1% or less hand work. Can you imagine the hoopla when those pesky manual machines came about!

Hand or machine was the subject in a meeting with Sandro Lucchini of Armitalia. He was showing me a set of five Holland style sidelocks he had just finished for an American client.

"Hand built?" I asked looking at the lockwork.

"No, when I want quality and perfectly squared parts I use the milling machine" he replied. That was years before the advent of CNC that is way more precise than the old milling machines.

Hands I think are probably best at fitting and getting the feel just right. Machines do some things better, faster and more easily.

Insisting that rough work like dimensioning a forging, should be done by hand so the object can have the title "hand built" is a bit sadistic to the worker, while making no difference to the finished part. Those who go for that sort of thing should be made to file a steel forging for eight hours. See how they like it.

Shades of Downton Abbey, where one rings a little bell, and someone rushes to sit on the loo and warm it for you. If one is able to pay 50 servants so that one needs not pour one's drink or button one's shirt, one might think $78,000 "sensible" for a gun. Those of us who have to make economic choices find it more sensible to buy our round action guns from Chapuis for $5500 and spend the rest on fuel, cartridges, and trespass fees.

DMB guns are lovely. Had Grandfather taken his covered wagon to the part of Texas that has oil under it instead of the part that grows wheat, I might have some. I console myself with the thought that we are supposed to look at the bird, not the gun.

But, when the birds are not flying the gun is a very nice distraction.

Agreed, 100%. And, happy I am. Even though I don't desire one, at this point, I can very much appreciate the DMBs, the Ds and Ms. Shot one recently. handled another rare one. Gorgeous guns.

I think you are probably right.

Steve, Lee did one in rose and scroll and Hunt the other in large scroll. I purchased the SxS for about £16k, or about the price of a mid grade? Perazzi. It has been enjoyed on the grouse moor but still has plenty of remaining life for my purposes. Oh, and it weighs a mere 5lbs 15oz, so it is a true joy to carry, hunt and shoot.