Has quality peaked already?

I've been in manufacturing for over 40 years (retired metallurgist) and honestly feel the materials are BETTER and the tolerances are held better. This is in regard to the machine's ability to control size and not custom made hand turned parts. You didn't see stainless steel rifles back "then" either.

I'd bet on the accuracy of today's rifles also. Now comes the downside. The old guns had some beautiful wood. Today's mostly are synthetic (many bad) and the wood is plain.

The finishes on the lower priced guns are also not what they "used to be" when craftmanship was so important. Many of us could not afford a rifle built the "old way" in today's world.

I have new rifles and like them alot. :)
 
As other have said, we only have the quality guns left because all the crap guns have been scrapped. The garbage guns that are left are sometimes now valuable just because they are old.

My dad showed me the 22 rimfire falling block gun that he and his brother had when they were young, just looking at it I could see it was a shoddy design, build cheap, and not made to last. Even when new, cases would rupture occasionally due to poor casehead support.
 
The Winchester FN Model 70 seems like the best-made of the generally-American guns that I've seen in quite a while. Yes, there are Coopers and other high-cost rifles, but if you're looking for quality there are very few.

The high-end Savages look nice, but I'm not partial to their basic bolt action design. They're a bit wierd to me.

Weatherbys are still very good rifles, though many people don't like the style or finish.

Brownings are still good guns, maybe better than they were a few years ago, but may all be made overseas.

Generally, hunting rifles made in stainless steel will hold up better than blued guns, especially with regard to rust. Unfortunately, stainless is softer than chrome-moly, so if a rifle is to be shot often, stainless has a tendency to wear or peen and some won't stand up under a lot of shooting. Target guns often have stainless barrels, but blued-steel actions.

Even stainless .22LR benchrest barrels wear out much sooner than chrome-moly. Their peak accuracy is usually less than 10,000 rounds, but chrome-moly may go over 200,000 rounds and still be quite accurate.

Stainless centerfire barrels used to last a bit longer than chrome-moly, but I'm not sure about that. Either don't normally go 2,000 rounds of benchrest match shooting, but that's top accuracy. Most of us could shoot 4,000 rounds through one and not notice a big drop in accuracy, especially if we don't overheat them.
 
While you may be correct about stainless steel being softer and not standing up to a lot of shooting, a hunting rifle will not normally be shot a lot but it may be exposed to a lot more bad weather than a target rifle that would be fired a lot. So you takes your choice.

While highly skilled metal working craftsmen may no longer be required to turn out good quality firearms, the machines do not operate all by themselves. There is still a human doing something somewhere. It is true that computer controlled equipment can turn out parts that are closer to "spec" with less variation than was otherwise the case, it doesn't follow that close tolerances result in a better firearm. It should certainly result in parts that are truly interchangeable than otherwise but that's an idea that goes back to Eli Whitney. The question then is what you want the most. A highly accurate firearm, thinking mainly of rifles here, will likely have closer tolerances than a so-so rifle. But the so-so rifle may otherwise be a better choice if it means it is more reliable, a sometimes more important characteristic. A WWII .45 auto was never thought of as an especially accurate pistol the way it came but no one ever has a bad thing to say about the reliability. This isn't to say you can't have both and some things won't work well at all if the construction is indifferent.
 
This gets back to one of the things I run into all the time.

Depending on who you ask and the age of the answerer, it always comes down to the same type of answer.... "Western civilization peaked at (insert decade here) and has been going downhill ever since." Everything before was old-fashioned and everything since is crap.

Seems like the same old circle

That being said, music these days just stinks...:rolleyes:
 
"Anything that is in the world when you're born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. Anything that's invented between when you're fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it. Anything invented after you're thirty-five is against the natural order of things."

--Douglas Adams
 
I need to write that one down and remember it. That's a good one. I've known a lot of engineers (work for one). You should hear what they say.

As far as music goes (I'm 65), I've discovered a lot of wonderful music, all performed by virtual kids to me. It's all in German and comes from Austria, although it isn't all Austrian. It's fresh, upbeat, innovative and strangely familiar. Now, what else comes from Austria?
 
The new Rifles are good that are CNC machined. But I keep picking up on people saying :THERE IS NO NEED FOR A SKILLED CRAFSTMAN ANYMORE : I just hate that.
 
Now you need a skilled CNC machine operator. The thing is, everything is more difficult than it appears and that fact isn't appreciated. Part of the reason for that is, fewer and fewer people actually do anything with their hands anymore except type (or keyboard, I think they say). People even belive that the pyramids had to be built with the aid of outer space aliens because something like that would have been impossible 5,000 years ago.

Ever see a Civil War period weapon? They look pretty good, don't they? Well, they were machine made. You can see the machines in Harpers Ferry. The machines are from Pratt & Whitney. They weren't exactly hand crafted like you might think.

Advances in manufacturing are sometimes due to advances in our ability to measure things.
 
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