New FWB Sport - The good, the bad and the ugly - Part 2

[robs5230]

If anyone read my first post on this rifle, this is a follow up.

So to Part 2
And I'm going to focus on a couple of points from the title of the thread.
The good and the bad.

And I'd better start with the bad. And there's a fair lump of it.

My chance to work on the rifle that @gb2017 owned, made me quickly decide I wanted one for myself and with Geoff's help I bought one.
It arrived on 25th April (Saturday) after what ended up being a 10 day delivery, which was forecast by SWS.
Like a kid with a new toy, I quickly opened the box to find a badly bent / kinked barrel. From what I'd regarded as one of the world's finest gunmakers


I had to remove the rear sight to get a straight edge across the breech top. I ended up using a short carpentry square as the "bend / kink" in the barrel was too acute to use my engineers square.

So now I'm spitting feathers.
SWS were informed and to their credit they simply said they'd send documentation to arrange an uplift and return at their cost and they'd refund. So in this, I can't really fault SWS (except thinking they may have checked before delivery).

As I'd already got a communication open with Feinwerkbau, I also informed them and they responded that they attend to this when the factory repoended on 4th May.

Now I was in a bit (well a lot) of a dilemma.
My initial post certainly caused a bit of a stir and possibly generated a few orders which quickly saw all stocks of these depleted at SWS.

I'd already been told by Feinwerbau they only had very small supplies of these left in the factory and I knew some had already been secured by pre orders from SWS.

To make matters worse, it was at this point that I noticed the serial number on mine and its possible significance. Shed Tuner had figured out the numbering on these and its as follows.
All models start with 124 (model number)
Power level is dictated by the next 2 characters. 75 = 7.5j, 00 is 18j.
Next 3 characters are the rifle number. Mine is number 124
So thats number 124 of the model 124 in 7.5j spec :facepalm:
Whatever happened with FWB it wasn't going back, because of the number.

Production numbers are very low on both 7.5 and 18j spec and as much as an oddity as they are, they're going to be rare.

So basically at that point, I'd decided that I'd be keeping the barrel. Aother email or 2 sent to FWB and hoping for some kind of resolve that wouldn't end up in me returning the rifle or the barrel.

So now to the barrel. Initially it looked like a banana, but it wasn't. It was straight as a die from the front face of the breech block, but when viewed down the bore it was that bad, that the top half of the bore couldn't be seen.
It was simply kinkied at the point where the breech met the barrel.

So, a couple of quick emails were sent off to Dave Pice, Dave Mercer and a message sent to and an AGF member, asking an opinion of what I'd already guessed may be an impossible job.
Two replies didn't fill me with happiness, but one from Dave Mercer at least gave me a bit of hope.
That spurred a quick conversation with Dave and resulted in me tackling the barrel.

The rifle was smartly disassembled and 30 minutes later after a huge effort (its a proper lump of a barrel) its straight and I mean truly straight. More on that later.

Parts were ordered which arrived a couple of days later and the rifle was built up just as I did with the one of Geoff's.

On test shooting the rifle with a scope off another rifle, it shot bang on at 15 yards and produced a 3 shot one hole group from a pretty lazy position leaning on a decking rail.
So its straight and its accurate.

I have the gun I want, in very nice fettle and its accurate so I'm happy.

So the point of the post ???

Well its really the reply Ive just recieved from Feinwerkbau this morning. Should I have been as shocked as I was when I read it ? Dunno.
But I reckon anyone else considering one of their products may think very hard about throwing money at their brand name. I won't buy another FWB rifle for sure.

Here's their reply copied and pasted from the email :

"
Dear Mr. Smith,





I spoke to our technicians about your complaint. The gun was fired at our factory and it was within specifications.





In general, barrels, whether intended for sporting or hunting rifles etc., must be straightened several times during the manufacturing process, so that the deviations of the bore axis from the ideal, straight form caused by the manufacturing process are kept to a minimum.


However, since small, barely measurable deviations have a significant effect on the point of impact, the final and decisive straightening takes place when the weapon is fired. The condition is that the weapon must hit a certain target area with a fixed sight setting. If this is not the case, the barrel is accordingly aimed a last time.





This is also the case with the Mod. SPORT, the last aiming takes place when the weapon is shot over the open sight. If small deviations from the manufacturing process in one direction add up, it is possible that the barrel must then undergo a slight curvature in the opposite direction.





Practice shows that straightening a barrel - provided it is carried out by a specialist and with expertise - has no negative impact on the shooting performance and precision of the gun.


On the contrary, it has the advantage for the user of the gun that he can make small corrections to the sight to bring the target and the point of impact into coincidence, or that the sighting device offers sufficient adjustment range to suit the shooter's personal circumstances (eye, anatomy, targeting habits etc.).

It seems that its acceptable to them

Are Feinwerkbau really the maker I thought they were ?
I'll let others decide that.

Ooops, I forgot the good :facepalm:

Its the rifle I've wanted for a long time.
Barrel is straight and the rifle is accurate. It's running right where I want it and I'm as happy with it (possibly more given the serial number) as I was when I had completed Geoffs and knew they worked well at sub 12.
Open sights are off and bagged.
Sling swivels will be fitted shortly and it will hopefully see some daytime rabbits when we're allowed out to play.
I did after all, buy this to use in the field