I see both sides.

I own exactly one bolt gun. It shoots .5 moa or better with handloads, runs extremely smooth with a great trigger, and cost $1k brand new. I did add a $500 Manners stock and a nice scope.

On the flip side, I didn’t get to pick much of anything on it. Barrel length, weight, caliber, fluting, finish, twist, stock color (mine was on clearance and had limited color choice). So it’s not like I have a half dozen $1000 guns in the safe that I could replace with one custom. But if I was gonna buy another bolt gun, I’d consider an affordable custom. If I had a bunch of money, I’d definitely consider one of the nicer customs. At the same time….I wouldn’t really expect it to shoot any better than my Tikka CTR even though it cost way more. And that part is a little unfortunate. But that’s not always what you’re paying for.

The right Smith, the right hand loader, and the right shooter it will shoot better and more consistently. And that is part of what you're paying for.

Preventing stress in the barrel steel while cutting, proper stock bedding, hand loading attention to detail, trigger control and follow-through. These are some small details that do add up when the rifle is getting proven.

Accuracy is just one part of it.

Back up a few decades and most factory rifles, at best, could do about an inch give or take, with decent hand loads you could maybe get a tad bit better.

You could order a custom gun from Rifle Inc, Jarrett, Kliengunther or Hill Country rifles that would shoot small groups or you could take your factory gun and have the barrel floated, action bedded and in some cases the barrel re-crowned and it could shoot pretty good.


Now we have cheap savages sitting on the rack at wal-mart that will shoot the same group as those customs from yesteryear.

It’s not all about accuracy. I am a hunter, not a shooter, so I live in the world of “good enough”. As long as the rifle shoots “ good enough” for what I’m doing I don’t expect any additional accuracy. But the fit, finish, options available, etc. are just so much greater than a factory gun, that’s why you go with them.

Accuracy is everything for a rifle, it’s only job is to impact where it’s pointed. If it doesn’t do that it doesn’t matter how pretty it is or if the barrel fit in the channel properly.

I also want it to feed and extract properly and be generally reliable.

Quoting myself after another day of people arguing with a wall...

OP never asked about OEM vs. custom nor has he posted since the topic started. It was cloudy yesterday so it seems there were a lot of people yelling at the sky.

If he has $; why not. With that said, on the Texas “HUNTING” Forum, say you buy a $800 Tikka, that shoots .58. And then you buy a custom that shoots, say .29 (which I think would seem dang good for the typical 85% of the guys in this forum, assuming they were CAPABLE. For you shooters of animals like a deer, with a typical heart/lung shot, at what range would that make a difference, 80 yards(most deer shot there), 150 yards, 400, 600…? Maybe that’s a separate post.

Huntmaster I see no reason to have anything past a Tikka CTR unless you’re competing in some manner. Now, some people, myself included, want what we want and the only way to get that is build it or have it built. As stated above, the money is not relevant for most people when they realize they have a safe full of rifles that are not exactly what they want. Those can be sold to finance the project making it little or no money out of pocket.

It’s simply about having what you want vs a tool that will do the job.

Who appointmented you hall monitor?

News flash, probably 10:1 people learn from threads that didn't start them nor do they comment on them.

The custom rifle is going to shoot better than any factory rifle out there. So let's just let that be a foundational fact and brush it aside.

From page one. Stock type, barrel contour, barrel length, twist rate, muzzle device, ect, ect are chosen by the end user. As Judd pointed out, he's built a very light 7 PRC, and a barrel shorter than what factory rifles offer. As one example. There are millions of combinations a person can create. There are not millions of combinations of factory rifle offerings.

It seems reasonable to expect that a custom rifle will shoot better than a factory rifle. But how much accuracy for a deer hunter is needed? And is the hunter/shooter good enough to utilize the better accuracy. Nobody (no Hunter) needs to spend huge money for an excellent rifle, but if you want it and can afford it, have it made. It’s a matter of “want”, not “need”.

Did you know that people hunt things other than whitetail deer?
Did you know that not everyone sits in a blind and looks at a feeder 100 yards away?
Did you know that some people hunt in the mountains and might need to shoot farther than 200 yards?
Did you know there are hunters that walk many miles per day and carry everything they need, including their rifle?

Did you know some people don't hunt? OP never mentioned hunting either.

Yes I did. Have you ever been to a rifle match? Very few rifles there are not custom rifles. Pick you discipline, it doesn't matter.

When you’re talking about a sheep hunt that cost you upwards of $50k, then yeah, you want an excellent rifle.

Yup. I've got one here I did not build the rifle, but a great builder did. I was responsible for load development ammunition, and DOPE. He is coming to pick it back up next week. He is soon going on a Dall Sheep hunt in Alaska. My bill is a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of the hunt.

cost is relative as JG points out above.

I want to see the 7mmPRC Judd built to sell

Depends on the use and needs of the shooter as to what they need. The vast majority of hunters are deer/hog hunters that will never shoot over 200 yards and shooting skill is not up to taking advantage of a custom build rifle. For those that can or will put in the time to get that shooting skill a custom can make sense.

I figured I’d stir things up a bit. It still comes back to want versus need. That said, I don’t own a bone stock rifle. They have all been upgraded in some fashion and to some degree.

I will make one concession though. If a fellow was going to hike up mountains for a shot at some very elusive critter, he (and me for sure) would want a very light rifle that was extremely accurate. There might be a factory rifle that meets those general specs, but probably not. And then there’s the scope to consider. If you only get one shot, you better make it. That might push a fellow to spend way more than he needs to.

Want versus need…

This barrel came out of the lathe this morning. 20" 28 Nosler, carbon fiber Bartlein, Kelby's Nanook action, Manners EH-1 carbon fiber. The stock and barreled action are 6 pounds 1 ounce. This is mine, and it was all about cutting weight, and having a barrel length that will still let a "magnum" be a magnum, but also still be maneuversble with a suppressor.

It will change colors, for some that blend in better west of I-35

That looks good JG. Love the weight.

Looks like a mulie killer

True to a degree, I’m not taking a 10lb rifle all in into mountains. But I’m also no skimping on cheap failure points to make up weight, So I will build a sub 6lb rifle so that I can use HD rings and over built optics, that can take miles of trail abuse where that be horse back or back pack.

Nothing worse the being 9 miles in and having optics knocked off because you tried to cut weight via optics components

I’m also not buying a factory rifle that has twist rates that don’t allow you to take full advantage of the cartridge design

If you run some numbers you’ll find the answer is much, much farther than anyone should be shooting at game. Far enough that some loads will flat run out of gas before reaching the target!