Swamped barrel profiles / calibers

[Jim Kibler]

Hi Jim
I feel a little wrong in saying this as you are the expert.
I think perhaps you are missing a great opportunity.
CNC's biggest drawcard was great repeatability.
It is now my understanding (potentially very flawed) that with modern CNC programming it is easier than ever to make programming variations.

What if you were able to do mix and match swamped barrels?
For instance the breech and muzzle profile of say your SMR or Colonial but 2" longer or shorter?
What about the breech of the brass barrelled rifle but the muzzle of the Krupp?
The front and back would be set but the middle would be of variable length.
Perhaps as some vendors can supply a stock from a multitude of known examples. You could do the same for barrels.

This would be a step closer to the originals with essentially a customisable profile available to each buyer. Yes it would be at a premium and probably paid up front or at least a large  non refundable deposit. But you could offer custom profiles within reason of course.

Apologies for the ramble

A lot of what you say is true, but from a business perspective we don't prefer to have a million potential variations of things.  It makes things more difficult.  If we tried hard, I'm sure we could set up a system to do "one off" custom barrels but there are a lot of drawbacks to this.  There would be a lot of customer intereaction, lots of chance for error when continually running new programs etc.  It's much better for us to standardize to some degree.  Remember, it's not always just what can be done, but what's the best approach.

[bob in the woods]

Thank you for your response 

[Jim Kibler]

Jim,

What would be the price on those barrels.

AsMs

The price wil basically be what others are charging.  Somewhere around $250.

Thanks,
Jim

[Bob McBride]

....

 ......There would be a lot of customer intereaction.....

Wait, what's wrong with "lots of customer interaction" Mr. Engineer YouTuber?   

[Jim Kibler]

....

 ......There would be a lot of customer intereaction.....

Wait, what's wrong with "lots of customer interaction" Mr. Engineer YouTuber?   

Nothing wrong with customer interaction, but our primary goal, as the case with most businesses, is to be efficient and as profitable as possible!

[alacran]

Jim I really admire your business acumen. I admire it even more than  your craftsmanship and your engineering ability.

[Top Jaw]

I know you don’t want to do custom profiles. But since your profiling straight barrels, here is a thought.  I think there would be a market for profiling someone’s existing straight barrel to one of your existing profiles.  Much like if a customer wants to use their own wood and you put their blank through your CNC process.

Several of us might have a few 1”, 15/16” or 7/8” straight barrels collecting dust that could be candidates for a slim swamping.  If you had some gradual profiles that would fit these measurements, (below a certain caliber of course), I think there would be a market for profiling them and bringing some surplus straights out of the shop rafters and back into service.  Maybe one choice for each diameter in 42” or 38”.  If longer, it would be cut to one of those lengths.  Perhaps skip the precut lugs, if not enough meat available.  I would be a customer if so.  These might not fit any of your existing kits, but it would be a service for reclaiming NOS barrels.

[sqrldog]

Bobby Hoyt will do that for you. He has taken  1" straight barrels to A weight swamp for me. He does a good  job. Most of the barrel profiles mentioned here are available from several barrel makers if you don't mind a wait, just have to plan ahead. Tim