Current quality of the Italian makers

[Ed C.]

A very mixed bag. I purchased 3 guns recently. One Investarms Hawken was just thrown together. Inleting on the stock was a sawdust pile jamming up the triggers and lock. Hammer strike on the nipple was off and I had to set the lock in further. It came with a 2017 barrel. I took care of all of the problems and it is basically a good gun now. Another Investarms Hawken was nicely finished, needed a little trigger adjusting and came with a 2022 barrel and is a tack driver. This week I got a Pedersoli Sharps and it is beautiful right out of the box. Fine fit and finish, smooth action, perfect triggers, and sights are dead on. This is how is a firearm should leave the factory instead of expecting the buyer to be an amateur gunsmith.

 

[GYJ]

I've bought 13 new production Italian replicas since COVID. No sign of any QC issues in any of them. In fact, the most recent ones are the nicest. Including these two I bought late last year.

 

[CVA Enthusiast]

Ok From my experience Pietta or Uberti is there a better, between the two seems every so often 1 out shines the other. Then it flips both are decent in my opinion some prefer fit finish of Uberti others Pietta I like Pietta then again it is a price point for me I have had Uberti like them decent enough, a good choice. Both basically have some same issues fit and finish Now I will say Uberti is a little more refined, not a whole lot. Either or not a wrong choice how much time are you willing to dedicate to smooth out the idiosyncrasies?

 

[Stantheman86]

USFA didn't "go under". The president and CEO Doug Donnelly just decided to quit. In hindsight, the guns were too good and too expensive for the market to bear. Too much, "I'd rather have a Colt" from people who could never accept that USFA was making a better Colt than Colt ever did. They were selling the Pre-war for $1200 when it really should've been over $2000.

They did make some percussion guns from Uberti parts. I certainly would've gotten in line for percussion or cartridge conversion guns made to the same standards as the later domestic guns. I'm sure the market wouldn't have supported it though. Just look at the folks complaining about the quality of a $200 Italian.

I wouldn't call the 12/22 a "crackpot" gun, I love mine.

The OmniPotent never got off the ground, for whatever reason but in the last several years, you could buy standard production USFA's from Davidson's. Two of mine came from them.

My coworker had an Omnipotent he was trying to sell me, ironically. I never saw it in person but I'm assuming since he knew it was a USFA Omnipotent that he actually had one

After the CEO/Owner quit , what happened to the company?

I believe if he just focused on meat and potatoes Colt clones and not stuff like .30 revolvers, 12 shot .22's , etc they'd have done better. Apparently they didn't sell many 12 shot revolvers to anyone else but it's good that you enjoy yours

From what I recall, Colt wasn't happy with USFA eating their lunch , with Guns & Ammo declaring they made a better Colt than Colt. Did something happen behind the scenes? Did Colt pay the owner to walk away? We'll never know

They also made the only 1910 .45 ACP repro and a beautiful 1911 pre-A1 . If anyone actually got any of those out of them they're truly lucky

 

[Stantheman86]

Ok From my experience Pietta or Uberti is there a better, between the two seems every so often 1 out shines the other. Then it flips both are decent in my opinion some prefer fit finish of Uberti others Pietta I like Pietta then again it is a price point for me I have had Uberti like them decent enough, a good choice. Both basically have some same issues fit and finish Now I will say Uberti is a little more refined, not a whole lot. Either or not a wrong choice how much time are you willing to dedicate to smooth out the idiosyncrasies?

Uberti makes an overall better gun, there's no two ways about it. Short Arbor notwithstanding.

There are quirks to each. Most Uberti .36's need a .380 ball, where all of my Pietta .36's take the much easier to find .375.

I buy them all to shoot, most of the Piettas I buy are brasser Navies that I use as range shooters. I don't get uber serious or scientific about all this stuff, I punch paper, blow smoke and sling round balls around at the range. And for 2 or 3 hours I can escape real life and pretend to be a gunslinger. They provide entertainment just like any of the other things in life that I use in my free time to enjoy myself.

I'm not wearing a pair of Piettas or Ubertis into battle any time soon , they both do their job of entertaining me and I'll keep buying both

 

[CVA Enthusiast]

Uberti makes an overall better gun, there's no two ways about it. Short Arbor notwithstanding.

There are quirks to each. Most Uberti .36's need a .380 ball, where all of my Pietta .36's take the much easier to find .375.

I buy them all to shoot, most of the Piettas I buy are brasser Navies that I use as range shooters. I don't get uber serious or scientific about all this stuff, I punch paper, blow smoke and sling round balls around at the range. And for 2 or 3 hours I can escape real life and pretend to be a gunslinger. They provide entertainment just like any of the other things in life that I use in my free time to enjoy myself.

I'm not wearing a pair of Piettas or Ubertis into battle any time soon , they both do their job of entertaining me and I'll keep buying both

You nailed it there are quirks to both, both lack fit and finish. You like the Uberti I like the Pietta

 

[Pete453]

Just look at the folks complaining about the quality of a $200 Italian.

Most want $1200 quality for the price of an Italian gun. Not a very realistic attitude, not gonna happen. I've bought 4 '21 guns in the past year and all have been well worth what I paid. With an hour's worth of stoning and tweaking they are definitely worth more than I paid, and I like tinkering, so I'm fine with how things are. When I paid $1000 for a 25 year old modern revolver, I got $1000+ worth. Happy with that, and no tinkering needed. Quality workmanship costs, if you want more, spend more, everything is expensive nowadays.

 

[GYJ]

My coworker had an Omnipotent he was trying to sell me, ironically. I never saw it in person but I'm assuming since he knew it was a USFA Omnipotent that he actually had one

After the CEO/Owner quit , what happened to the company?

I believe if he just focused on meat and potatoes Colt clones and not stuff like .30 revolvers, 12 shot .22's , etc they'd have done better. Apparently they didn't sell many 12 shot revolvers to anyone else but it's good that you enjoy yours

From what I recall, Colt wasn't happy with USFA eating their lunch , with Guns & Ammo declaring they made a better Colt than Colt. Did something happen behind the scenes? Did Colt pay the owner to walk away? We'll never know

They also made the only 1910 .45 ACP repro and a beautiful 1911 pre-A1 . If anyone actually got any of those out of them they're truly lucky

When Doug decided to quit, he closed the doors, sold off the equipment and all the parts. I ended up with a few unfinished cylinders and a bunch of grips for future projects.

IMHO, they tried to do too much in house. At the end, they were doing all the finish work and even making their own screws. The guns were absolutely superb but cost more to make than they could sell them for. The 12/22 wasn't the problem. It was weird tings like that Zip gun and the modernistic adjustable sight guns in strange colors.

USFA is the reason why Colt's guns are so much better now.

 

[mkabe]

Pietta is doing a great job
I have lots of 2022 dated revolvers and probably some 23s at this point

We can get a new gun that shoots , hits where you aim it, and that will provide you with a lifetime of entertainment for $250-300 .

Just don't expect a Colt, expect a Pietta

Too many people think 250 bucks is gonna buy them perfection

Uberti is doing great too. I have a bunch of their "post Pandemic " guns and I've been buying Ubertis for 20 years. The newest guns are just fine. Every manufacturer has lemons . I've had $30,000 cars that were lemons, it's not like you're going to pay $400 for a percussion revolver and not risk a lemon .

Cap and ball revolvers are "non firearms ", they live in a grey area of QC and don't need to meet any specs like SAAMI .

They still need to be put together with quality and care!

 

[TBone]

....

Cap and ball revolvers are "non firearms ", they live in a grey area of QC and don't need to meet any specs like SAAMI .

Under US law, that is true. However, muzzleloaders are still required to pass proof in Italy, and thier cartridge guns have to make CIP spec.

 

[3 eared musket cap]

A while ago I posted about my recent purchase of a Pietta handgun from Midway, $234 (Navy-ish, .44 cal.). I had a good bit of their mess to clean up. I got it all sorted out, made a grip out of red gum eucalyptus (original is plastic). polished the brass to a 400 grit finish. Haven't shot it yet but am really happy with how it turned out. It has a 2022 date stamp and I have read on this forum how the Italian gun makers quality has declined since the scamdemic.

So yesterday I picked up a Uberti unmentionable from my dealer, suffice it to say SAA-9, paid $625 from Bud's. This handgun is outstanding. Near flawless finish, perfectly checkered grip, crisp trigger with no perceptible creep (does have some over travel) build date 2022.

So I don't consider this a Uberti-Pietta quality difference but what? Is it just a better quality because of the price point difference or does Uberti treat center fire revolvers different than BP revolvers?

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I was told that the Manufacturers grade what their final products come out as. The higher grades grades sell for more $ to retailers. The lower grades for less $ to retailers. If you buy for price point, you are likely to get a lower grade product. The higher end retailers sell a higher grade product, because they spec a higher grade product when they purchase their stock.

 

[Stantheman86]

I was told that the Manufacturers grade what their final products come out as. The higher grades grades sell for more $ to retailers. The lower grades for less $ to retailers. If you buy for price point, you are likely to get a lower grade product. The higher end retailers sell a higher grade product, because they spec a higher grade product when they purchase their stock.

It makes perfect sense , the $234 Pietta brassers from MidWay are basically 90% complete kit guns

I'm guessing it's a Price Per Unit agreed upon by the Retailer and Pietta/Uberti and the guns are made to that price point.

Other manufacturers do this too. A security firm like Wells Fargo ordered 1000s of Rugers "base model" GP100 but would only pay so much per gun. So Ruger supplied revolvers that were totally functional but not as well finished cosmetically. I have one, it's obvious they cut corners to save Man Hours and labor.

Guns are just Product to these companies.

 

[mkabe]

Under US law, that is true. However, muzzleloaders are still required to pass proof in Italy, and thier cartridge guns have to make CIP spec.

I didn’t know the even were CPI specs for muzzleloaders…..?

 

[mkabe]

It makes perfect sense , the $234 Pietta brassers from MidWay are basically 90% complete kit guns

I'm guessing it's a Price Per Unit agreed upon by the Retailer and Pietta/Uberti and the guns are made to that price point.

Other manufacturers do this too. A security firm like Wells Fargo ordered 1000s of Rugers "base model" GP100 but would only pay so much per gun. So Ruger supplied revolvers that were totally functional but not as well finished cosmetically. I have one, it's obvious they cut corners to save Man Hours and labor.

Guns are just Product to these companies.

I ordered a Ruger SP-101 in 327 Federal years ago that I never would have excepted if it wasn’t specially ordered for me. It had machine marks all over the frame, looked really bad in-spite of it having passed inspection.
I called Ruger and was told “tough!”, no no no no they didn’t, they were great! The sent a paid return container right away and after about a week or two back it came polished slightly better but still not to my satisfaction. They also checked the timing, adjusted barrel/cylinder gap and lighted the trigger. Mechanically perfect but cosmetically poor. Several hours of elbow grease and Mother’s Polish and it looks like chrome. One of my favorites!
So we can always get a not so nice one if price enters in.

 

[GYJ]

I was told that the Manufacturers grade what their final products come out as. The higher grades grades sell for more $ to retailers. The lower grades for less $ to retailers. If you buy for price point, you are likely to get a lower grade product. The higher end retailers sell a higher grade product, because they spec a higher grade product when they purchase their stock.

You were told wrong.

 

[45D]

I didn’t know the even were CPI specs for muzzleloaders…..?

Cartridge guns . . .

Mike

 

[Old-Duckman]

It makes perfect sense , the $234 Pietta brassers from MidWay are basically 90% complete kit guns

I'm guessing it's a Price Per Unit agreed upon by the Retailer and Pietta/Uberti and the guns are made to that price point.

Other manufacturers do this too. A security firm like Wells Fargo ordered 1000s of Rugers "base model" GP100 but would only pay so much per gun. So Ruger supplied revolvers that were totally functional but not as well finished cosmetically. I have one, it's obvious they cut corners to save Man Hours and labor.

Guns are just Product to these companies.

Sure, level of finish would only makes sense but proper functionality...well that's a horse of a different color IMO.

 

[Stantheman86]

I ordered a Ruger SP-101 in 327 Federal years ago that I never would have excepted if it wasn’t specially ordered for me. It had machine marks all over the frame, looked really bad in-spite of it having passed inspection.
I called Ruger and was told “tough!”, no no no no they didn’t, they were great! The sent a paid return container right away and after about a week or two back it came polished slightly better but still not to my satisfaction. They also checked the timing, adjusted barrel/cylinder gap and lighted the trigger. Mechanically perfect but cosmetically poor. Several hours of elbow grease and Mother’s Polish and it looks like chrome. One of my favorites!
So we can always get a not so nice one if price enters in.

I had to send 4 revolvers back to Ruger but only 3 were their "fault "

3 were apparently fitted by the same tech, 2 brand new GP100s and a .45 ACP Redhawk, locked up from heat expansion after 2 cylinders

Both came back within a week with action jobs , perfectly functional and all are some of my favorite guns. I wish I could afford to shoot them more btw I have a .327 GP100, I love it.

I have Ruger GP's that look like they received final polishing from a drunk trainee with a Dremel , but all of them work perfectly and will outlast me . I remember not long ago when a new SP or GP was a $500 gun . People joked that Ruger sold "kit guns" but I'm glad to have every one I bought when I was accumulating Rugers.

I had a $1200 S&W PC 629, I bought it brand new in 2010, horribly fitted and the DA pull was like 20 miles of bad road . S&W didn't even want to talk about it. I "fluffed and buffed " it myself and had to fit a new hammer block. S&W tried to mask the issue with graphite lube. A 1200 dollar Performance Center gun It was the last new S&W I bought , mainly because the Customer Service told me it sucks to suck in so many words .

My $234 Piettas are straight shooters. I just paid $9 for a Dave's hot and juicy single and an ice coffee at Wendy's and $100 on drinks for me and my gf last night, and we didn't even have many.

So 230 bucks feels like getting a free gun at this point, given that it costs 50 bucks to step out of the house and actually drive , and eat something

 

[Stantheman86]

Sure, level of finish would only makes sense but proper functionality...well that's a horse of a different color IMO.

MidWay is selling finished guns for less than Dixie asks for a kit.....Midway is undercutting everyone and I'm fascinated by this. They just had a "special " on $340 Uberti Dragoons, people won't even let used ones go for that

Either they're getting them cheap in big bulk orders or they're accepting less of a markup to sell more. Because I don't know how much meat is on the bone for profit with a $230 revolver these days.

Then again, Gander Mt sold 99 buck Brassers 20 years ago so for all we know a Pietta wholesales for half of what we're paying

I'd love to know what the "bulk rate" for percussion revolvers is.

 

[Pete453]

So 230 bucks feels like getting a free gun at this point, given that it costs 50 bucks to step out of the house and actually drive , and eat something

When put in perspective like this, these guns are a bargain! When my honey and I go out for dinner it's an easy $50-$60, including only 1 or 2 drinks each. And what do I have left to show for it tomorrow? When I buy a revolver it's there for as long as I want to keep it, and it has resale value. I'm surprised more spouses don't encourage us to buy guns more often!