Well I finally got my left handed, Zastava 458 Win mag modified more to my liking.

I contacted Toomanytools (John) here on AR to ask him to replace the pencil barrel with a .750" (muzzle) barrel, add a banded front sight, a barrel band swivel mount, open up the barrel channel for the fatter barrel and glass bed the action. John gave me a great estimate for this work so I sent him my rifle and told him that I was in no hurry for it so he could take his time finishing it.

I received the gun yesterday and I couldn't be happier with it. John does outstanding work.

John decided that since he had to open up the barrel channel, he would strip off all the muddy stain, re-point some of the checkering and refinish the stock. He also decided that it needed a barrel mounted recoil lug and another crossbolt so he did that too.

Even with all that extra work, the whole job came in right at what John estimated for just the barrel and barrel channel work. Even then he wouldn't take any payment until after I received the gun and had inspected it.

You don't see many old school gunsmiths like John around and I know he'll get all of my hunting rifle work from now on.

Here's a "before" picture of the gun:


Here's what it looks like now:

Well done!

Much nicer! Did the action get worked over, too? The one I have is awfully rough. Does it have the Mauser "click" when cycled?? Very pleasing sound indeed!

quote:

Originally posted by bluefish:
Much nicer! Did the action get worked over, too? The one I have is awfully rough. Does it have the Mauser "click" when cycled?? Very pleasing sound indeed!

Actually the metal work was pretty good on this one, the action is not rough at all. The wood was another matter.

nice .. what have you done with the original barrel?

quote:

Originally posted by jeffeosso:
nice .. what have you done with the original barrel?

I have it here. I have a friend who makes Contender barrels out of my take-offs but I haven't mentioned it to him yet.

Do you need one?

wow .... nice works done. zastava on the best vision.

John does nice work. And, he's a nice guy.

quote:

Even with all that extra work, the whole job came in right at what John estimated for just the barrel and barrel channel work. Even then he wouldn't take any payment until after I received the gun and had inspected it.

John did some work for me as well and was quite impressed with his focus on customer satisfaction.

Nice rifle, but that stock needs some reshaping, IMO.

Wow Fjold, That's good work!

I did a very similar "fix" on this one:

Before:


After:

quote:

Originally posted by Sevens:

quote:

Even with all that extra work, the whole job came in right at what John estimated for just the barrel and barrel channel work. Even then he wouldn't take any payment until after I received the gun and had inspected it.

John did some work for me as well and was quite impressed with his focus on customer satisfaction.

Nice rifle, but that stock needs some reshaping, IMO.

Would agree about the stock. Accepting you are a leftie as I am, I would get rid of that rolled over comb so that at least a right handed shooter could use the rifle at a pinch.

BSA made the mistake when they brought out their CF2 model rifle (right hand) with a rolled over comb making the rifle totally unusable for a left handed shooter and thereby cutting out many buyers of their rifles (back when LH rifles were relatively rare).

Although a leftie, I only ever use RH rifles so that I can competently use any rifle or buy and sell from the large pool of RH rifles available. I wouldn't own and use my beloved Oberndorf Type A Mauser if I only chose LH rifles

The roll over on the comb is going to get shaved off, I can't get the open sights to line up as it is.

In bolt guns, I only buy lefties as I've been buying them that way since 1975. I practice right handed with them and with my semi autos, lever guns and such, but I only buy left handed cranks.

Here's an old picture of some of my lefties:

quote:

Originally posted by eagle27:

quote:

Originally posted by Sevens:

quote:

Even with all that extra work, the whole job came in right at what John estimated for just the barrel and barrel channel work. Even then he wouldn't take any payment until after I received the gun and had inspected it.

John did some work for me as well and was quite impressed with his focus on customer satisfaction.

Nice rifle, but that stock needs some reshaping, IMO.

Would agree about the stock. Accepting you are a leftie as I am, I would get rid of that rolled over comb so that at least a right handed shooter could use the rifle at a pinch.

BSA made the mistake when they brought out their CF2 model rifle (right hand) with a rolled over comb making the rifle totally unusable for a left handed shooter and thereby cutting out many buyers of their rifles (back when LH rifles were relatively rare).

Although a leftie, I only ever use RH rifles so that I can competently use any rifle or buy and sell from the large pool of RH rifles available. I wouldn't own and use my beloved Oberndorf Type A Mauser if I only chose LH rifles

we have a BSA CF2 at home and as a leftie i can shoot it with no problems.

depending maybe on the lenght of the neck.

Phil

quote:

Originally posted by medved:

quote:

Originally posted by eagle27:

quote:

Originally posted by Sevens:

quote:

Even with all that extra work, the whole job came in right at what John estimated for just the barrel and barrel channel work. Even then he wouldn't take any payment until after I received the gun and had inspected it.

John did some work for me as well and was quite impressed with his focus on customer satisfaction.

Nice rifle, but that stock needs some reshaping, IMO.

Would agree about the stock. Accepting you are a leftie as I am, I would get rid of that rolled over comb so that at least a right handed shooter could use the rifle at a pinch.

BSA made the mistake when they brought out their CF2 model rifle (right hand) with a rolled over comb making the rifle totally unusable for a left handed shooter and thereby cutting out many buyers of their rifles (back when LH rifles were relatively rare).

Although a leftie, I only ever use RH rifles so that I can competently use any rifle or buy and sell from the large pool of RH rifles available. I wouldn't own and use my beloved Oberndorf Type A Mauser if I only chose LH rifles

we have a BSA CF2 at home and as a leftie i can shoot it with no problems.

depending maybe on the lenght of the neck.

Phil

Not sure if they fitted different stocks on the CF2 for different markets but the ones here were hopeless with the sharp rolled over comb digging into the check bone when when trying to get a weld on the stock as a leftie. I can comfortably shoot any right handed rifle provided they don't have a stupid roll over check pad which really does nothing for a right handed shooter either.