I met a S&W rep in a gun shop and asked him if S&W did the heat treating on the Montana 1999 actions. He did not know what the action was but he told me that S&W was very active in seeking outside work and they had 40% of what they wanted. That they already made the Remington M 700 barreled actions!, the Weatherby barreled actions, the Walther PP PPK guns and many others.

That S&W had spent ten million on tooling and facilities and had great over capacity. That the employment at Smith used to be 2500 and now was headed up but only at 700 people.

He mentioned that there is a great deal of consolidation going on in the gun industry with a few sources making almost everything. That Colt was looking to outsource everything but the military contract.

[ 02-27-2003, 05:29: Message edited by: Savage99 ]

This is nothing new.

In fact, where I work, there will be hardly any parts manufacturing left in five years or so. We will just assemble what others make to our specs.

Get used to it. It's the future of manufacturing.

This explains Remingtons quality of late.