I need your help! I have a chance to purchase a few Sanat Barbara Actions with triggers. Some have the engraving on the top and side receiver ring and rear bridge. These are all new actions in-the-white that have set around for awhile. Please give me your opinion(S) as the quality of these actions. I am not sure whether the bottom metal (floor plate is included)I have a msg to the seller as whether it is supplied with the them or not. The price would be around $200.00, is this a descent price? Thanks for all that read and respond!

Me, I'd pass. Especially on the ones with the ugly engraving. Quality was sketchy and ran all over the place.

Going to be a long day I deleted my message.

The Santa Barbara is a good action Parker Hale used them. Some were rough some looked good. They weren't as nice as the normal MKX. I heard somewhere about some having a heat treating issue. I only heard it never saw it or saw it in writing. Can you see them or is it only online?

Action, bolt, trigger and floorplate $200 is a good price. Without floorplate add $75-150 to the price. I don't care for the engraving

Ramrod,

I have seen a phtograph of the engraved model, I am not wild about jewelry on firearms. However, the standard models w/o endraving comes in single or double trigger models. The standard model single trigger is my interest. I can have them hand selected, but that does not mean anyone knowledgeable (gunsmith savy) will be the one selecting the action.

Yep big question if they have a clue when they choose one.

Guess it depends on what you want. If I was just building a rifle in normal caliber I would check on an old Model MKX. If I was looking to build a real custom I would look for an FN or another model that would hold value.

MY choice would be
FN
Old MKX
New MKX with the cross pin
Daly

If you watch you can pick up a good old MKX for $275-350. I have never had one that didn't shoot sub MOA. If you just want the action buy the rifle. The stock will bring $25-75 depending. The barrel $30 so you are back to around $200 with in my opinion a better action.

I picked this up for $300. Pulled the stock and put it on my 22-250 the barreled action was 270 and I stuck it in another stock I had. I would call the blueing about 98%.

I'd stick with a good milsurp any day over that made at Oviedo.

Ramrod, none of those you mentioned would be my first pick unless perhaps it was the pre-non "C" ring FN. Although I do agree with the order that you placed the wannabe Mausers in.

quote:

I'd stick with a good milsurp any day over that made at Oviedo.

I agree with you on any rifle you were sticking a lot of money into. Years back I used to trade grunt work for good machine work on my action. No longer have that option. Since my rifles are just baxically shooters I find the MKX acceptable. You just can't get any money back on the MKX or other after market. But for a reasonable priced hunter/shooter they work for me I sure others will diaagree.

The c-ring comment has me confused If you are saying you would take the c-ring FN I agree I like the C more than the H. If your prefer the H then I disagree. But the H has never given me a problem.

They used to have a reputation for being brittle. There's a bunch of those for sale on one of the websites.

quote:

Originally posted by ramrod340:

quote:

I'd stick with a good milsurp any day over that made at Oviedo.

I agree with you on any rifle you were sticking a lot of money into. Years back I used to trade grunt work for good machine work on my action. No longer have that option. Since my rifles are just baxically shooters I find the MKX acceptable. You just can't get any money back on the MKX or other after market. But for a reasonable priced hunter/shooter they work for me I sure others will diaagree.

The c-ring comment has me confused If you are saying you would take the c-ring FN I agree I like the C more than the H. If your prefer the H then I disagree. But the H has never given me a problem.

Yes, maybe I wrote that poorly. The C ring FN would be acceptible. That would be about the only action on that list I'd put on par with the good milsurps.

For your stated purposes I suppose those mentioned would be fine. Myself, I still would avoid the Santa Barbara but could see using the others. The new Rem's, if they really hit the market in quantity, would be roughly equal to the later Mk X's and the CD's.

I bought 2 about 4 years years ago. My thinking was that with the trigger and bottom metal, even if I did not like the actions I was still doing OK. SOld both of them in short order. I did not even want the trigger or bottom metal that came with the actions.

But that is just me and you may be tickeled with them. For something pretty spartan and basic for field use, it would be OK. For something "nice," I would look somewhere else. And it also depends on your definition of "nice." My standards are pretty high and there was no way I would be happy with them. But they were perfect for the 2 guys who bought them from me.

quote:

Yes, maybe I wrote that poorly. The C ring FN would be acceptible. That would be about the only action on that list I'd put on par with the good milsurps

Yep we are on the same page.

Wow, fancy that, a civil conversation actually occurred on AR. Thanks, I mean that!

$hit happens

I bought a really nice custom built on a santa barbra action.. the trigger was really bad, ordered a"santa Barbra" Bold trigger, it would not fit, my gunsmith took 4 old Santa Barbra triggers out of his junk box and got a 3# OK trigger. It would have been much cheeper to scrap the Barrelled action( with Shilen barrel) & find a FN Supreme in a junker stock. I would not buy a Santa Barbra action with the intent of putting any money in it.



0

quote:

"santa Barbra" Bold trigger, it would not fit

Hmmm I actually used Bold Santa Barbara triggers (I picked up on closeout couldn't pass up $15each) on a 1909 and a Daly. I did alter the safety so it would be closer to the action.

I used to buy those as a barreled action, brand new for $109, they were a good deal.

quote:

I used to buy those as a barreled action, brand new for $109, they were a good deal

Talk about showing our age. I have several old MKX barreled actions that I bought with gloss blue for $125. The action alone were aroudn $105