Any one have any experience (good or bad - personal or hear say) with Fox Ridge Outfitters as to the quality of work/product they provide from their T/C custom shop?

I had a 21" bull barrel style .22 Hornet Contender barrel made by them in the early '90's. It took a little less than 90 days. The finished barrel was beautiful and shot very well. I have a Leupold 4-12 VXII on it. I am able to get groups of less than 1" with Remington factory HP loads. Of course, I immediately scratched it.

I also had a 16.5" bull barrel style .445 SuperMag Contender barrel made in the late '90's that was very nice too. Delivery took a little over two months. I use this barrel, set up as a carbine on my spare frame, as a companion to the 10" handgun version I have in the holster. Accuracy is quite acceptable, but I haven't worked it with enough to really say it's capabilities. I loan it out regularly, with stiff .44Mag loads, for various kid's first deer hunts. Lightweight, fairly safe for a beginner and powerful enough. It's killed several deer for my buddies kids.

Both F.R. custom barrels were extremely well finished, highly polished with DEEP bluing that is nothing like the crap (grey/black paint?) T/C smears on its firearms these days.

Both orders were placed by telephone & credit card. Within one week I had a written confirmation showing all of the particulars for my verification.

I'd do it again.

EDITED to add that I've also done simple mail-order business with them and they have been fine, perhaps not quite as snappy as some outfits, but satisfactory.

[ 09-08-2003, 23:26: Message edited by: eshell ]

I have a .25-35 Winchester gloss blue, standard taper and a .45-70 24" bull blue. They shoot pretty well, about average or a little better. IME, from field positions (no bipod or shooting sticks) the system averages 1.5" at 100 yards and these barrels do about 1.25" which isn't a big difference.

I posted this in the single shot rifle forum a couple of weeks ago. I copied from there because I am too lazy to type it all again.

I have 2 Fox Ridge barrels and won't buy another from them. The reason? Poor chambering and sloppy tolerances. Examples? Sure my .250 Savage barrel I can load a 100 gr Ballistic Tip about .070" longer than SAAMI standard forget accuracy with factory loads. Another? OK. My .350 Rem Mag barrel I load to an overall length with the 225 gr Ballistic Tip to 3.160" not bad for 2.8" cartridge right? And that bullet ain't even on speaking terms with the lands. I settled on that length because it gave me .350 of bullet including boat tail in the case neck.
That's why I didn't put Fox Ridge on my list. Obviously there isn't anything custom about their barrels but the extra chamberings. Sean

I just recieved a 12 ga New Englander barrel from them. They said 6 to 8 weeks, I got it in 5 weeks. The only complaint I have is they did not supply a wrench to remove the choke tube in the barrel.
Jim Wisner

I have a 7-30 Waters barrel I got that is one of theirs that looks like they finish sanded/ground it with a crow bar. I bought it second hand and cheap so I knew what I was getting.......next to my Bullberry it looks like a turd.

I should have added that I do own a couple of Bullberry's barrels and a Dave Van Horn. IME, the 2 Custom Shop barrels that I have are really just factory barrels in unstocked chamberings. However, they do shoot well, just a hair better than average and the average includes the Bullberry AND this is from field positions.

If you've got doubts, it is always better to see what you're buying before you put your money down. Pass on it if you can't have a look. FWIW, this applies to more than just TC barrels.

Whatever you do, best of luck.