Economy guns

[Alexx1401]

I've not met anyone who has bad things to say about the SCCY pistols, other than rough, heavy triggers. Everyone says they always go bang.

I got to shoot one of them a short time ago. Lady at the range had one that was new to her and asked for some help. For the price I was super impressed with it. Certainly nothing fancy but it worked great. For people who don't have much cash but want a gun for protection these are great.

 

[bsa1917hunter]

Lots of quality guns back in the day as well...
Many models of :
Winchester...
FN Browning...
Sako...
Marlin...
Savage...
Mossberg...
And others , were made by the above companies but were "Store Branded" like :
J.C. Higgins , Revelation , Ted Williams , etc...

But I do hear ya....its nice to see a decent quality , lower cost firearm out there.
Andy

Andy, one of my most favorite books I have and enjoy looking at is titled, "RIFLES a modern encyclopedia". So yes, I subscribe to your class/era of rifles way of thinking. Oh by the way, the copyright date of that book is 1958 . Now days we have some great rifles that can be had for cheap. In some ways it's also good for some of us that are looking to buy old used rifles because the prices and availability of these "cheap" rifles drives the prices of the one I like the most down to very reasonable/attainable/affordable costs. Example: It seems like there are more and more people that would rather buy a savage, Thompson center, or Tikka vs. my beloved pre 64 model 70 rifles. One reason I've been seeing pre 64's at very reasonable prices lately. I don't have a problem with it, as i love and use them all. Lately when I'm reaching for something extremely accurate, I'll grab one of my "cheapest" rifles. Its a Savage 12FV Cabela's exclusive chambered in 6.5 creedmoor. That coupled with its cheap ($300.00) SWFA SS 16x rifle scope and you have a winning combination that is really hard to beat in the accuracy department, at any cost.



I'm a sucker for "cheap rifle" koolaid. Especially when they shoot good. One of my other "cheap" rifles is a Stevens 200 22-250. That along with its $100.00 (used price) weaver rifle scope and you are looking at a really cheap tack driver:



Why not buy them, when they have the potential to shoot this well?... I will never be without my pre 64's and they won't ever be displaced by these cheap guns, but dang if the safe isn't getting filled with more and more of these economically priced rifles. I actually grew up using one of the cheapest rifles in its day, a sporterized m1917. Remember when they kept those rifles in barrels and you could pick through them and buy them for real cheap? Around $10.00, from what I hear. Guys would buy them in full military dress and sporterize them to their liking. In a sense they were the "poor man's" pre 64 model 70, way back in the day. You could build a m1917 for cheap and there were so many gunsmiths back then that did such things. Some of my favorite "cheap" rifles from that hay day were sporterized m1917's. Here's one that was done to resemble a pre 64 model 70:


I actually bought this^^^^ rifle about 15 years ago for the meager sum of $150.00.... So called "cheap" rifles have been around for a long time. Savage first introduced its model 110 back in 1958 and ever since, rifle manufactures have felt the sting as the cheap savage ate into theirs sales a bit. Because of the introduction of the savage 110, way back then, Remington had to do something to sway sales in their direction again. They introduced the 788 in 1967 to try and compete with Savage and their insanely low priced rifles. The funny thing about that story is Remington actually shot themselves in the foot because a lot of guys ended up buying/favoring the little 788 because it gained a reputation for fine accuracy. Remington had indeed built a rifle to compete with Savage and regain some of the market sales, but at a cost to their own 700 sales. The history of firearms is a fascinating study, but little do many realize there have been so called "cheap"/"economical" rifles abound for quite some time...

 

[Ops]

eaa m92 clone

 

[Grumpa]

What? No Charter Arms mention? Sacrilege!

 

[Alexx1401]

What? No Charter Arms mention? Sacrilege!
View attachment 635434

They get a little bad press but I have had several over the years and they were all fine. Never have been a wheel gun guy but every one of the Charters I had did work great and were low end price wise. When I met Wife she had no guns. Taught her to shoot and her first gun was an old Charter .38 that was great price wise and how well it worked. Before they started making small auto's in good caliber that worked I had a couple of the old 5 shot, alloy framed .44 Sp. They were great and I often with I had kept one of them.

 

[CountryGent]

The Turks know how to make a Shotgun.

Good to know. I vaguely recall reading somewhere that their anti-RKBA laws are super bad, but obtaining a shotgun license was easy. No idea if that is true, but that might explain an industry tooled up to put out a quality scattergun.

 

[Ruger Rich]

Those rock island revolvers aren't bad. Not great finish wise, but run well. The m200 (4 in) is a bit more reliable than the m206 according to reviews, but for my .02, both are worth the 199. I love my SCCYs, though.

Got the M200 for my wife. It's ugly (like me) but she likes it and it's the one on her night stand. Shoots ok.

 

[Alexx1401]

Got the M200 for my wife. It's ugly (like me) but she likes it and it's the one on her night stand. Shoots ok.

Bottom line to me has always been just that, does it work like it's supposed to. I have often looked and looked hard at many "pretty guns". Never been seriously temped by them since I don't look at guns as something to display. Nothing wrong with that for those who do of course. I just never wanted to worry about scratching them or such when I use them. Have a few firearms I LOVE, that are on the ugly side. I love them because they just work. If they are "cheap" and work? Well hell that's a win win to me

 

[terdog]

to get me to re-evaluate my anti-Taurus bent. I've had a lot of bad Taurus experiences, but this gun felt better, and ran better than I've ever seen a Taurus run before. A $179 sub compact 9

The GF & I have had 5 of the G2c's between us. All have been great guns, with necer a single problem between them all.
I just saw an ad that someone is selling the plain black model for $169, and Taurus has brought back the $25 rebate. Thats $144!

A couple of weeks ago I bought the new G3 for my daughter as a Bday gift.$215 shipped!

 

[2DaMtns]

I have an old Stevens 325 in.30-30. It's my go to beater for a camp gun and hunting in terrible weather and really thick stuff. I got it for $140. I also have a Remington 788 in .243. I bought it for $400, came with a cheap fixed 4x scope on it. Bought the cheapest ammo I could find and it shot under an inch at a hundred yards. My wife has a Savage axis II in 243 that she bought for $400 or less. Both of those shoot almost as well as my bergara HMR in 6.5 creedmore. I often see people posting or listing measurements of their groups on higher end rifles and wonder how I can justify the price increase for often only moderate accuracy improvements (on stuff that is still in production, that is). To each their own, I certainly understand people wanting certain things and I am in no way bashing people buying higher end rifles. I have other interests and have paid more money for certain products for fairly marginal improvements.

To summarize, yes, you can get great guns for less than great cost.

 

[Wombat of Doom]

I keep thinking about getting a Henry Repeating Arms , Single shot rifle in .30-30...
Nice to see a "economy gun" , that ain't got a lot of plastic on it.

At one time I owed a pre-war Savage 219 in .30-30 it shot like a house afire and was easy to carry....I'm thinking the Henry would be a good replacement for it.
Andy

I love the .38special/.357magnum I got.

 

[leadcounsel]

Is it just me, or are there more fairly decent "economy" guns nowadays, than ever before?

I'm talking about fairly inexpensive rifles, handguns, and shotguns that those of us accustomed to quality guns might turn our noses up at, but they actually work pretty well. Most of us remember the cheap guns of yesterday, the Lorcins, RGs; and even further back, the various junk revolvers of the turn of the last century. A lot of them were simply junk right off the assembly line.

I was just looking at a Rock Island .38 Special revolver at BiMart, for $199. It seemed like a very usable, serviceable gun for the money. They had Sccy pistols for less than that, and I know people who like them. On Black Friday you can pick up a usable budget hunting rifle for around that much. I don't care to own a Hi-Point pistol, but they have a pretty good reputation for what they are. I'm not a Rough Rider fan, but most people like them too.

I know so many guns were a lot cheaper back in the day, but when you factor in inflation, I have a feeling that they might be cheaper now, at least for usable inexpensive firearms. A nice, top quality revolver maybe not so much...

Dollar has lost value over time, so the price points are roughly the same.

It's smarter to buy a well made used gun or unfavorable caliber (40 cal) versus a "bargain gun" from a garbage gun maker (Taurus, Rossi, etc. who won't stand behind their junk). I've sworn off Taurus and junk gun companies after so many headaches. Just not worth it.

For instance, $300-$400 Glocks, FNs, Sigs, Walthers are a far better deal than a slightly less expensive Taurus or Keltec....

This month, I've purchased
* 2 new FN pistols for $350 each total.
* 2 near new (used) Walther P99 and PPQ for $400 each total.

These are world class pistols for bargain pricing. And not uncommon deals. There's more guns than money at these prices...

We are right now living in the best time for gun buyers of modern designs and materials (cars too). Technology, innovation, and manufacturing have driving prices to absurd low prices for high quality machines.

 

[leadcounsel]

The GF & I have had 5 of the G2c's between us. All have been great guns, with necer a single problem between them all.
I just saw an ad that someone is selling the plain black model for $169, and Taurus has brought back the $25 rebate. Thats $144!

A couple of weeks ago I bought the new G3 for my daughter as a Bday gift.$215 shipped!

High rates of them (Taurus in general) breaking. And then you have to deal with their industry WORST customer service. And at that price point, dealing with them is not worth the headache, so just throw it in the trash. $150 wasted on a Taurus is a worse proposition than $300-400 spent on a good quality (even used) handgun.

New pricing has driven the used market pricing thru the floor on modern guns. A little hunting and some patience and you can generally get a package deal with mags, holster, etc. for really low pricing.

 

[terdog]

Taurus DID have that reputation, not so much any more.
Not sure what Taurus products you actually owned, but the G2c and a couple other of their newer models have been as good as any other brand. They did some QC and things are much better.
The G3 should be as good as the G2c since it is virtually the same, only bigger.

 

[terdog]

As I mentioned I've had 5 of the G2c's and 1of the G3's.
Never had a single issue with any.

 

[Pops1911]

I still want a Hi Point carbine in 45acp!

 

[terdog]

I keep thinking about the 10mm Hi Point

 

[zenbreath]

It is a couple things. One is demand. The more of something that is cranked out the cheaper per piece it gets. The other is the light years advances in mass manufacturing. As it's gotten faster and cheaper to make all the parts that go into guns, the price of the product of course goes down.

Right on the money!

Years ago, you needed a master machinist and a master gunsmith to turn out flawless weapons, today, a CNC will pump them out all day.

 

[Kruel J]

I still want a Hi Point carbine in 45acp!

I keep thinking about the 10mm Hi Point

Sigh.

 

[leadcounsel]

Taurus DID have that reputation, not so much any more.
Not sure what Taurus products you actually owned, but the G2c and a couple other of their newer models have been as good as any other brand. They did some QC and things are much better.
The G3 should be as good as the G2c since it is virtually the same, only bigger.

Sir, I own probably more Taurus handguns than most people own handguns of all platforms and brands. I've had 13 in my collection at some point.

One of my first handguns was a Taurus PT140 circa late 1990s. Garbage. Trip back to Taurus failed to fix it. Overall, I haven't even shot most of them, but about 35% of those I've owned have been junk or returned under recall. Or sold off with disclosures. And the only reason I've kept the 65% I've kept is they are clones of guns which Taurus probably got right (2 PT92s, a few SW revolver clones, and a couple of the "better" Taurus older semi-auto designs that seem of decent quality - and the resale is zilch on this brand so no point in selling for a few bucks).

FYI, Taurus had a recall of 9 or 10 models across the spectrum and generally screwed over owners, and getting a refund or replacement under recall was a consumer's headache.

The company is suffering and their prices are basically down to disposable junk gun levels at sub $200. Which doesn't provide much room for profit margins in the supply chain. They've gutted customer service, quality control, and their own warranty because of being overwhelmed with returns and recalls.