I have a Stevens 200 in 223. It has a tensioned barrel, SSS trigger and Stockade gunstock, bolt lift kit as well as their bolt. The scopes have been mounted in Leupold rings and bases.

The build was done last year and I told the shop to chop the barrel to 18" and tension it, it came back with 20" so I took it back for them to do it the way I had paid for. They tried to argue that I never told them 18” so they pulled the ticket. The ticket showed 18” so they fixed it. Well I get it back and everything seems right so I screw it into the stock. It has sat for a long time but over the course of the last few months I have really began to shoot it more. Before I would shoot it probably 10 times or so in a setting when showing friends.

A couple of months ago I took it out with some friends for a few hours, it was grouping well at 400 yards then it shifted completely off the 12” target. I thought that maybe the cheap scope I was using finally gave up so I packed the rifle up for the day. After getting home I cleaned the rifle and removed the suspect scope, never taking it out of the stock. I install a much better scope than what was on there and get it zeroed at home on my 25 yard range.

I take it out again and this time it basically does the same thing, shoots great then shifts for no reason after so many rounds. I began to think to myself that maybe it is time to bed the gun into the stock to hopefully fix the problem with inconsistency because have two scopes in a row crap out is a rarity. Last night I remove the action from the stock and start prepping the stock for the bed job. When I start prepping the action I find something disturbingly wrong.

The shop that did all the work never reinstalled the recoil lug. I guess I didn’t notice it either when I first got it home. Not trying to make excuses for me but I do have some health issues right now and if I was having a bad day a nuclear explosion could have went unnoticed also.

I am sure this is the accuracy issue. The gun is capable of shooting very well, better than I had ever hoped. Before the work the gun has shot .2’s and has since then it shifts.

Now I get to talk to the shop to see what they say. Hopefully they fix it but after almost a year I am not so sure they will. I have had to take stuff back before and as a matter of fact every project they have done for me in the last two years has had to be taken back to have it done the way I paid for it to be done in the first place. I keep going back because most shops in my area will not take on custom builds, especially if it requires any type of machining.

The biggest problem I have is the 400+ rounds I have worked up specifically for this gun. Hopefully they will still shoot after everything gets fixed but in my experience anytime anything is changed the harmonics change and ammo that once shot well no longer does. If I cannot use the same ammo I have loaded I am not sure what I am going to do. It has taken me over 6 months to load the 400 rounds because of my health. I got so disgusted with this I even told my wife last night this may be the reason for me to find another hobby.

This shop promotes itself as a precision rifle builder and they do make some accurate rifle but I am wondering how many are actually as well built and accurate as they claim now. They have a 4-6 month wait on all their rifles and charge a premium ($4K+) for any rifle they build. The recoil lug seems like something major part to forget, especially for a shop that has built its reputation on accurate firearms. I am not going to mention the shop until I find out if they are going to fix the problem. I do believe this is going to be the last time I deal with them.

Dolomite