Griffith area... Eric Gutridge's shop

[Mat]

Saturday July 11th 1pm. I walk into Eric Gutridge's shop in Griffith, Indiana at 1pm. Eric is a very polite, well spoken, and cheery man and is very easy to like. I asked if he could do a muzzle device swap on my KAC SR15, after all he has a sign out front donning "Custom AR-15s", supposedly has 25 years experience, and along with his father is listed in American Handguner's Top 100 Pistolsmiths. He accepted the job no problem. I showed him the Triple Tap inconel muzzle brake, he held it up verbally admiring the craftsmanship of the device. He said his now deceased father was a research engineer and researched a paper on rocket blast compensasion. Eric pulled out a sketch pad and illustrated why, according to him, devices such as the one I brought in don't really work as well as they could. He said there is a 30 degree angle that all the commercially available brakes are lacking. He was rightfully concerned about the use of the shims required for the installation and asked if I had instructions because the comp didn't come with any. I drove home, printed out KAC's instructions, ran the papers right back. We did not speak about price or timeframe other than that he said he wouldn't be able to get to it that day. My fault, his fault, whatever, I'm really not too concerned about money or time when it comes to having something done right.

Saturday July 18th 3pm. I called Eric exactly a week later to get a timeframe from him. He chuckled and said he had just spun off my old muzzle device. He told me that he wasn't looking to start anything complicated on a Saturday but he'd give me a call when it was done. He called back at 5pm, the time when his shop closes, and informed me the installation was complete, "top dead center" he said, and I could pick it up any time next week (he's closed on Sundays) and that the charge is $100. I thought the charge was steep but I didn't care, as far as I knew an experienced gunsmith flawlessly installed my device. That was the full extent of my telephone contact with Eric Gutridge.

Monday, July 20th 1pm. I walk into Eric's shop and told him I was there to pick up the SR15. He flips off some machine running in the next room, (slightly paraphrasing of coarse) "Aaahh yes, let me show you what I did. (he lays my rifle on the wooden holder on his front desk) I managed to install the comp without using the shims. See... I figured this groove here is top dead center on the comp (pointing to a random groove toward the top of the device). See it's pretty close to the picture. I didn't need the shims because I machined off some of the rear, it machined nicely... see... I'm a machinist. (smiling proudly). I'll show you this because I don't think you'll mind... (points to a pin mark he tapped on the top of my barrel) I lined the comp top dead center of the barrel..." blah blah blah going on to explain some more nonsense like I was supposed to be impressed and thankful for his bizarre mistreatment of my firearm. Nothing was anywhere near top dead center and he didn't even use the RockSett! Remember, he asked for the manufacture's instructions, and then totally made up his own!!! The most rational decision I could come up with while being so frustrated was to smile and nod. I paid him his $100, flew home, contacted KAC's military liaison for advice (note: KAC does not specifically know Eric did the work): "... While your gunsmith is a hack, it should not cause major issues, however I wonder at what sort of person shaves an inconel part ,I'd never let him touch a firearm again. It should not cause issue as the mounting surfaces are not at the rear as [forum member] pointed out. DO NOT LET HIM REDO HIS ERROR! and USE ROCKSETT." The non-issue he was referring to was concerning whether the comp would still able to interface with the KAC suppressor, although several posts later people brought up if the machining threw off the perpendicularity of the device to the barrel, I might have even more problems. I got word from the shop repairing Eric's supreme f'up: "We just finished getting your brake off. We had to hand file the flats on the brake as they were too short to get a wrench on. The guy who installed it also used so much red loctite that he created a washer against the barrel. ---- Yes the guy did appear to shorten the back end of it. This meant that the flats (where the wrench sits) were too short for us to get a wrench back on. Couple that with a truck load of red loctite and you get the idea."



To clarify my safety concerns for any future would-be Gutridge victims err... patrons, here's a copy/paste from one of my posts on AR15 in response to the suggestion I should have either given Eric a chance to "correct" the issue and that I am a hack because all I needed was a wrench to do the job myself. Somehow that poster did not seem to notice the wrench comment made Eric's failure look even worse, hehe.
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But my reason for the freak out is not because something crappy happened to me or because I wasted some money on a bad job. I think I'm mostly just so surprised that something as serious and potentially dangerous as a botched firearm job is so easily brushed off by so many people. I've had a few suggest that I should have asked him to correct the job, I'm trying to figure out how that would go:

"Excuse me sir, would you mind re-doing the job but correctly this time, like you were paid for, and said you would? I'm going to be holding this contraption up to my face and making it explode repeatedly. For the safety of myself and the people around me, may I please ask that you stop making un-calculated alterations to its components?"

I didn't do it because I like to rag on people for doing a bad job or even just having an off day, but there is a huge safety issue involved. We are detonating explosive cartridges inside a device most of which are meant to be held up to our face which happens to be stretched across the front of our heads, for most of us at least. When a person makes un-calculated changes to the shape and size of firearm components, there is the likelihood of a new and completely unnecessary danger introduced to the process. I apologize if I acted like an idiot, I for sure started off in an ugly way, and then continued hehe. Obviously my experience over there wasn't the worst, but what about the next guy? At least understand that safety was my concern, I'm O.C.D. about safety.
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I propose a new measure of quality when judging say... a gunsmith or a doctor or a doorknob, whatever. It's based on 5 simple levels called G's:

1G is of coarse considered good by a few people, like a placebo effect really. There is no harm or good coming from this product or service.
2G looks like there is good reason of suspicion that this product or service might be tainted or spoiled, possibly rotten.
3G means "take caution", use only if you are absolutely certain you don't care about what happens next.
4G there is no doubt this product or service is up to no good and on course for complete and utter failure... and it might take you with it.
5G(also called an E.G.) is supreme. This level of failure is so refined and perfect it can wreck things around it, just by existing.

This scale is universal and can be used in most any circumstance, just try it! I used to think I could never make such an important scientific contribution to my planet, but my experience with Eric Gutridge has taught me I don't need to know a ****ing thing about anything and still be great at it! I'm assuming you are all applauding me right now, but don't... you are all capable of the very same potential and beyond. Wanna be a gunsmith? Get a smock, someone else's credentials, and open shop! It's just that easy.