bwaites Wrote:There is no trademark fee for licensed Grendel manufacturers.
No royalty or other fee for rifle/barrel production? Interesting.... that means either it's demand driving up pricing, or additional mfg costs
Poked around a bit, some mfg's charge more for the same rifle in Grendel/clone, others do not:
- LBC- Same price for 264LBC vs other cals. Used to be a $200 premium for Grendel for same rifle compared to 5.56
- SAOD- $30 premium for 6.5CSS for same barrel ($430)
- M1 Sales- $50 premium for 6.5 Sporter over similar calibers
SAOD's uplift could be from having a grendel specific bolt.
M1 comes with no bolt, so their surcharge appears to be the least justified.
On the Licensed front:
- JT is about $135 more for Grendel for same rifle in 5.56. 6.8 is about $50 less than grendel, from memory. And shaw 4140 grendel Barrel/Bolt is roughly same cost as SS AA equiv.
- Satern charges about $80 more for same barrel in Grendel than 300 AAC, though some of that could be bolt costs. They have other grendel cut rifle barrels on closeout as well as Liberty button rifled. Just a hair cheaper than AA's price for similar.
- Midway (AR Stoner) was about $50 more for Grendel over 6.8 SPC
But here's the kicker.... for a rack grade, basic Grendel/clone barrel, only Liberty was less expensive than AA, and that's only once on closeout. M1 Barrel is pretty cheap, but once you buy their bolt it's not.
Point being- You can debate quality, business practices, etc. But based on my quick & non-exhaustive checking, to build a basic rack grade Grendel you almost have to pay more to use a non-AA barrel!!
Once you get into premium barrels all bet's are off as there is more variance in all their barrel pricing, not just Grendel. And since the premium barrels quickly climb into the $500 range, the variance in pricing is a smaller percentage of the total cost.