There is no doubt that generally a manufacture of a product may know what is best, at least at the time of manufacturing. BUT, it seems that someone always comes along with something that will improve performance—this is very evident with cars and motorcycles. So is the case with firearms.
I believe T/C uses a 4-screw base setup for a ‘scope, yet someone decided a 6-screw base was better and offered this service for T/C barrels? T/C offered one handgrip—many companies decided to improve on that. T/C triggers used to be adjustable—not any more. There is one case where the manufacture absolutely didn’t know what he was doing. The new triggers are terrible—my opinion—and I will always opt for the older frames.
Now to the charlatan (that is the correct spelling, by the way!) who may or may not know whether oversized hinge pins improve accuracy. I purchased several of them back in the late 1980’s and have used them ever since. I did purchase only one size bigger as I do think that forcing them into the frame may not be the best idea. They are marked and go into the frame exactly the same orientation every time. They do require a very minimal tap with a wooden dowel and brass hammer to be removed. I also use the heavy duty locking bolt springs. The combination of both of these after market devices has most likely improved the accuracy of all of my Contender barrels…Period. Will they take a 2 M.O.A. shooter and make it a ¼ M.O.A. shooter—Nope. But they do allow for a very even abrupt lockup of the barrel to the frame. You can feel it when the barrel is closed. It is a consistency thing. Consistency is one of the factors of accurate shooting. And, in all honesty, it would, most likely, be statistically impossible to actually say if accuracy has improved or remained the same—way too many human factors involved. Only under mechanical methods could improvement be proved or disproved. Yet, I continue to believe it did help and continues to allow several of my barrels to shoot sub-M.O.A. accuracy.
And so it goes…BCB
