This was quite some undertaking for Enfield and the Ordnance and very much against the wishes of the traditional gunmakers who had considerable weight in Parliament. However, the Lovells and the government could see this was the only way to get what they wanted - arms made with interchangeable components to ensure a long service life. It is considered that the lack of a large number of gunsmiths of various trades as well as a different market promped the adoption of 'the American System' in America. The problem in Britain was the variation in gunmaking skills - rather like the 'Khyber Pass' gunmakers. The expensive guns - high end - were very good, well crafted and presented pieces complete with presentation cases, but some of the lower-end examples that still exist are better as scrap. At least the really bad ones could be sent out into the Empire.
Perhaps a little hard on the gun trade. Most of them made Enfields of a reasonable quality that could pass inspection and most of those of lesser quality were made to a price for the foreign civilian trade and all were proofed as safe. Major factory makers in Liege and France made adequate ones too.
The cheap civilian trade used up a lot of inspector reject parts (rejected as out of pattern not as unsafe) and I used to have a Pattern1853 based Snider made up of reject parts including an oversize barrel hastily put together for the French National Government for use in the defence of the Cotentin Peninsula in the 1870 War and that shot quite well.
What made the British government move to interchangeable arms was not the quality of the work per se,as they all had to pass inspection, and Lovell was criticised for the rigour of his inspectors. But the problems of maintaining them which needed skilled and forge equipped armourers in the field and variations in the markings of the sights. Which latter was of little significance to most of the troops of the American Difference of Opinion as they and their officers had negligible training in their use and were adequate for the ranges of actual engagement. The Union bought trade made Enfields when they were short of small arms but always intended to standardise on the interchangeable Springfields as soon as they could, which was not done until the war ended.
Similarly the British government desperately needed large quantities of Pattern 1853 Enfields for the Crimean War and had to place orders anywhere they could from small trade makers and foreign factories from Belgium, France etc. and the USA as they could not make enough in the normal system. Hence they saw they must have a permanent source of interchangeable arms and invested in the Enfield factory and, over a long period, they removed the non interchangeable Enfields from front line use to the militia, colonial, native forces and Volunteers and finally sold them all off as the army transitioned to the Snider which conversion was only done to interchangeable arms by them. But the trade converted anything that could pass proof.
So most trade made Enfields were adequate rifles suitable for issue but militarily inferior to the interchangeable rifle muskets, but rarely bad ones. I too have seen some pretty poor ones but many of these had led a hard life or put together from disparate surplus parts. Often in more modern times. The pattern has also been tainted by the common Indian copies for their local use. The 'Khyber' Afridi made copies can be quite well made and the iron up to the task, even if the steel is more variable. The bad ones are hand held pipe bombs but Darwinism has weeded out the worst but survival has been helped by inferior powder and use with light round balls and shot. But I digress from the forum focus.
I do agree that some trade Enfields were very poor but most were fit for use.
Bringing the