No, I will not tell you how to vent a gun you bought somewhere else

 Here is an email exchange I just had with someone:

Guy with more balls than brains:  I just obtained a French Flintlock Carbine 1777 Musketoon (AN IX model)

I need to drill the flash hole of vent hole. What is the dimensions (diameter) for the bit?

Me, career gunsmith:  Our guns are shipped vented and tuned.

If you bought one with no vent, it isn't one of ours.

Guy with more balls than brains:  I did not get the musketoon from you. The one shipped to me is not drilled. I am trying to determine the size of bit I should order or buy.

I was hoping you could give me this information.

Me, career gunsmith:   Ask the guy you bought it from.

Guy with more balls than brains:  Thanks for the great assistance.

I cannot believe the balls some people have. What would make someone think that I would tell him how to (maybe) fix an unfinished gun that he bought from one of my foreign competitors?

Here is a truth for people like him: an unvented gun is an unfinished project kit gun at best.

There is a lot more to making an unfinished gun work than drilling a hole in it. DO you know how to inspect the barrel? Do you have the proper tools to safely remove the breechplug when you need to rework it? Of even funnier, when you break off a drill bit in it? Do you know how to adjust the lock parts so that the gun is safe to carry loaded? Can you heat treat the lock parts after reshaping them? Do you even know what you are looking at enough to KNOW if something is unsafe and needs adjustment?

Here is the first hint that the answer is no to all of those questions: the guy who is going to play gunsmith does not know enough about what he is doing to even have a clue about what sized vent to drill.

Ignoring the fact that probably half of the guns that are floating around as "unvented" project guns are my intellectual property that was ripped off, no professional gunsmith in his right mind would give out tech information to someone who clearly lacks the knowledge to be screwing around with this stuff.

Makes me wonder if the guy also writes to random doctors he has never met and asks "Hey, I'm going to try my hand at carpal tunnel surgery on my wife, what size scalpel should I get?"

If you have to ask me about drilling a hole, you should probably not be playing gunsmith.