Are S&W revolvers unreliable?

[dogngun]

I have been shooting revolvers, mainly Smiths, for 35 years now. I have had trouble with 2 revolvers, one an old Colt Det Special, the other an old Charter Arms Bulldog.
I have owned and shot Smiths as old as the 1880's (top break .38's) and never had one not work. My newest now is 1990's, but that is for reasons of economics, not fear of the "new ones."

FWIW, I remember that the 1970's Smiths were called "junk" compared to the "good old ones", as were the Smiths made in the '80's. I stopped listening after that, so I'm not sure about the current crop of complainers.

Mark

PS I own only 2 revolvers that are not Smiths-they are both SAA's.

 

[Deanimator]

Deanimator This is what you are talking about?

http://www.thehighroad.org/showthrea...ight=29-2+cuts

1/8" long scratches. Got a Picture?

The gun you sent them was over 30 years old, and you are surprised that they dont have parts on hand???

Try taking a 30 year old LTD wagon to the ford dealer for major repairs and ask them for a new engine.

Its a shooter a couple scratches 1/8" long from the lathe chuck???

1. If the Ford dealer negligently ruined my engine, I'd expect them to do whatever it would take to return it to its original condition. If they can't do the work they hold themselves out as being capable of doing, they should find another line of work.

2. If the Ford dealer ruins your engine and tries to blow the whole thing off until you call them on it, you should not trust anything they say.

3. If the Ford dealer agrees to replace your engine and then doesn't, you shouldn't believe what they tell you.

S&W ruined my barrel.

S&W tried to pass off the damage without comment, hoping I wouldn't notice.

When notified of the damage, S&W tried to claim they didn't do it.

When they admitted their fault, S&W tried to skate by with an attempt to cosmetically conceal the results of their incompetence, rather than return the gun to its proper condition prior to their mutilating it.

Having finally agreed to replace the barrel they ruined, S&W then said they wouldn't. They then sent me a curt email TELLING me that they were going to refinish my gun. You don't TELL somebody that you're going to do that. You ASK them if they MAY.

They again attempted to rush me into allowing them to refinish the gun based on some fairy story about a polisher leaving.

I purchased two replacement barrels. They rejected the first. The second should reach them today.

My interactions with S&W have been so nightmarishly similar to those with SBC, that I half expect them to start badgering me to purchase DSL service from them.

There's a fascinating book by a fellow named Coox. It's about the Battle of Nomonhan, fought between Japan and the Soviet Union in 1939. Reduced to its basic elements, it's the story of how the Japanese violated virtually every elementary principle of warfare. Similarly, my interactions with S&W are an example of how to violate every imaginable principle of customer service.

 

[Master Blaster]

S&W ruined my barrel.

The bad news: Somewhere along the way, they put an about 1/8" scratch in the left side of the barrel, perpendicular to the length of the barrel, near the printing. It's deep enough so that when you run your fingernail over it, it hangs up.

S&W tried to pass off the damage without comment, hoping I wouldn't notice.

How did it shoot?

Got a picture of the scratches? Tiny 1/8" long scratches you had to look closely to see. S&W probably didnt do it on purpose, nor did they see them.

Since its a 30+year old gun it could have already had a few scratches.

I have many revolvers that are covered by 1/8" scratches and even larger scratches, but they all shoot fine, and they get even more scratches everytime I shoot or carry them.

Post a picture of the Damage so we can see Please.

 

[Deanimator]

How did it shoot?

The gun shoots fine. That's of course completely irrelevant.

They didn't do the work as a favor. I payed them money to have the forcing cone fixed.

I've got guns with scratches on them too. That's also irrelevant. I don't believe that S&W intentionally damaged my gun. Irrelevant as well.

S&W holds itself out as being competent to perform repairs to their products. Repairs do not include additional damage or defects to the gun.

S&W has been shifty about the whole thing. NOBODY could have missed the cuts on the barrel. I noticed them as soon as I got the gun out of the box. Somebody HOPED that *I* wouldn't notice. And having been caught, they have persisted, to the point of great annoyance, in insisting upon grinding or buffing on the barrel they ruined as a clumsy cosmetic coverup of the damage.

I didn't send my gun to S&W to be refinished. I certainly didn't send it to them to have the barrel scarred up. It's not as though I sent my gun to them with a list of impossible or unreasonable demands. I had ONE request, namely that they fix the forcing cone and barrel-cylinder gap so that the gun no longer "spit" or blew gas back into my face. They also defaced the barrel. That's THEIR fault. It's THEIR duty to rectify that act of negligence. Creating flats, dips, assymetry or reduced OD in my barrel will NOT return the gun to its proper condition.

If S&W had been honest and not tried to slide something by me, perhaps I would have been more indulgent of their pratfalls. But they weren't, and therefore that ship has sailed, hit an iceberg and sunk with all hands. As someone on another messageboard so aptly put it, S&W isn't some guy in his garage with a "BFH". They portray themselves as a professional gunmaker who also performs gunsmithing. They should be held to a higher standard than Cletus the Slackjawed Yokel, and I certainly intend to do just that.

There are pictures of the gun on gunsnet and smith-wessonforum.

 

[Master Blaster]

http://smith-wessonforum.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/580103904/m/9591087951?r=7261021261#7261021261

Picture

 

[Headless]

Wow. You really care about the 0.01" difference that buffing a scratch out of a 20 year old gun's barrel that's been used and is already not in perfect condition would make... Seems like you want a new gun in return for a scratch that could be eliminated entirely by S&W in an hour. Your list of possible solutions - none of which are either possible or in some cases acceptable to you - makes it fairly impossible for s&w to help you.

 

[Deanimator]

Wow. You really care about the 0.01" difference that buffing a scratch out of a 20 year old gun's barrel that's been used and is already not in perfect condition would make... Seems like you want a new gun in return for a scratch that could be eliminated entirely by S&W in an hour. Your list of possible solutions - none of which are either possible or in some cases acceptable to you - makes it fairly impossible for s&w to help you.

A _40_ year old gun, by their admission. Actually, guns tend to INCREASE in value with age... especially if they're not all scratched up.

Again, I didn't want my gun "buffed", much less scratched in the first place. That's certainly not what I requested.

I don't want a new gun. I want a new barrel. In fact, they should have received the second one I sent them, today. Of course I didn't ORIGINALLY want a new barrel. I just wanted my forcing cone fixed. Unfortunately, S&W can't seem to do one without the other... or at least that's their track record going in.

S&W can "help" me by installing the replacement barrel which I sent them, and ensure that the finishes match. Whether they can actually do that without screwing something else up is anybody's guess. I'm pretty sure Cylinder & Slide could do it though. Of course I'll bet C&S wouldn't try hide a mistake, then blame everybody else for it either.

But then some people think that good work and honest business practices are completely unreasonable demands. I guess I'm just, in the words of First Lady Bunny on the TV show "Lexx", a "bad, bad, bad, bad, bad man..."

 

[Ala Dan]

A scratch on your favotite firearm only gives it character and class.

Kind'a lets others know that she works just fine~!

 

[Deanimator]

A scratch on your favotite firearm only gives it character and class.

That's true... if YOU put it on the gun!

Otherwise, it's just as if some drooling product of incest and foetal alcohol syndrome rammed a line of shopping carts into the door of your Lamborghini Countach in the grocery store parking lot!

 

[Headless]

LOL @ comparing your 40 year old, well used model 29 to a Lamborghini. I think you may be the very definition of a problem customer. It's a gun, not a lamborghini. You said you wanted it for protection, not as a show piece, yet your attitude is one i'd expect from someone with an all chromed custom once-off centennial edition 1911 with silver coated bullets that had been scratched.

I think it highlights S&W's excellent customer service record that they are actually going to replace the barrel entirely for you with a barrel you provide rather than simply refinishing the barrel to eliminate the small scratch, which would have likely took them less time and been totally unnoticeable to the human eye. If they refused to help you, i could see some merit in several threads complaining about this, but from what you've said they have been attempting to convince you to let them fix the problem for months; it's just taken you this long to decide on exactly what you wanted them to do that was both possible and "acceptable" to fix the problem.

 

[Deanimator]

If they refused to help you, i could see some merit in several threads complaining about this, but from what you've said they have been attempting to convince you to let them fix the problem for months; it's just taken you this long to decide on exactly what you wanted them to do that was both possible and "acceptable" to fix the problem.

You're mistaken. It took them around a month to get the gun back to me from the original "repair". It was damaged when I got it back. It took me around a week to decide that I didn't want a gun with a ground on barrel. They first tried to claim they didn't do it. When that crashed like the Hindenburg, they tried to get me to let them grind on it. I refused. I told them I wanted a new barrel, and sent them pictures of the damage they'd done. They wanted to see the gun so I returned it to them. They again wanted to grind on it. I again refused. They then agreed to replace the barrel. The next week, they said they couldn't replace the barrel, and again wanted to grind on it, or rather they TOLD me they WERE going to grind on it, until I threatened them with legal action. At that point, they agreed to reimburse me for a barrel. The rest of the time has been taken up by LOOKING FOR replacement barrels. Against all expectations, I was unable to find any at my local Walmart. Wisely, I purchased TWO, both from individuals on the net. While I was negotiating for the purchase of the barrels, they again tried to rush me into allowing them to grind on my barrel, because a supposed "master polisher" was retiring with no replacement in sight. They rejected the first one last week, again offering to grind on my barrel.. I sent them the backup last Friday. They're supposed to notify me when they receive it. I haven't heard from them yet.

In point of fact, S&W has had that gun longer than I have.

By your logic, I shouldn't be upset if I send someone a 1900 American Eagle Luger and they ruin it, because after all, it'd be A HUNDRED AND SIX YEARS OLD!!! I guess to you, the older a gun is, the LESS diligence a gunsmith has to show in handling it...

 

[JN01]

.38 Special said

JN01 -- So how is my "bet" that you'd get sued if you shot someone with a "de-locked" revolver "BS"? Would it kill you to be nice?

Most if not all of us are familiar with horror stories of "clean" shootings that ended up getting dragged around the court system for years, with jackass attorneys dredging up all sorts of nonsense along the way. It wouldn't surprise me one bit to learn of some lawyer spouting off something like "So, Mr. Jones, you deactivated the factory safety device on this gun with the intention of making it extra-deadly, didn't you?!?"

Sorry, didn't mean to come off so harsh. I'm just saying that in most of these IL threads, the arguement is made that there are only a few documented instances of a lock failure, which is true, but then the same people often claim you will get sued for disabling the lock for which there are NO documented instances.

I don't doubt the possibility that some shyster lawyer might TRY to make it an issue, but I can't see how it could possibly be relevant in a self-defense situation. If the modification affected the function of the gun, such as a super light trigger pull or a disabled grip safety, the prosecutor might try to claim that you recklessly, unintentionally shot the guy. In the case of the IL, you wouldn't be carrying it or using it for self-defense with the lock engaged, making no functional difference between it and a non-lock equipped or lock disabled gun.

On the other hand, strange things sometimes happen with our legal system.

 

[Headless]

By your logic, I shouldn't be upset if I send someone a 1900 American Eagle Luger and they ruin it, because after all, it'd be A HUNDRED AND SIX YEARS OLD!!! I guess to you, the older a gun is, the LESS diligence a gunsmith has to show in handling it...

That's as absurd as comparing your model 29 to a ferarri. You don't have a 106 year collectable, you have a 40 year old model 29 that is totally unremarkable... you just want to treat it as though it WAS a 106 year old collectable. S&W probably asked repeatedly to buff out the scratches because that is all that was needed to fix the scratch

 

[.38 Special]

JN01 -- no worries mate.

I certainly don't have any evidence of trigger lock disablers having trouble in court over it. I'm simply using my imagination, based upon all the other related foolishness I have heard of in these matters. Certainly, though, if a kid were to get a hold of a de-locked gun, the owner may as well report directly to jail.

Personally, disabling the lock seems to me a bit of a solution in search of a problem. I figure the odds of the ammo company sending out a primer without a pellet or a case without a flash hole are probably higher than an S&W revolver activating its own lock.

But like I say, I avoid the whole trouble by buying only old S&Ws!

 

[bronicadave]

Yup, problem customer. Deanimator, could you post a photo so I can alert my employees to close the shop if they see you coming?

 

[Deanimator]

You don't have a 106 year collectable, you have a 40 year old model 29 that is totally unremarkable... you just want to treat it as though it WAS a 106 year old collectable.

Don't look at 4" Model 29s on the auction sites. You'll just feel silly.

 

[Deanimator]

Yup, problem customer. Deanimator, could you post a photo so I can alert my employees to close the shop if they see you coming?

Why would I want to bring a gun to somebody who thinks it's ok to damage a gun and try to hide the fact? I could just bang the gun on a big rock and not pay you or S&W anything.

My predecessor at work thought that people who complained when they never got goods that they payed for were "problem customers" too. When he's sentenced, I'm going to give him the first season of "Oz" on DVD as a going away present...

 

[Headless]

Don't look at 4" Model 29s on the auction sites. You'll just feel silly.

Round and round we go - my last post on this matter. Your model 29 was already scratched up, all over the barrel. It wasn't in mint condition ANYWAY. You're worrying about 2 1/8" scratches in addition to tons of wear all over your gun already. It's not a show piece; it's well worn ANYWAY. S&W could have refinished the gun and eliminated not only the two 1/8" scratches but all the other obvious scratches on the barrel too. You obviously would much prefer to get an entirely new barrel (new barrel! +100$ to the value of my ubar pistawl!! yar! how convenient), and they're even entertaining you in that. IMO S&W is doing just fine with a customer who is stubborn and refuses to take their advice on fixing an easy to fix problem. I mean really, refusing to let them buff a scratch out because you can detect the difference between pre and post buffing with a digital caliper?!

 

[Deanimator]

Your model 29 was already scratched up, all over the barrel.

No it wasn't. There wasn't another scratch on the gun. What you are seeing is video artifacts from a cheap digital camera. I realize that S&W aren't the sharpest wifflebat in the drawer, but I suspect that THEY would have raised that objection had it been a valid one. In fact, they did NOT. The ONLY scratches were THEIR scratches.

There, don't you feel silly now?

PS - If you'd like to buy me a $5000 Minolta digital SLR, I promise to take MUCH better pictures next time...

 

[Master Blaster]

If you loaded 6 rounds in the gun and pulled the trigger would every cylinder fire??

Then its reliable scratches or not, really this thread was about whether S&W revolvers are reliable. So your unfortunate and traumatic scratch experience would not in any way prevent the 29 from firing every shot loaded in it.

So even with scratches S&W revolvers are reliable

 

[Deanimator]

If you loaded 6 rounds in the gun and pulled the trigger would every cylinder fire??

Then its reliable scratches or not, really this thread was about whether S&W revolvers are reliable.

We have proved beyond all doubt that S&W as a company is totally UNreliable. They're the SBC of firearms.

 

[Vic]

wow...tough customer.

I just bought a 1968 trooper .357 that was discribed as "very good to excellent" off Guns America.com. When it arrived and I opened the box (in front of my dealer), I was embarrased. At best I would say "fair to good". Mechanically...fine. Cosmetically...it made my stomach turn. A few hours later on a day off, it looks like NEW. I was a little irritated but the price was low enough I couldn't complain especially since I have an awsome looking and accurate .357. As far as S&W I've owned the 629CLDX...great, the 617...very nice but heavy, the 686, good but not that accurate in my opinion, the Victory Model (completely GI), accurate and nice. S&W is a gun I wouldn't turn my back on especially the older ones (1950-1979). I even had the 1917 (?) .45 with half moon clips (GI), it was nice. Smith and Wesson is about as good a revolver you could every buy, as are the older Colt productions. Dependable? As dependable as the person who maintains it. As for S&W service, it sounds like they bent over backwards to make it right once they admitted they screwed up, and you should let them fix it. If they mess it up fixing it again, you should be compensated. Just my .02 worth.

 

[Deanimator]

As for S&W service, it sounds like they bent over backwards to make it right once they admitted they screwed up, and you should let them fix it. If they mess it up fixing it again, you should be compensated. Just my .02 worth.

I have this thing about being lied to. It comes in part from my many and universally awful dealings with SBC on internet matters.

Once you lie to me, I question EVERYTHING you say. That's hardly unfair. And it's easy to avoid. Just don't lie.

I sent them another replacement barrel Friday. I discovered this morning that DHL has lost it without a trace. S&W may get to grind haphazardly on my barrel after all... unless you have a 4" Model 29-2 blued, pinned barrel lying around...

 

[Master Blaster]

Last word

 

[Deanimator]

DHL's tracking system is screwed up so that the online shipping history omits big chunks of transactions. The first DHL person couldn't find the shipment. The one I talked to a few minutes ago was able somehow to find the transaction. The barrel was delivered on the 26th. Still no word from S&W.