S&W Quality Control is suffering

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  • BJones

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    I have grown up to believe that S&W is the premier Revolver Manufacture in the world, however my experience in the past year makes me rethink their quality. They do guarantee their gun forever, but I bet their return repair shop is pretty busy these days.

    In the past year, I have purchased 5 S&W guns, and have had to send 4 of them back to S&W for repairs as soon as I shot them the first time. Their customer service is fantastic, they are quick to repair them and they pay for shipping both ways, but, what a pain. Maybe I am just lucky to have 80% of my purchases need repairs.

    1. S&W AR15: Bolt locked first time fired, I got the bolt open, fired it again and the bolt locked. Sent back to S&W they replaced the bolt and did some work to the barrel. Works OK now
    2. S&W 929: Light primer strikes 2 out of every 8 bullets. Sent back to S&W they replaced the main spring and firing pin. Works OK now
    3. S&W 627 2.78" barrel: Gun locked up would not shoot out of the box. Took back to gun shop and they gave me another gun that did work, they sent to S&W for replacement.
    4. S&W 66 2.75" barrel: Worked OK out of the box, no problems so far.
    5. S&W 642: would not fire at all, the cylinder would turn, but the firing pin would not reach the primer. Sent to S&W have not gotten it back yet.

    My confidence in S&W quality is badly shaken. I would hesitate to purchase any more new S&W products, even though they make it right, it sure is a pain to have to deal with manufacturing defects 80% of the time. I was under the impression that they fired each gun before leaving the factory, if that were the case the would have discovered some of these deficiencies.
     
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    Kirk Freeman

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    I have grown up to believe that S&W is the premier Revolver Manufacture in the world,

    Over Korth? Over Manurhin?

    They do guarantee their gun forever, but I bet their return repair shop is pretty busy these days.

    It has to be. People will spend $40 to save $10 on a gun. Review the 328,098 threads on INGO about gun prices in the last 12 months, "they must be pretty dang proud of that gun".

    A manufacturer must win that race to the bottom or cease operations.

    QC takes money. Give how few people shoot their guns, skip QC and fix it on the return. It's simple math.
     

    BJones

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    I guess I should have said,I grew up believing S&W to be the Premier Revolver Manufacturer in the USA. Kirk Freeman is correct, there are other top manufacturers in the world.
     

    223 Gunner

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    I too love Smith's and grew up on them. I will now have to rethink any that come up on the used market and wonder if there is a problem with it.
    It is too bad that it has gotten this way with other premier gun makers as well, Kimber comes to mind.
     

    Hoosier45

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    QC takes money. Give how few people shoot their guns, skip QC and fix it on the return. It's simple math.[/QUOTE]

    This. Lot of people buying guns they never shoot.
     

    Leadeye

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    I see QC issues in manufacturing every day, half of the problems have no explanation so I usually figure drugs are involved. Some days people look squarely at defects and just pass them along.
     

    WebSnyper

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    I see QC issues in manufacturing every day, half of the problems have no explanation so I usually figure drugs are involved. Some days people look squarely at defects and just pass them along.


    Well, that and are they incentivized to have quality go out the door or quantity, or are they just straight up paid the same regardless.
     

    Hopper

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    Jones, I'm also a committed S&W revolver enthusiast. These days, I know before buying one that depending how carefully I look it over, or possibly even moreso if I order it online to deliver to my FFL, there's a chance it will have to go back to the mothership for additional TLC. So far, the only one I have that has NOT gone back are, as you stated, the recently released 2.75" 66. Oh, and a Model 19-5 that I picked up from a member here on INGO. That gun is a true darling for sure.

    Clocked barrels are my biggest gripe. There's just no good reason for a barrel to NOT be installed straight before it leaves the house.

    FWIW, the latest model I've sent back to S&W for warranty repair is a 1911 SC-E Series round butt. The plunger tube (on the left-hand side, where the slide stop hits the front and the safety clicks into the back) came unstaked during a range session last weekend. Pretty much locked me up. Hoping they'll give the finish some TLC as well, as there was a slight bit of manhandling involved getting it apart so I could get the live round out. So it's not just their revolvers.

    But, on a brighter note, EVERY time I've sent something back to S&W for warranty work, it's always come back to my satisfaction. And my new 66-8 2.75" is the bomb, a real accurate shooter, and it's even better after I upgraded it with a Wilson Combat spring kit. Definitely a keeper, as it sounds like yours is.
     

    Dean C.

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    My Smith 360 has been good to me so far, that being said it came with an 18# double action pull from the factory. Had Ray Saltzman do an action job to get it to roughly 10# pull and much happier with it.
     

    snapping turtle

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    Overall Smith rely’s on CNC machines to make parts of very high tolerance and much less on manpower of a skilled type to produce the end products. The people involved have a quota to make. The machines can make a ton of parts but so far they are not yet putting all the pieces together. A little better post production quality control would cut down on the send backs but as others said the company has made it your job to do post build quality control.

    Compairing a Korth to a smith would be like compairing a Buick to a rolls Royce. Ask ten people at the next gun show not sitting behind the table if the know what a Korth is. Maybe one will know. Ask ten setting behind a table if they have seen one. Maybe one has. I see why Smith is looked at as a best of wheel gun maker.

    To stay in business one must meet a price point the market will bare. Smith has met that sweet spot for years. Not to hot, not to cold just right. Smith quality was not up to colt when they were in direct competition (smith triggers were as good if not better). But they won out in the price point.
     

    yetti462

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    Just buy early production (no lock) Smith's and you'll be fine. No wonder the dadgum things fetch a premium$. The only guns I'm buying from here on are gonna be no lock Smith's. Their value seems to hold and they are a joy to shoot.
     

    M67

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    Just buy early production (no lock) Smith's and you'll be fine. No wonder the dadgum things fetch a premium$. The only guns I'm buying from here on are gonna be no lock Smith's. Their value seems to hold and they are a joy to shoot.

    Pretty much. Smith still makes the best revolvers but I'll still buy older ones over newer ones any day. Really the only modern ones I'd consider would be a 5" 460 or a Ross 500.

    At the end of the day they're still man made objects so there will always be that possibility that it won't work, just like anything else (and one reason I will NEVER say "revolvers never fail")

    And Smith's lifetime warranty is only for guns made after 1984 (I believe that's the right date), anything before that and you need work done, you have to pay for it

    At least they're taking care of you with the work.
     

    Bosshoss

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    Just buy early production (no lock) Smith's and you'll be fine. No wonder the dadgum things fetch a premium$. The only guns I'm buying from here on are gonna be no lock Smith's. Their value seems to hold and they are a joy to shoot.


    As someone that works on them almost every day I have to disagree. The reason the older S&W revolvers are better is because of the fact that there was no internet back then. If someone had problems with a gun maybe 10 or 12 friends/family members heard about it now thousands can read that someone had a problem with one click on a keyboard.
    I say that in NO WAY SHAPE OR FORM are the older guns better quality than the new ones. The new ones are not perfect by a long shot but I see a lot less manufacturing mistakes and fitment issues on the newer guns than the old ones. The machining quality inside while not affecting the functioning(most of the time) on the old guns is not pretty compared to the newer guns. The older internal parts were forged and tolerances were all over the place and required hand fitting at the factory to even get them to work. The older gun are getting hard to find parts for also.
    S&W needs to get a handle on their Quality Control but I see the same thing from Ruger and other manufactures(guns that should have never been shipped).
    Buy old or new and shoot the crap out of it and enjoy it instead of worrying about it.:twocents:
     
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