Straight Jacket Armory

[ballisticdaddy]

So I ordered a barrel blank from this place almost 2 weeks ago and it has still not shipped. Spoke with a guy who assured me that my barrel would ship out that day but no tracking sent and order still shows as processing. Anybody else dealt with these folks lately?

 

[rijndael]

This may be of interest to you:

 

[Maciej]

So I ordered a barrel blank from this place almost 2 weeks ago and it has still not shipped. Spoke with a guy who assured me that my barrel would ship out that day but no tracking sent and order still shows as processing. Anybody else dealt with these folks lately?

Ordered an Impact Action and barrel from them, they've been excellent with communication and I have no doubt they'll take care of things as best as possible. Their customer service has been absolutely fantastic.

 

[Long Range 338]

They do great work and your barrel will be a shooter but I have seen them struggle on delivery times.

 

[JuanOctavio Sandoval]

This company stole $226.39 from me. Long story short I paid this company 1,227.05 to chamber a Bartlein barrel for me. Nick calls me and gives me the opportunity to cancel my order because he was annoyed with all the status updates I was requesting. After I take him up on his offer he kept $226.39 out of my $1,227.05 I paid him.

Nick approached me with the opportunity to cancel my order and then turns around and steels $226.39 from me. Take this for what its worth.

 

[JuanOctavio Sandoval]

So I ordered a barrel blank from this place almost 2 weeks ago and it has still not shipped. Spoke with a guy who assured me that my barrel would ship out that day but no tracking sent and order still shows as processing. Anybody else dealt with these folks lately?

Yup. I experienced the same thing as you. Nick got annoyed with the status updates i was requesting on Fridays and offered to give me a refund.

After I decide to take him up on his offer he stole $226.39 from me. He did not issue me a full refund. Take this for what its worth.

 

[DJL2]

Once probably would have been enough to get your point across mate. Doubt anyone here cares you got charged a "pain in the ass" fee, but someone might.

 

[Shoots 700's]

Sounds fair too me

 

[rijndael]

Sounds fair too me

If it was disclosed, and both agreed to it, sure. If it wasn't disclosed, then it doesn't sound fair to me.

 

[Shoots 700's]

Return and Cancellation Policy​

All sales are final. Due to the very specific custom parts that we have to order to serve our customers, we have a zero-cancellation policy after 48 hours. Once you place an order with us, we will not grant a refund. However, we do reserve the right to grant cancellations at our discretion. Cancellations that are granted have a 50% restocking fee. Because of the nature of our business, many of our orders are custom orders. We do not keep an inventory. This is a custom-built rifle shop, and as such, we cannot grant refunds. If you are unhappy with your finished product, please contact us at: [email protected].

Note: We recommend that you use a carrier that offers shipment tracking for all returns and either insure your package for safe return or declare the full value of the shipment so that you are protected if the shipment is lost or damaged in transit. If you choose not to use a carrier that offers tracking and insure or declare the full value of the product, you will be responsible for any loss or damage to the product during shipping.

The United States Postal Service offers limited tracking capabilities and that there is a 30-calendar-day waiting period before USPS will initiate a trace. The customer is responsible for shipping charges both ways on returns, as well as for shipping charges on shipments that are refused.

 

[rijndael]

They offered it, unsolicited, because they didn't want to deal with a needy customer. Common courtesy says you mention it.

 

[Bacarrat]

I'm wondering how the hell you pay anyone 1200 for a chambered barrel is beyond me.

 

[Shoots 700's]

You need to read the terms and conditions. I bet they dodged a bullet

 

[rijndael]

You need to read the terms and conditions. I bet they dodged a bullet

Well, if he's nagging them for statuses because they keep missing deadlines, maybe both sides dodged a bullet.

But who knows, this is only half of the story.

 

[blackblue]

This may be of interest to you:

View attachment 7930894

Joined just to jump in and bash on them?

 

[rijndael]

Joined just to jump in and bash on them?

Yea, that's it. Me, wasting my time, to dig up a post that helps someone, screen shot it, and post it here, so they can understand why something hasn't shipped.

 

[mtrmn]

Yea, that's it. Me, wasting my time, to dig up a post that helps someone, screen shot it, and post it here, so they can understand why something hasn't shipped.

I'm thinking he quoted the wrong post. Probably intended to quote JuanoctaviowhatevertheF who only has 2 posts.

 

[CaptArab]

IME, they're super unorganized.

Once customers are pissed enough to start to lose their minds, Nick gets on the phone with people to yack for hours to try and smooth things over, then over promises, repeat.

I told him multiple times "I don't have time to talk on the phone, man, I just want my barrel. Can you email or text me please?"

Then 6 weeks after he'd promised shipping by tomorrow, he'd say "man I was on the phone 9 hours yesterday - I haven't had time to cut that barrel"

He definitely knows what he's doing wrt gunsmithing but that's about it. Also a genuinely good guy, just a lot of his struggles are self inflicted. His way of operating was a cool relic of years ago, and a much more personable experience, it just doesn't scale well to the volume he's taking on.

Personally I'm not looking for my gunsmith to be my buddy. I'd order blanks from an automated call center spun up by robots if they shot well.

If "building that relationship" is worth waiting a year, he's your guy.

I'm obviously a bit salty after waiting nearly a year for a barrel then letting him talk me into a contour I didn't even want, that ended up kinda ruining the purpose of the build, all while paying a good bit more than PVA.

I'm sure the vast majority of customers are very very happy.

 

[cas6969]

I was close to ordering a custom rifle last winter, the blued steel and carved walnut kind, from a highly skilled, true artist. But bailed out as I was literally pressing the button to order it, but stopped. The smith seemed to lack the ability to communicate with me via email and wanted to talk on the phone for everything. (I don't want to talk on the phone with anyone, for any reason, but that's another matter) He would respond to all my emails, but I couldn't get any actual answers from him that way, everything seemed evasive and not really an answer. Was he avoiding putting anything in writing, or just a poor writer? Lot's of "Whatever you want"s. We're working out the fine details of what I'm ordering, this it the time for specifics. (I also don't need to find out later that "Whatever you want" meant "Whatever you want for an extra $1200" lol) He's a well known, highly respected gun maker, but it just gave me an uneasy vibe so I decided to let it go.

 

[FourT6and2]

$1200 to chamber a barrel? Uhhhh no.

 

[Long Range 338]

Nick is semi local so I've been to his old shop and talked with him in person. He does do great work but does struggle with meeting his own deadlines - this has been my experience with all the smiths I have worked with BTW, super frustrating. At this point I've gone down the pre fit path for most of my stuff and would only deal with the headache (of any gunsmith) for a truly custom build. I do have 2 rifles that Straight Jacket barreled for me and they definitely hammer. The work is top notch IF you can wait.

 

[b6graham]

$1200 to chamber a barrel? Uhhhh no.

i'd hope it was a carbon bartlein purchased through SJA

but...i again wouldn't be surprised if we never see that user post again

 

[Sogan]

It’s been a few years for me but service was good the last time I bought an action and barrel from them. They even fixed one issue in short time as well

 

[kthomas]

Nick is semi local so I've been to his old shop and talked with him in person. He does do great work but does struggle with meeting his own deadlines - this has been my experience with all the smiths I have worked with BTW, super frustrating. At this point I've gone down the pre fit path for most of my stuff and would only deal with the headache (of any gunsmith) for a truly custom build. I do have 2 rifles that Straight Jacket barreled for me and they definitely hammer. The work is top notch IF you can wait.

There are some gunsmiths that are very on top of it. Which is why I use who I use. I only have to wait a 2 or 3 weeks before a custom barrel arrives at my door from a top shelf gunsmith.

I've never used SWA, so no experience and no intention of piling on. I've heard they do good work, but consistently not making deadlines is not a good business practice. Hopefully they can figure it out.

 

[asus611]

I ordered a prefit Bartlein from SJA about 3 years ago. Absolute hammer, exactly the specs I wanted. Took about a month from order to screwing it into my action. I have also ordered a left handed Curtis action from them in early 2021, that took 6 months to get to my FFL. Very happy with the work, comms could be better.

Also organization could be better. I got 3 emails following up after I got my barrel asking me if I got my barrel ? Thought that was a little weird. Nothing inherently wrong with SJA, I just think that the competition and alternatives out there is pretty fierce it would be totally reasonable to go with another option based on positives of another vendor as opposed to the negatives of SJA

 

[blackblue]

Yea, that's it. Me, wasting my time, to dig up a post that helps someone, screen shot it, and post it here, so they can understand why something hasn't shipped.

I quoted the wrong post that wasn't meant for you.

 

[4O6shootist]

Have had 2 bad experiences with SJA. Shit chamber job, looked like Hellen Keller hand reamed it(barreled action) the other a compete build. Barrel wasn't free floated nor did it feed any of the 3 dummy rounds sent with the rifle. They can pound sand as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Niles Coyote]

I have had nothing but great experiences with SJA and they have my next barrel order.

 

[YZ400Man]

I got a prefit 7Sherman Short mag barrel from them. I changed the action I wanted it for a few weeks after ordering and they said no problem and made it for my achimedes action. I changed barrel contour when they said they had one in stock and got my barrel in good time. Shoots great and I couldn't be happier.