I dropped a upper off at my local shop 5-6 weeks ago to get the brake I bought from them pinned& welded. I called after 3 weeks to check and got “it’s at the gunsmith, we haven’t heard anything”
Am I being impatient to call tomorrow and ask for it back if it isn’t done yet? Creeping up on 2 months. I get people are busy but damn. I wanna shoot my rifle lol
I have been Smithin Professionally for 20 yrs this yr.It is the impossible to maintain a schedule like a good auto shop for example. Consider: Your upper comes in,you have 25+ jobs on hand. You open up an S&W MP380 that is a LEO wife's carry.As you have seenTFM [too many] times a MIM parts snapped in two.We Call -Smithwessn who now refuses to release schematics to anyone,period, so you cannot give them a pt# or thier"description"/name.Each and every parts "person" says "just send it in". I explain that I said that too but this customer does not trust SWs shop any longer and refuses to send in. I get the" Why won't he send it,we'll fix for free ?" .
Here's the why, he bought 2 pro shop top dollar revolvers years back to compete with, each had problems from day one.He sent #1 in fast ship ,they promised a "quick turnaround,bout a week" as these were New Proshop wheel guns. 3 weeks later no call no revolver,he calls the Proshop,no answer,he leaves mess,calls Cust service asks what's up? "Our Gunsmiths don't talk to anyone" the girl says. PIssed now " why the hell not?"I heard they say it slows them down and interupts their work". He asked for the Supervisor, girl transfers him rings long time,goes to Vmail. He leaves short message telling her how fouled up this is his, leaves numbers to reach him 24/7. Next 3 days he leaves same message after being forced to work the phone maze each time.They won't give him direct #. Oh wait, the other matching revolver has problems now as well,locks up in fast DA shooting which is what it was supposed to be" tuned" for. He's spent over 2 G's and didn't get to the second match before this started. Supervisor STILL hasn't returned any of his calls week + later. He brought revolver #2[good name for it!]in to me. We found the problemS ,test fired 100 mixed rounds through it,100% function, customer happy,he even gave us a great tip.. 2 weeks later he got #1 rev back,still no call from supervisor. He shoots it at one steel challenge event ,begins skipping the cyl lock before the match was over. I fixed that one too.
SO. back to the 380, which he only bought another SW because his wife loved it,it was her first CCW and she shot it well. I am now slogging through the same swamp for one MIM part.I explained and described the part for 30 plus minutes.I finally ask" How about if we send you some good pictures? SW drone guy won't give us a phone # so we can text pics.We take a buncha great pics on Graph Paper from all angles,convert pics to SW's liking and Email em. He replies that they received and he'll get right back to us, It is 1PM,I call back at 3:45 in case they close at 4. He is "gone for the day" according to the new answer person. I ask "Well could you get the pics and get us that part coming fast please?". I'll try he says, but it will be tomorrow.I tell em just to please tell #1 person we need the part fastest he can move it,we'll pay shipping no problem.I now have almost 3 hrs of shoptime in the gun and no parts. As a gunsmith that gives a shit and believes this is one of the true Honorcrafts remaining I am also disgusted any firm would make such a crucial part by MIM. If this LEO wife was gunfighting her way out of a Bulletmore,Md car jacking or trying to escape a hoard of felon grade squeegee zombies she would have heard nothing but a "snap"before being killed or beaten dead. I replace the MIM parts in many customer's guns with actual heat treated steel parts so they don't have to worry about the same situation.
It was 12 more days before we got the part needed. 4 more shop hours of millennial nonsense. I will say that the last woman I dealt with was absolutely great, she went from looking at pics,to finding the part to overnight shipping in one call and 2 hours. The "Supervisor" never did call me back . I won't divulge the identity of the great one, that supervisor would likely get her fired or worse. Can't have someone with a work ethic,intelligence,initiative and a great phone presence making every one else in the whole department look like what they are: Un-fire-able people who hate their customers.
Keep in mind that every gunsmith deals with crap like this most every day, do not compare gunsmithing to automotive work,please.
As far as costs, do you want a gunsmith having to rush through your job in hopes of maybe breaking even? Or do you want him to have a fair amount of time to do the work as close to perfection as possible? Sorry this digressed into such a long reply, but like Gunsmithing it takes more time to explain it well. Regards, Supervel
