New Wingmaster failed

[riverbear]

Another warranty repair update:

Found out I'm not supposed to include the shipping days to or from the gun shop as part of the repair time. So, the 4 to 6 weeks repair time actually changed to 5 to 7 weeks out of my possession. I didn't consider shipping time but that makes sense.

So now I want them to take all the time necessary to totally repair the gun. It's been out of my hands for over 3 weeks so what's another 3 or 4 or more weeks. Now I'm at the point that I really don't care how long they keep it but when they return it, the damn thing should to be right.

I'll keep you posted.

[Synchronizor]

Too bad about the wait, but it's good to hear that the problem seems to have been identified and addressed. The 870 is a very straightforward and well-understood design. Since the shop your gun went to is a Remington-authorized repair location, I had no doubt that they would have easily identified the source of the problem.

Anyway I tried to track my repair at Remington's online. At the repair tracking page I was instructed to list the gun's serial number and my zip code. That resulted in a frightening response of, "Serial number not found." What? After triple checking the numbers I decided to speak to a real person.

There was a phone number to call if I had a problem so I gave it a try. I spoke to a nice lady that laughed and said, "Well our online service tracking software dosen't work but give me your tracking number and I'll check it out. I did and she did then she told me the gun shop did receive the shotgun a couple weeks ago but I would have to contact the shop for more details.

Yeah, Remington's website has been pretty iffy as far back as I can remember, but they just did a complete overhaul of it earlier this year, and now it's flat-out broken. I recommend calling them directly for anything and everything.

To be fair though, very few big companies manage to have useful, well-organized websites that work properly. And that doesn't just go for gun manufacturers, either. I work in manufacturing/automation engineering, and spend a lot of time on websites tracking down parts and equipment, and the vast majority of them are just messes. It's not unusual for me to spend half a work day tracking down a schematic, data sheet, or CAD model that I could have gotten from a good website in ten minutes.

I have a good friend in the web development business, and we've had conversations about just how complicated websites are these days. The days of plain text and images are gone; now everything has to have advanced code, dynamically scaling and animated menus, tracking processes for every page, etc. All this crap makes it exponentially more difficult to make things flow well and work for every computer and browser out there. Plus, unlike retail or social websites, which rely on presentation and usability to make sales or encourage traffic for ad revenue, manufacturer websites that aren't used for sales don't really need to care about that. They're there for people who either already own their product, or people who already want to own their product.

[riverbear]

Without a doubt, the web page world of many companies has become the necessary evil of doing business but it's not where they really want to focus much of their budget. I'm sure Remington will improve their system in time.

I know that Browning has the work order system that Remington is working towards. The last time I had Browning do some gunsmithing they assigned me a control number. I could use the number to go online and find out when my pistol was assigned to a gunsmith, when it was being worked on, when it was sent to shipping, when it was shipped. It is a pretty cool system that can be viewed 24 hrs a day without bothering anybody. Very nice.

[riverbear]

Time for a Remington Warranty update:

Since I'm getting ready for a trip to Colorado I took my truck to the dealer for some much needed maintenance. There was quite a bit of work to be done so I had a several hours to kill. While sitting in the customer waiting lobby I happen to think about the repair of my new Wingmaster and decided to call Remington for a service update.

The lady at Remington Customer Service checked my Return Authorization Ticket number and said, "Your gun was fitted with a new barrel, test fired, and shipped on June 3 and since this is June 15, you should have it by now." My immediate response was, "Mam, if I had it I wouldn't be calling." She said, "Well we have no tacking information so you should contact Mann's and Son's in Picnicky, Illinois for the tracking number." Since I was curious as to where my new shotgun was I decided to call Mann's.

The lady that answered the phone at Mann's was quite pleasant and willing to help me find my gun. She confirmed that the new barrel was installed, test fired, and shipped. I told her it did not arrive and asked her for the UPS Tracking Number.

After a considerable wait, she said she would have to call me back while she continued the search for shipping info. About a half hour later, while I'm still hanging out in the customer service lobby, my wife called. She said, "I'm not sure what this means but I just got a call from a lady at a gun shop and she told me to tell you they located your gun." I said, Great, where is it?" My wife responded with sort of a curious tone in her voice and said, "It's in the gun shop's basement waiting for Remington to ship them a new barrel." I couldn't believe it. Wow, that's where the gal found it about two weeks ago in the same condition. I thought it was time to call Remington back and ask what's going on.

This time I spoke to a gentleman that listened to my explanation then put me on hold for 7 minutes. After returning he said he would have to call me back and would do so before day's end. Before he hung up I asked him to just have the barrel "overnighted" to Mann's then have Mann's "overnight" the completed repair to me and I will be out of their hair. He assured me he'll call back with a solution.

Since Remington's customer service closes at 5 PM Eastern, at 4:58PM I figured he wasn't going to call me so I called him. Instead speaking with the gentleman, I was connected to a nice woman named Theresa. I had to explain all of the day's events while she politely listened. I covered everything that went on that day. She asked me to be patient and she'll speak to a manager and see what they can do. After a brief wait she came back on the line and explained that the barrel has to ship out of their Inventory Dept. and she will email them and find when they will have a barrel to ship and, until then, my gun will remain on "parts Hold." I was okay with her answer until she said, "Just to let you know, it's hard to get barrels this time of year." Hmmmmmmm. Yep, that comment bothered me.

Finally, I had enough and sent her an email. In it I wrote, if it is going to take forever to get a barrel, then replace my gun with another new 870 Wingmaster, or I'll pay the difference and you can send a new model 1100, or the best is just send my money back and I'll start over. I'm was getting despirate to find somebody to get serious about helping me.

Well, now a couple days have passed and it's after 6 PM on the 17th and nobody called about the gun or responded to my email. At least on the bright side, the maintenance on my truck is complete and it's ready to head out west. The long trip will give me plenty of time to wonder about a few things like: why does Remington have trouble getting new barrels this time of year, or who put the note in the computer stating the gun was fitted with a new barrel, test fired, then shipped on June 3, or better yet, how come after talking to 7 people, I have no idea where my gun is or when I'll receive it? Good grief.

[BurstBarrel]

There is a lot I could say but in short Remington is F'ed up!

It also shows in some new Remington 870 parts I bought recently without going into detail they were scrap metal on arrival.

In 2012 when a friend of mine and I decided to go semi-auto on bird guns he got a Vera Max and I went with a Benelli. He's had several issues with the Versa Max and I've had nothing but fun.

[riverbear]

I understand about your trouble free time with Benelli. I've got my eye on a Montefeltro as a possible soft shooting semi that shows a history of trouble fre shooting.

Instead of using my Wingmaster for a Memorial Day "clay bird" shoot with family and friends I picked up a Mossberg 500c 20 ga. It functioned perfectly all day for several shooters and lots of ammo. The Mossy was less than half the price of the Wingmaster and so far it's been twice the gun.

Thanks to Remington I probably won't have the Wingmater for several other planned shoots this summer. I wanted to participate in the events for the fun plus the familiarization with the new shotgun in preparation for dove season. To be honest, my little Mossberg is quickly changing status from "substitute" to my "go to" gun.

[riverbear]

Final update:

Yesterday I checked my email and found a UPS shipping notice that the Wingmaster was going to be delivered on 6/23. What a suprise.

After it arrived I put the box on the work bench in my shop and opened it up. The gunsmith's report listed the work done as: Adjust Action Bars, Replace Bad Barrel, Test and Return.

I cleaned it up a little then grabbed the gun, some ear and eye protection, a bucket assorted shells, and went over to the range to try it out.

After shooting the bucket of shells at some clay targets without a single problem, I finally got the smile back on my face the I didn't have since the day I bought the little shotgun. Now I see why so many guys love their 870's. They're great shotguns.

Hat's off to Remington for finding a barrel to replace my original and getting it to Mann's so they could make the repair.

Hat's off to Mann's and Son's for doing excellent gunsmithing to turn that little Wingmaster into a dream to shoot. They know their business.

After I got back to my workbench I noticed that the shotgun was returned with an Imp Cyl instead of the Full choke I shipped it with. I called Remington with the intent of swapping chokes with them but they didn't hesitate to say they'll send a new Full choke and for me to keep the extra Imp Cyl. That was a nice way to handle that issue.

Bottom line: I wasn't real pleased with the Remington repair process but they proved that they knew what they were doing and the results provided me with the great little upland game gun that I originally wanted.

Well done Remington.

Thanks

[Synchronizor]

Glad to hear your ordeal had a happy ending, and now you can enjoy your 870.

Regarding the barrel thing, 20ga Wingmasters - though fine guns - are not topping any lists of best-selling 870 models. It's entirely possible that barrels for them are only manufactured in limited, intermittent production runs, as is the case for other less-common 870 parts (blued magazine extensions, for example). So, a contributor to your wait (though clearly not the sole cause) may have simply been unlucky timing.

[riverbear]

Synchronizer you are correct regarding the 870 Wingmaster 20 ga not being on the Remington high priority parts list. Actually, the high polished blued 26" barrel VR Remchoked barrel is really an odd ball part according to various sources.

I suspect the replacement barrel might have been used because it had some problems with the bore that did not look like a new one. Remington had me send the barrel back to Mann's for reaming out the bore.

What a hoot this whole process has been. Since May 17th I've only had the gun 6 days and of those 6 it only functioned properly 3 days and right now I have no idea when Mann's will return it for the second time.

Oh well, sometimes you just have to laugh.

[riverbear]

Time for an update:

After making the above post yesterday in response to Synchronizer, I decided to call Mann's Sporting Goods today and check on the barrel repair. I spoke to a gentleman that said they are waiting for a new barrel from Remington. (Wow, that will make the THIRD new barrel for this gun.)

He said Remington's response did not list the barrel as back-ordered so it may be sent anytime and upon receipt he will immediately forward it to me. That was encouraging except that I only sent the barrel to Mann's not the entire shotgun. Since they won't have my receiver to test the new barrel, I could end up with my original shotgun problem. (For the record, since I was supposed to only get the second barrel reamed, Remington said I only needed to send the barrel to Mann's.)

I decided to call Remington to see when they might ship the new barrel to Mann's. The fellow that I spoke to said he had no idea. I asked if he could check on the shipment and he said he could not that I would have to check with Mann's. I felt that he misunderstood my question so I told him that Mann's has already ordered the barrel from Remington and Mann's is waiting for it to be shipped. I explained that I would like to know when they are shipping the barrel to Manns's. He responded with, "It could be back-ordered and will take 30 to 60 days to ship." With that comment I realized he really didn't give a damn about my barrel (or me) so I replied, "Thanks" and ended the call.

So now I'm just waiting on Remington...again. Good grief.