what is it with Remingtons?

[gaseousclay]

i'm curious. a lot of you seem to defend Remington and their faulty triggers like it's not an issue. some of you also state that other gun manufacturers inevitably have the same issue. i've never heard of any other firearm company that has had 'accidental' discharges with their rifles due to trigger design flaws. user error maybe, but not because of a flaw. are there any statistics available that show fatalities caused by gun discharges by companies other than Remington?

 

[coyota1]

i'm curious. a lot of you seem to defend Remington and their faulty triggers like it's not an issue

Because a lot of us own Remington rifles which includes me, and have not had the problems with triggers. I'm not convinced at all that the trigger groups are faulty. I do NOT believe the charges anymore than I believe in the tooth fairy. Not until I hear or see something concrete, empirical, or believable.

 

[tahunua001]

I'm with Coyota1. there has not been a single bit of solid evidence that these malfunctions are not user error rather than faulty design. that is like saying that glocks are notorious for accidental discharge because of their design rather than the fact that the knuckleheads with the ADs were doing something they weren't supposed to at the time.

 

[.300 Weatherby Mag]

I've got a new SPS with the X-Mark Pro trigger. Mine is crisp and after setting the pull (per their instructions) to 3-1/2 lbs works just fine. I think the tinkerers are at fault with that issue.

I have a 700, that I bought new that came with the Walker Trigger.. With a completely unmodified trigger, it would fire when you took the safety off... I've never seen another rifle did it, nor have any of my other Remington 700s done this... Remington replaced the walker trigger with the X-Mark Pro, piece of crap... Remington admitted no fault, but did replace the trigger at no charge... AND NO MY FINGER WASN'T ANYWHERE NEAR THE TRIGGER WHEN I TOOK THE SAFETY OFF!!!

 

[jmr40]

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/CNBC/Se...Remington_Under_Fire/Documents/Rem_Doc_07.pdf

Here is a letter from Remington's repair facility admitting that they were able to reproduce the problem.

More evidence

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/CNBC/Se...Remington_Under_Fire/Documents/Rem_Doc_08.pdf

Of 133 Remington 700's sent in that year Remingtons own people could get 89 of them to fire without pulling the trigger.

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/CNBC/Se...Remington_Under_Fire/Documents/Rem_Doc_09.pdf

Mike Walkers 1948 letter urging Remington to change the trigger.

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/CNBC/Se...Remington_Under_Fire/Documents/Rem_Doc_03.pdf

A 1947 letter from engineers advising Remington management of a dangerous trigger

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/CNBC/Se...Remington_Under_Fire/Documents/Rem_Doc_02.pdf

Another letter from Mike Walker advising Remington management of a dangerous situation.

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/CNBC/Se...Remington_Under_Fire/Documents/Rem_Doc_06.pdf

Various customer complaints

 

[jmr40]

Just to make sure others understand my intentions. I'm not a Remington hater. I am not advocating anyone boycott the company. Current Remington management did not cause this problem. They inherited it from a management group that no longer works there and where most, if not all are dead now.

The guys who are burying their heads in the sand and refuse to see the obvious are going to get someone killed by just not simply addressing the issue. I've known about this issue since the late 70's when Remington was hit with a flurry of lawsuits resulting in them changing the safety so the gun could be unloaded with it in the "safe" position. There were Programs on TV back then just like the CNBC program. The CNBC program broke no new ground and did not report a single fact that had not been common knowledge for 30 years and well known within Remington management for over 60 years.

Even Remington ran full page ads in the shooting and hunting magazines urging Remingon owners to send in their rifles to be retro-fitted with the new safety. Yet some guys seem to think that CNBC is trying to do a hatchet job on your favorite gun company.

If I can just get one knucklehead to understand that a Remington can quite possibly discharge on it's own might save one persons life. And you had better believe it is possible. Clueless people who simply ignore the problem give a false sense of security. I own Remingtons and if they ever make something else I like I'll buy another. But you better believe that they get carried with an extra measure of caution. As long as you understand the problem is extremely rare, but extremely real, and if extra caution is used you'll be fine.

 

[emcon5]

i'm curious. a lot of you seem to defend Remington and their faulty triggers like it's not an issue

What evidence you have that the triggers are faulty?

If there is some actual evidence, I will be happy to change my opinion, but lacking anything at all, the only "fault" I can find is that any moron with a small screwdriver can monkey with them and make them unsafe.

One of mine (early 1980s BDL) was like that when I got it. Way too light, way too little sear engagement. It has since been fixed, and I can beat on the rifle with a rubber mallet with the rifle cocked and safety off without it going off.

Here is a letter from Remington's repair facility admitting that they were able to reproduce the problem.

Well, they could reproduce a problem, but they don't specify what the problem they could reproduce was. The listed problem on the both rifles was a binding firing pin head, and the 600 had a binding safety. What exactly was the symptom those rifles were returned for? Binding firing pins were pretty much the opposite of rifles firing uncommanded, aren't they?

Of 133 Remington 700's sent in that year Remingtons own people could get 89 of them to fire without pulling the trigger.

No. "Unable to duplicate" means they could not get the rifle to go off. Of the 133 complaints 44 were verified, but there is no info in that document as to what those complaints were. They had ~75 reports of 700s going off by themselves (which I admit seems high) that they could not duplicate, the other unable to duplicate problems were different.

Mike Walkers 1948 letter urging Remington to change the trigger.

I can hardly read that, but OK. I agree, A trigger block on the safety is a good idea. It does not automatically mean that a safety without a trigger block is defective.

That being said, the old 700 safety design that locked the bolt was stupid.

A 1947 letter from engineers advising Remington management of a dangerous trigger

Actually, that says some of the parts are "out of design limits", which "can be be very dangerous from a safety and functional point of view" Were there any follow on memos that either the design limits were revised to meet the out-of-spec parts, or were the parts inspected and improved so they meet the specs?

Another letter from Mike Walker advising Remington management of a dangerous situation.

Which he fixed: "This change will be incorporated in the drawing as soon as tool procurement is completed". It is also referring to the 721 trigger, which predates the Remington 700.

Various customer complaints

What were the results of those complaints? What did Remington find when they inspected the rifles?

If I can just get one knucklehead to understand that a Remington can quite possibly discharge on it's own might save one persons life.

You should be getting the knuckleheads to understand that any firearm is potentially dangerous, and mechanical safeties do not cancel out the need for basic firearms safety. Any of those tragedies could have been averted by application of Rule # 2: "Never let the muzzle cover anything you are not willing to destroy."

 

[Clark]

I am nobody, so nothing can happen to me from badmouthing Rem700 actions, unlike Jack Belk, "past president of the American Custom Gunmaker's Guild".
You may remember his posting on AR last decade as "J Belk".

My schpeal contains only one complaint about the safety:
One can modify a Rem700 to try to bring it up to Win M70 standards:
1) Glue a shroud to the receiver to get a flat receiver bottom to resist bullet twist torque.
2) Get a Sako extractor modification to replace weak extractor with a bigger extractor.
3) Safety blocks trigger, not firing pin..... Gentry 3 position safety on firing pin
4) Recoil lug not attached... drill lug and receiver and then pin together.
5) Barrel may shake loose, apply glue. Vaughn also has proposed Rem700 design change.
6) Bolt handle soldered on and will break off, TIG weld on handle stronger
7) Not controlled feed... no cure
8) Plunger ejector instead of knife blade ejector... no cure
9) Failed case head shoots shooter in the eye with gas... wear eye protection

What does it all mean?
Rem 700 is the most stripped down nothing of a bolt action available. Of ~ 100 actions with the Rem700 at one end of the spectrum and custom Mausers [M70 parts added] at the other, all of the other actions in between are a trade off between the expensive to manufacture Mauser and the cheap to manufacture Rem700.

What does this mean to you?
The Rem700 action is so cheap to make, they can afford a better barrel.
So for the same price, the Rem700 is more accurate.

No one I know of uses Rem700 for dangerous game, but with eye protection, it may be the best choice for ground squirrels.

 

[nimbleVagrant]

Doesn't the Army and Marine Corps use the 700 action on dangerous game?

 

[mete]

Yes they use it as a sniper rifle !! I don't know what trigger is used though.

J.Belk -I couldn't remember the name when I posted before .Not considered credible by most gunsmiths.

Safe on - pull trigger - fires as safety is put OFF. I've seen this in 22 pistols ,the first was my own !! These were not defective design but incorrect dimension parts .It gets your attention !

 

[Bart B.]

Doesn't the Army and Marine Corps use the 700 action on dangerous game?

Yes, and so did the USN and USAF snipers back in the late '60's and '70's. But the 700 was not the choice of the best shots and most knowledgeable folks in bolt action rifle action quality and reliability in any of these services; 700's had (and still do, for the most part) too many shortcommings. For example....

* Twists too much in epoxy bedding for 30 caliber rounds; shoot loose and accuracy drops off. Two military rifle teams tried using 1 to 2 inch long recoil lugs to keep it from twisting from barrel torque, but they didn't improve things very much.

* Unreliable extractor, problems feeding from the magazine in rapid fire and inconsistant trigger pulls.

* Not a very stiff action.

Knowledgable shooters in the services preferred the Winchester 70; its action was much better in all these areas besides being about 2.5 times stiffer. But alas, Winchester was in dire straits financially in the 1960's and the military folks holding the purse strings didn't think such a company should make the "new" sniper rifles for the services.

 

[old roper]

Here is good article on the M700 vs M70

http://yarchive.net/gun/rifle/remington700.html

Read all the upper articles then go down to posting from Gale McMillan that actually was building rifles and see what he talking about.

What real interesting that Bart B and the others didn't take him up on his 50K bet.

This is small clip on his bet from Gale McMillan post

"If that doesn't covince you maybe we can arrange a little shoot
off for say $50,000 winner take all"

 

[gaseousclay]

What evidence you have that the triggers are faulty?

If there is some actual evidence, I will be happy to change my opinion, but lacking anything at all, the only "fault" I can find is that any moron with a small screwdriver can monkey with them and make them unsafe.

I don't get it. there's documented video footage of US military test firing these rifles and they went off from just touching the bolt. there also seem to be several people here that have had similar discharges happen with their Remingtons. So are you calling these people liars because you view it as a smear against Remington? If you personally haven't had any problems, good for you, but it sounds like you're trivializing the matter

 

[emcon5]

documented video footage of US military test firing these rifles and they went off from just touching the bolt.

No, there is a video of some unknown dude in generic Camo with a black ball cap and blurred face. I would bet $100 that rifle did not leave the factory like that. What was found when the rifle was inspected by Remington?

And you know what, give me a couple hours with a jewelers screwdriver and I bet I could get my 700 to do the same thing. Monkeying with the easily monkeyed-with 700 trigger does not mean it is defective, and with zero context, that video isn't all that meaningful.

There is also a memo from the Marines telling units not to mess with the trigger adjustments, followed by an order for a bunch more rifles.

 

[allaroundhunter]

I don't get it. there's documented video footage of US military test firing these rifles and they went off from just touching the bolt. there also seem to be several people here that have had similar discharges happen with their Remingtons. So are you calling these people liars because you view it as a smear against Remington? If you personally haven't had any problems, good for you, but it sounds like you're trivializing the matter

These were with triggers that were modified by soldiers in-country. Since this happened, the rifles were returned to Remington and the problem was that the triggers were modified in ways that they were not intended to be. With the proper trigger, the same rifles that had previously had problems could not be made to discharge on accident by any means. Since orders have been not to tinker with the M700 trigger, there have been 0 reports of ADs coming back from overseas.

The whole problem with the trigger is that people who don't know what they are doing try to "make it better" and make it dangerous instead. It is not the fault of the rifle, it is the fault of the operator.

 

[coyota1]

The whole problem with the trigger is that people who don't know what they are doing try to "make it better" and make it dangerous instead. It is not the fault of the rifle, it is the fault of the operator.

This is the core of the problem I believe. Military snipers do not have halos around there heads anymore than civilians. They are "gun nuts" also, (I will include myself in this category) and will go to extremes to get that edge in accuracy. These trigger groups although adjustable, are not designed to be target triggers, but are being used for this purpose. For a little over $100, get a timney, and then set it below 3 lbs.

 

[jmr40]

there has not been a single bit of solid evidence that these malfunctions are not user error rather than faulty design.

It is these type of posts that bother me. Some folks might actually believe them and get into trouble.

I've provided PROOF that Remington engineers found the trigger was faulty as far back as the 1940's.

I've provided PROOF that 152 rifles were returned to Remington in 1980 complaining of guns firing on their own. Remington found that 55 of the total did it for them, they were unable to make the other 97 do it. ( I did misread the chart on my earlier post). Just because Remington could not duplicate the problem, does not mean it didn't happen. But anyway you look at it this is 55 confirmed incidents, verified by Remington technicians, just in 1 year. If that is a typical year that would be at least 3500 such incidents over the life of the trigger design.

Since the 1950's Remington has been sued over 75 times. To the best of my knowledge they have never prevailed. Either losing the suit or settling before.

This is not a witch hunt by a TV network. The problem has been around since TV was in its infancy, long before CNBC existed.

How many times has Winchester, Ruger, Savage, or Weatherby been sued? Why is it that no one ever blames ANY other gun of firing on its own? To believe that there is no faulty trigger, the only other conclusion is that Remington owners are the dumbest gun owners on the planet. I know a lot of Remington gun owners and I don't buy that theory.

 

[ligonierbill]

For JimPage, and others wanting "the rest of the story", I killed my first elk with this 700 on a snowy day the weekend after Thanksgiving in Idaho. Late hunt, cow tag. Long shot, but the cow went down kicking. So, we hike over, rifle slung and a fresh cartridge in the chamber. She's done, so time to unload and get to work. This is the old safety - release to open the chamber. Bang! Hmmm...I wasn't near the trigger. Did have gloves on, though...maybe. Glad I followed my hunter safety and had the muzzle in a safe position. So, I get back to work on Monday and start telling the story, and the guy finishes it for me. Not you, it's the gun, says he. So, that's when I started pressing the trigger with the safety on, then releasing the safety, with, you know, an empty chamber. Repeat, empty chamber. Fast forward to 2010, and my brother is carrying the rifle on a snowy day in Colorado. (Some of you may remember 2nd rifle season that year - harsh.) Warned him to stay away from the trigger, and I think he did. Still, he had to flip off the safety. Bang! Again, muzzle safe, but big brother has to truck on over there to see his elk. No elk. So, folks, it can happen.

I need to emphasize that some fool fooled with the trigger on this one. It's not set super light, but looks to be too light. Note the common element of cold and snowy, however. I'm keeping the rifle, but it's getting a new trigger. If you have an older 700, be real careful about adjusting the trigger pull. There are good instructions on the net.

 

[emcon5]

I've provided PROOF that Remington engineers found the trigger was faulty as far back as the 1940's.

No. You provided a memo that some of the parts are "out of design limits". That is not the same thing as a faulty design, no matter how much you claim it is.

I've provided PROOF that 152 rifles were returned to Remington in 1980 complaining of guns firing on their own.

No. You provided proof that 152 rifles were returned to Remington for safety problems. The only problems that were specified were the ones that could not be duplicated.

Remington found that 55 of the total did it for them, they were unable to make the other 97 do it. ( I did misread the chart on my earlier post). Just because Remington could not duplicate the problem, does not mean it didn't happen. But anyway you look at it this is 55 confirmed incidents, verified by Remington technicians, just in 1 year. If that is a typical year that would be at least 3500 such incidents over the life of the trigger design.

No. You provided a document that stated of 133 rifles returned they could confirm the problems of 44 of them, but there is no information what those 44 reported problems were, nor is there any indication of what the root cause of the problem was. It could be that all 44 failed the "Trick" test, or that all 44 had triggers that were monkeyed with by the end user. I would guess that the details are in the "Attached Letter" mentioned in the document.

If I was a cynic I would guess that letter was not included by the MSNBC because it didn't support their thesis.

 

[Clark]

nimbleVagrant

Doesn't the Army and Marine Corps use the 700 action on dangerous game?

I have read a post by Bart Bobbitt a long time ago, that explained what happened that resulted in Rem700 Rifles going to the military for snipers.

2004 rec.guns

Winchester was going
through dire financial straits in the 1960s. Although the competitive
shooters liked the Winchester and well knew its advantages over the
Remington, the militay brass watching everybody's finances and
business outlook - chose Remington. I talked with one of the Navy
guys who went to the Pentagon to discuss all these things and he said
it was a real dog fight among those hammering out the details of the
choice for the next standard issue sniper rifle for the US armed
forces.