I wasn't sure where to put this since they don't have an Industry page, but I wanted to give a HUGE shout-out to Dennis @ San Tan Tactical for some of the best customer service I've ever experienced in the firearms industry!

The short version:
Dennis went above and beyond to help me out with something, and saved me a huge headache and a lot of money. These guys rock, period.

The extended version:
So I've been working on building a rifle to be used on duty as my patrol rifle (police). Being a lefty I settled on the San Tan STT-15 after much back and forth over the options available. I ordered the lower from Rainier Arms (excellent dealer), and was quite impressed with what I got - even the packaging from San Tan was top notch. Anyway, part of the deal for me to get the rifle approved for duty use was having it assembled either by the factory or by our department armorer. Since I was buying many different parts from many different manufacturers, I opted to go the armorer route. After I had all my parts together, I gave them to our guy (Colt certified armorer), and advised him this lower was a little different than a standard lower in how it went together - specifically the take-down pins. Well needless to say something went wrong along the way... I don't want to blast my department armorer on a public forum for it since he was just trying to do what he knows, but I am also confident it wasn't San Tan's fault when it came to the integrity/construction of the lower. I'm not going to post exactly what happened, since again I pretty much know it was NOT the lower's fault and I don't want people jumping to bad conclusions about this product, but needless to say it was messed up and essentially became a throw-away part... I felt sick to my stomach.. My $300 stripped lower was trashed before I even got to shoot it, and I had qualifications coming up in 2 weeks.

I contacted San Tan through e-mail explaining everything that happened including pictures, and received a quick reply from Dennis. It went something like this (short version) - "you break it, we fix it!" I was floored, I really thought I was going to be buying another lower and then fighting my department to pay me back for it... Well that didn't happen. Dennis not only offered to replace the entire lower for free, he offered to assemble the whole thing for me for free and even picked up the shipping - both directions!!! I had a fedex label in my inbox that day and had the lower with all the parts in the mail to him the next morning. Dennis had the whole thing replaced/assembled, and back in the mail to me within a day of receiving it. I got the lower back, fully assembled and working beautifully in plenty of time to make my quals for the year, and since it was the manufacturer that assembled it I was good to go!

I know (and I'm pretty sure Dennis knows) he could have told me to pound sand when I showed him what I got back from my armorer. The fact that he instantly offered to replace it, covered the shipping, and offered to assemble it (to meet my department requirements), was WAY more than he needed to do and I am VERY impressed with how this was handled.

If you were on the fence about buying an STT-15 before, hopefully this helps you make your decision. I am very happy with my lower and it's functionality, and this customer service is the icing on the cake. I plan to be writing a full review of my rifle soon, and will update this post with a link once it's done. Thanks again to San Tan for the awesome support. You guys ROCK!

What needs to be done to get it assembled right?

Glad things have turned out right for you, I look forward to your review on their product.

The springs need to be cut to get the right amount of tension due to the unique install of the rear takedown spring and detent... I believe there are multiple threads on here that discuss it with more details than I can provide.... Perhaps someone can chime in that knows more about how much to cut.

What is the optic mounted on end of the handgaurd...looks as if it has a pressure switch?

That is a TLR-1.  It's a light

There is a light mounted on the end - Streamligth TLR-1HL, which has a pressure pad mounted on the top for ambi access. It also has a hard switch on the rear of it which I can access with my thumb from my standard grip (remember I'm left handed). Light is mounted using a Keymod Thorntail. Pics below...

That's awesome.

How did the armorer mess up cutting springs or did they try to remove material from the lower (my guess)?

For the record I'm not officially saying it was my armorer's fault since he did what he would normally do on a standard colt lower... I think it was more of a misunderstanding and not being familiar with this product. I'm not going to get into the details on here (respect for my armorer), but I'll just say this for your piece of mind: cut your springs like SanTan recommends and you won't have problems

you should share how your lower became junk, if for no other reason than to warn others... i think we are having a hard time understanding how you can scrap a lower over takedown/pivot pins and detent springs..

we dont know who your armorer is, so explaining what happened wont fall back on him

I see your point, and yea I know it's hard to picture.. I guess I can share it, I was just trying to avoid stepping on anyone's toes since I know guys from my department are on this board, and I'm sure you know how that goes... Anyway, basically the detent and spring for the rear TD pin were installed without cutting the spring. With these lowers, the rear spring is held in place with a small set screw that can be tightened or loosened to adjust tension. From what I understand, it was installed with a full spring and the screw was tightened up pretty far - this resulted in a TD pin that was near impossible to open or close... Now for where the damage comes in - it looks like a punch and hammer were used to force the pin to open (don't ask why, I don't know). He (armorer) said that his best guess was that the tension was so high due to the captured (full length) spring on the detent that when he tried to push the pin out (like you would if you were taking the rifle down), the detent actually pushed out the side of the receiver slightly, which widened the hole and made it so the detent doesn't sit properly anymore, making it bind up horribly and making it near impossible to use the take-down pin (which in my mind makes the lower useless). Could it have been "fixed" somehow? Maybe. Do I want my patrol rifle having a "fixed" part? No... So to me, that means the lower was trashed. Thankfully San Tan took care of me, even though this wasn't their fault. Pics are below, hopefully this makes sense... The short version is simple - cut the springs like you're supposed to, and if you don't cut them and the pin seems hard to push, don't force it with a punch

Nice rifle. Looks pretty fancy for a patrol rifle that taxpayers bought though.

Who said the department paid for it?? That was bought with my money... and seriously why even make that comment? Ugh, people...

Nice rifle, I'm glad I went with STT as well. Might grab one of their uppers in the future.

What do you think about the Trl-hl and switch?

+1, that assumption should have not been made.

Pretty slick rifle man. Patrol gun? Our armor is a bad ass, but I don't think he'd ever sign off on letting us run something of this nature, even though by policy we can. Y'all are pretty lucky.

Even if somehow it was paid for by taxes. I would rather see my tax money go to something that may save an officers life, or help the officer save a civilians life. A waste of our taxes is welfare, not putting tools in the hands of the men and women sworn to protect and serve.

Nice rifle op, and regardless of what some think you should be provided with the tools you need to do your job. A patrol rifle is a necessary tool, and we do not expect our soldiers to buy their own rifles. So why should we expect our officers to buy their patrol rifles.

Generally if the armoror is doing the work I would think its department owned.

I must admit, I am impressed that he was able to even get the set screw in without cutting the spring.  I have a couple lowers that use the same setup and it would be damn hard to compress the full length spring and keep it lined up enough to get the screw started.  He really had to work to make that happen.

Because you said this:

 

Just going to go ahead and quote this for the people that missed it the first time.

 

No joke, looks a little superfluous to me.

 

He's talking about the department paying for a new lower since the Armorer ruined it, not a full patrol rifle that you made the comment about.  

OP nice rifle, pretty Gucci for my personal tastes for work but that's really nice none the less.

I took that to mean he would get them to reimburse him for the one they damaged. Not that they paid for it in the first place. Reading comprehension

I did, as well.

Uggh...arfcom

Pretty sure almost everyone else did as well.

OP, thanks for posting the pics. that makes more sense now, after it was together, it was very tight. Somewhat normal for a detent to be tight, and so when he took a punch to pop it open, looks like the detent couldnt move down and now the receiver is damaged.

good on STT for clearing up everything.

Well, so in typical ARFCOM fashion this thread has completely derailed from it's original intent...


I'm going to clear a few things up, and then I'm requesting this thread be locked by a moderator. The whole point of this post was to give a thumbs up to San Tan Tactical, NOT to turn into some "F the police" thread or a debate on how much I'm allowed to spend on my personally owned patrol rifle (which just blows my mind that it's even a topic of discussion) ...

So to clear things up, as most of you have already understood, the entire rifle was paid for by me, myself and I. The comment about getting reimbursed is exactly how it reads - I paid for it, they broke it, I wanted my money back. I don't know how that can be twisted into the department paid for it to begin with... Why would I be asking for reimbursement on something I hadn't paid for myself??? Also, yes I have a lot of expensive parts in this rifle, but everything I put on this gun was for a purpose, and had to meet strict requirements to get approved for duty use. I have spent a LONG time saving for this gun and it's my personal choice if I want to put some extra money into the gun since it may be used to save my life or someone else's someday. Why is it ok in the eyes of this community for someone to spend thousands of dollars on a competition AR, but if I spend my hard earned money on a tool that may be used to save a life, everyone complains? I guess I just don't understand the mindset here, and never will. There is a reason I've been a member here since 2006 and have less than 60 posts, and this thread is a reminder as to why I don't comment or post on things...

To those of you that stayed on topic, gave compliments or asked legit questions, thank you.
To those that felt the need to turn this thread into a soapbox for your anti-police views, please make your own thread next time or keep the comments to yourself. Next time there is a major incident in your town, just remember who's going to be responding to protect your loved ones . Would you rather we come with equipment that can neutralize the threat or would you rather we show up with slingshots and spears, since that would save you money? Just something to think about, and if you have a comment about it then start your own thread or PM me all you want...

Bottom Line: San Tan Tactical is an excellent company, and I'm sorry to see where this thread went and how fast it went off-topic.

Aaand I see that the mods jumped in here while I was posting this, so thank you.. Hopefully it can stay on topic now.

Yup that pretty much sums it up. It's an excellent lower, just gotta follow the instructions

I've personally never heard of San Tan Tactical, but great to hear about the customer service.  It's companies/people like that that get what service is and how it affects the PR side of things.  I work for a family business.....we have a saying.......we don't want to meet our clients expectations, we want to exceed them.  It is obvious in this case that they did with absolutely no questions asked.  

To the OP, thank you for your service and hopefully you never have to use this weapon to save your own or someone else's life, but it is good to know that you have a weapon that will more than do what is needed.