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Posted: 10/3/2008 1:55:49 AM EDT
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I sent a Benelli M4 barrel out to a memeber of AR15.com that had advertised themselves as being competent in the process of shortening it to NFA 14" length. Well, I first got it back and the person had shotened it to 14.5". Too long to fit on the stock 4 round magazine tube. I sent it back to him to bring it down to the needed 14". I just got it back last night. The barrel came back totally mangled. The barrel is acutally warped and turned upwards at the muzzle!!!! looking down the bore, you can even see where it is creased near the front sight. I have contact the AR15.com user that did the "work" and have not heard back from him. I am hoping he does the right thing and refunds me the $200 I paid him to butcher the barrel and supplies me with a new barrel to restart the process. I will keep the members updated here on my progress. Moral of the story, be careful who you send your stuff out to be worked on. |
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As I said, I cannot see the bbl, and I would take care of this. Furthermore, when I was asked to make this bbl a 14" bbl, I measured from the reinforcing ring, however what he needed was to be 14" from the bolt face, not actually possessing his shotgun, I cut it exactly 14" the job looked good, now I am told he has the bbl and it is mangled, I have not seen this bbl, and furthermore, I was asked for $1000 in the first response I had regarding this matter. On face value, my attorney said this has the appearance of a shake down. I myself would rather just see what the problem is, determine what has occurred and take care of it. Immediately posting his grievances on AR15.com, before I even had read his email, sounds pretty crappy. I am sure another gunsmith will gladly deal with such an individual.  send it back or shut the hell up. I know of ZERO smiths that would send $1000 to anyone before seeing the bbl, let alone sending a new bbl, and hoping to get the original back |
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And as far as not hearing back from me, that was not true, I emailed you back this morning. I guess that morning CST, is later than Afternoon EST. As a moral for everyone here, if you are not happy contact the person who has done the work or sold you the product. I could care less if I ever do another job, but I will make this right. |
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I guess my problem with this is that it is visibly obvious that the barrel is BENT upwards!!! Starting right where you attached the front sight to the barrel. You talk about seeing it so you can fix it! Are you blind? You HAD to see it when you warped it!! Every person I have shown it to notices it. The under lug that fits over the magazine tube is not even perpendicular to the barrel. It is canted forward because the muzzle is bent upwards. I thought this over and since sending this back to you (for the third time) will probably not end up resolving anything, and can make things worse, I am going to send it to Joey at King Armory. I have already spoke with him and he is going to let me know what the deal is. As for a "shake down". Please, I have offered to send you back the barrel and ifit is "fixable" as you say, you should be able to sell it. Funny, I even have and email from you talking about charging more because if you mess up the barrel, it will cost you $800 to replace. I guess you didn't really mean that though. Maybe I can get Joey from King Armory to add a post here after he sees the barrel to confirm my story. I am sending it out to him tomorrow. |
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Here are some pictures: This one shows almost a "super modified full choke"! http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/2.jpg http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/3.jpg http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/4.jpg Here you can see the rings inside the barrel where it started to warp. http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/5.jpg In this one, notice how the underlug is canted forward and only contacts the bottom of the magazine plug. http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/6.jpg As I said before, I feel like the member (you could probably guess who that is now)COULD NOT have not seen this problem! I've now brought this to two local dealers who are also gunsmiths and the see the obvious problem. I feel like the problem was known, but he shipped it out anyway, hoping I won't ask him to make it right. I've been told to "send it back or shut up". Well...... What would any of you do in this situation? Would you trust a person that sends out this kind of work then asks "what's the problem?" and "I need to see the barrel"? He is made it clear to me in a very recent email that he feels that replacing the barrel is not his responsibility. |
This seems like a really shitty situation  FWIW the barrel (where it seems to be "choked") is tapered to a smaller diameter in the middle than at the rear (obviously) and the front where the thread-in choke is. The barrel is VERY thin at this point. In order to get a flat surface to mount the magazine-hanger and front sight base on, it would need to be machined to a cylinder, not a cone shape. However the bend in the barrel is very obvious... On the one hand, i have SEEN what Warped can do with Benelli M4 barrels. He fixed one that was totally butchered by an inexperianced class 3 dealer. I was actually surprised that it was Warped, since i was going to say give him an IM and see what he can do Is it possible that the bent barrel was from shipping? A lathe or hacksaw is pretty much foolproof (if you use a stabalizer on the lathe), and if it had bent on a lathe, there would be MUCH more damage than what is apparent. The only other thing i can see doing the damage would be heat, but you dont need to get it that hot to braze the items on, so i dont know. If this was warped's fault, then i think he should stand up for it and do the right thing, but if he says it left him without any bend, mabey you need to talk to the shipper and see if they will cover it. It WAS insured, right? its like 10-15 bucks or something to insure it? 
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Wow! That barrel got tore up. I was expecting it to be bad, but not enough that I could tell from a photograph. It appears that there is a bead along the sight and lug, did he weld it on? If so that would explain why the barrel caved in, Benellis run a very thin-walled barrel and it doesn't take much to melt them. Your work order # is going to be CAS08-1063, if you can mark that on the package it will prevent any mix-ups. One option would be to cut out the warped section of the barrel, remachine the barrel lug (going to have to just to remove the solder "shim" anyways) to the needed height/diameter and solder it directly to a KA-1212BR breaching attachment and install that directly to the barrel. We did something like this awhile back building a demo gun on an 8-shot Mossberg 500 http://i291.photobucket.com/albums/ll284/kingarmory/Moss500A%20project/9-9-08a005.jpg |
Thats a pretty cool lookin setup, i must say  If i didn't already have a breacher for my Benelli i might try to get one of those ones
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Update - I have asked for at least the money I paid him to do the work back ($200). Emailed two separate times since Sunday. No reply. I fail to see how this is a bad situation for the other party though. The issue started when the barrel was cut to the wrong lenght (specified 14" and got 14.5"). Everyone (especially gunsmiths) should know that you measure barrel length from the bolt face. And you would also expect someone who says they do many Benelli M4 modificaitons to know the dimensions of the gun. |
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1) This needs to be in the EE forum, not here in the SG forum. Just a heads up. 2) Wow. Just... Wow. 3) KingArmory can do amazing things, but I'm not sure if they can fix that barrel. 4) Despite everything else I would still send the barrel back to warped to make it right, although that looks like the fix required would be a new barrel, cut to 14", with the lug and FSB properly brazed in place. While F22 seems to believe he is capable of it, I'm not so sure*, and if he can't do that himself, he needs to have someone do it for him at no cost to you. *ETA: Simply due to the heat-induced constriction at the spot of the welds. |
| Mark, barrel arrived today. Looks like the last 2.6" of the barrel is damaged, easiest option would be to machine an extended version of our KA-1212BR with an extra .750" longer mounting collar and install it in place of the damaged section then attach the barrel lug and sight to the attachment. The sight doesn't have much base to it so we would either have to move it rearward apx 1.25" and machine a recess for it in the attachment, or move it forward apx .50", cut the needed amount of the base off, and and have it TIG'ed directly to the top bridge of the attachment. Give me a call tomorrow and I'll discuss the details and options. |
Barrel is finished, just got to re-do the finish. The Duracoat over parkerizing didn't match color close enough for my happiness so I'm going to redo it. Should be ready to roll on Monday or Tuesday. We machined some custom jigs and collars to align everything, so if we gotta do an M4 again it'll be a walk in the park. It's a sexy setup now but I'll let Mark post the pics 
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Quoted:
Warped, you need to address the issue in the feedback forum ASAP. Thanks, Clint EE Mod Links are our friends 
http://www.ar15.com/forums/topic.html?b=7&f=109&t=610397 |
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Quoted:
Here are some pictures: This one shows almost a "super modified full choke"! http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/2.jpg http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/3.jpg http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/4.jpg Here you can see the rings inside the barrel where it started to warp. http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/5.jpg In this one, notice how the underlug is canted forward and only contacts the bottom of the magazine plug. http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/6.jpg As I said before, I feel like the member (you could probably guess who that is now)COULD NOT have not seen this problem! I've now brought this to two local dealers who are also gunsmiths and the see the obvious problem. I feel like the problem was known, but he shipped it out anyway, hoping I won't ask him to make it right. I've been told to "send it back or shut up". Well...... What would any of you do in this situation? Would you trust a person that sends out this kind of work then asks "what's the problem?" and "I need to see the barrel"? He is made it clear to me in a very recent email that he feels that replacing the barrel is not his responsibility.  That's horrible. Please post pics when you get it back from kingjoey.
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Well, I IM'd Warped to ask if he was refunding the money, no answer yet. BUT!!!!! KINGJOEY has come through big time!! I got the new barrel today. It is MINT! Joey snatched victory from the jaws of total defeat. Here are the pictures:
http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/DSCN2059.jpg http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/DSCN2062.jpg Night and day compared to the warped job of the previous gunsmith: http://i474.photobucket.com/albums/rr105/markc1911/3.jpg King Armory is the REAL DEAL!! Joey took the time to talk out options with me and returned back a mint product. I shot it today and it handles like a dream. Really tight pattern at 50 feet with various brands of 00 buck. Shoots slugs right on too. KINGJOEY gets a huge +1. |
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Glad to see it arrived intact. That's a pretty evil looking rig, if you don't mind I'd like to toss it on the site under our user pics since we're in the process of doing our monthly site update. Also, if you ever have that mag tube off for any reason send it in and I'll get it reparked so it matches the barrel.
BTW, try shooting it at night, you'll be surprised how little flash you'll get
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It is. KINGJOEY did a great job. I was shooting this yesterday, close to dark and there was very little muzzle flash. It cycled everything I put through it except Hornaday TAP 00 Buck. But this is a reduced load, so I'm not surprised.
I can't get over how tamed the muzzle jump is on this. It felt more controllable the my full size M4. |
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Quoted:
I can't get over how tamed the muzzle jump is on this. It felt more controllable the my full size M4. I actually had to polish the crap out of my recoil-operated 11-48 to make the gun function reliably with full power FFC after installing one of KingJoey's brakes*. While slightly problematic for me, it is a testament to just how well the brake works. *...Dry (no lube). After polishing, the gun works great with full-power loads, and is a pleasure to shoot (about the same recoil as a 7.62 AK). Given that the build was for my recoil-sensative wife, this is a VERY good thing. It also helps that light target and reduced-recoil loads can be cycled simply by lubing the mag tube. This is the nature of the beast with recoil-operated guns. |
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