[Rich Z]

Damn it....

This is a copy of an email I just sent to Remington about today's experience:

A couple of months ago I purchased a NIB Model 597 Remington Synthetic .17HMR rifle. Today (10/25/03) I finally had a chance to take it out and shoot it. I mounted a Leupold 1.75x6 Vari-X III scope on it and centered the dials then walked down to the range.

I set the target up at around 50 feet and fired three shots. NONE hit the paper. I had to move the target to within 20 feet before I could put any holes in it. To make a long story short, I had to adjust my Leupold scope to the max limits on both the vertical (ALL THE WAY UP) and the horizontal (ALL THE WAY TO THE LEFT) to be able to get CLOSE to zeroed. As it is the gun still shoots several inches too low and there is nothing more I can do about it. See attached image of target.

Back at the end of April in 2000, I purchased another Remington rifle (this time a Model 700 ADL in 22/250 with open sites) that at the initial shooting shot 6 inches low and to the right at 30 FEET.

I am beginning to see an unpleasant trend here with Remington's quality *control*.

In any event, I need to send this gun back (at Remington's expense, no less) as this gun is obviously defective. I could take it to the next gun show and sell it to some other poor schmuck, but that's not my style. YOU need to fix the garbage you are sending out. I cannot take this to a local dealer as I bought it across the internet and had it transferred through a dealer that way.

I think Remington needs to take a long hard look at their quality control procedures. Personally, I will have a very tough time convincing myself to buy another Remington product after this sort of nonsense.

Rich Zuchowski

Obviously I am not happy about this. Blew my whole day. I thought I would sight in this rifle, then tinker around with a couple of other ones while I was in the shooting spirit. Basically right now I would like to have a gun turn in program locally so I could take this thing there and drop it off in exchange for a beanie baby or something. GRRRR! :angry:

 

[Clint Boyer]

How is the reciever set up to accept mounts? Is it just drilled and tapped? What type of mounts are you using?

Is the scope new? Is it possible the scope could be defective?

I had this happen with an Interarms MX many years ago also with a Leupold scope. I ended up mounting a different scope (Redfield wideangle) on it in order to bring it in.

 

[Rich Z]

Yeah, that thought had crossed my mind, but I guess from my past experience with Remington, I am more inclined to blame the gun rather than the scope. It is a used scope, so it is certainly a possibility of being the culprit.

The receiver is drilled and tapped for a scope mount.

Sigh, I do have another Leupold laying around here that I haven't mounted on a gun, so I guess I can try that out next chance I get to play with a gun again. I think I've got one of those Gilmore/Leupold 2moa red dot scopes somewhere as well.

It's supposed to rain tomorrow (Sunday) and I have a show in Tampa scheduled for next weekend, so I don't know what sort of time I'm going to have available.

That's probably what torqued me up the most. My play time is extremely valuable to me, and something like this just kills the whole day for me.

Buying guns just to collect them, rather than shooting them, is looking more and more attractive to me.

 

[Clint Boyer]

High expectations..........

We get all excited about the propects of .5 MOA rifle and then can't get it to shoot! I've had more of those then I care to remember!

 

[Rich Z]

Heck, I wasn't looking for a miracle! I just wanted to feel comfortable that I had a fighting chance at a head shot on a squirrel at 50 yards. Not easy to do when your scope's crosshairs are about 4 inches higher than the bullet impact.

 

[Rich Z]

Damn that crow tastes GOOD!

I finally got around to playing around with the Remington again today. I mounted a Leupold/Gilmore red dot scope on it and set up the target at around 30 feet. In about 5 shots I was getting close enough to the x ring to move the target out a bit further.

All in all the gun shot rather well, and it was painfully obvious that the gun wasn't at fault in my earlier episode. So now I have to write a letter of apology to Remington.. To their credit, they had a return shipping call in tag to me in a couple of days to ship the rifle back to them at no cost to me.

Guess I have to send that Leupold scope to the factory to get it looked at. I guess the guy I got it from off of Ebay didn't want to spend the $5 to ship it back to Leupold and decided to just sell it off. Oh well. With Leupold's warranty, this is no big problem.

Just why do people do stuff like this? I have heard countless times someone say that they bought a brand new gun, and it was defective, so they took it to the next gun show and dumped it on someone else. Sheesh! Why not send it back to the factory and get the damned thing fixed? Or is there some sort of taboo against doing that?

Heck, if I buy a gun, I bought it for a reason, so dammit, why the heck should I not sent it back to the factory and have it fixed so I have what I originally wanted? Doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

Speaking of which, I think I have a Remington pump action .22 that I bought a while back that will shoot shorts, longs, and long rifles without jamming up. It has a problem in that it shoots too high using the iron sites and won't group worth a damn. Maybe I should send that one back to Remington instead.

Oh, and I did try shooting the .17HMR without the ear muffs on. It's not TOO bad, but I wouldn't want a steady diet of it. But for chasing around squirrels in the trees it will do just fine.

BTW, for the quick and dirty informal shooting I was doing, the gun grouped right well. But damn that trigger pull is stiff. Feels like around 8 pounds, but it breaks nice and cleanly.

 

[anodes]

I've got a Rem597 in .22lr that I hate the trigger on. Power Custom is makeing drop in parts for the 597 by now. May look into some of those for my gun. Darn bolt handle fell off and I need to get that fixed, too! Else, I love the gun. Congrats on your good news! Enjoy... www.crowbusters.com/recipes/htm :lick:
anodes.

 

[Bolo]

Eat Crow???

Why Not! I had the Crowbusters recipes bookmarked too:nuts:
Not as crazy as it seems... Crow season don't start in the "Bearflag Rupublic" till Dec., but I tried that Crow Creole recipe substituting shrimp for crow YUMMY! But enough of this recipe stuff, got to break out the Winchester 12 - Fall turky season opened yesterday accompanied by massive rainfalls ... hopefully the storm will pass and the birds will emerge... Spitroasted turky for T'giving!

OBTW: To keep this post remotely on the topic thread, I picked up a used Leupold VariX II and promptly sent it in for a check & clean = warrenty was still in effect.

 

[Rich Z]

Heck, that pre-check on a used Leupold might not be a bad idea. I got a 6.5x20x40 around the same time that I haven't mounted on a gun yet. I tend to get all of my Leupolds off of Ebay and this is the first time I have had a problem with one of them.