Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors Just picked up another broken Savage

This is NEVER acceptable packaging.

I have a cardboard box that looks like that. It was flexed on the barrel end so didn't break the stocks but it retained the angle in the cardboard.

I have an air line certified plastic hard case. No shipping company can say it wasn't packed properly. I'm not sure about the box store cases. The case pictured above looks good, am I missing something? I don't think any cardboard box is good. As I said above, if you can't put the muzzle on one chair, and the butt on another chair, and stand in the middle, it's not good enough. We are not supposed to step on boxes, but it happens. If there is a footprint right where the break was, did someone jump on it, I don't know, I hope not. But, if you jump on the middle of a box I packed, it won't break. If you wrap a rifle in bubble wrap and then put it in a cardboard box, there is O support end to end. Bubble wrap does a good job on glass, but does nothing to support end to end. Helps with scratches and dents, but, you need something stiff end to end.

Somehow I'm not making the point. We are not supposed to stand on packages, but it happens. It should not matter. If someone stands right in the middle of your box, it should not dent or bend. If it's long , wrapped in foam or bubble wrap, it has no support end to end. This is the third time I said, in this thread, "you should be able to put the rifle between two chairs and stand on it". If you can't do that it is not packed well enough. Most rifles are not packed anywhere near that well and make it fine, that does not mean they are packed correct. It just means they are treated with respect. If the last wall of the trailer is three feet high, and I ship an engine block that weighs 130 pounds, two loaders heft it up on top of the middle of your package, is it going to survive? If I tell you that a 100 plus pound box might get plopped on top of your box, are you going to think, this nice new card board box looks good to me, I'll use it. Wrap it in a blanket and slide it in, looks good. NO, IT'S NOT GOOD". I would never ship a rifle in a cardboard box. 99% are shipped in a cardboard box. But, I bet a Holland&Holland won't go out the door in cardboard. I bet a Turnbull custom doesn't go out in cardboard. If I keep telling you what you need to do to Gorilla proof your box, and you say, nope I'm gonna use cardboard and bubble wrap, what more can I say. Gnoahhh just got a rifle in the mail, and it wasn't damaged, ask him how it was packed, Joe.

New guns are much more likely to be marked as guns and they make it. They are shipped in form fitted styrofoam, inside new boxes. They have support end to end. They are probably packed by machines that don't care. That should be a warning that soft flexible packaging won't work.

Used guns are packed by people, not machines, designed to packaged with collapse specifications. Most people use whatever box is there, wrap in bubbled pack or foam. They don't buy a 4 foot long block of styrofoam, split it in half, carve out the exact shape of the contents, and snugly fit it to the foam.

If a new gun goes in the same trailer, with the same Gorillas, and doesn't get a scratch. Then the same gun is shipped out used and gets snapped in half, I think it's time to quit blaming the Gorillas, and blame the shippers. If your gun got snapped in half, I'm not blaming you. You didn't misspack it. Tell me how many guns that you have shipped that got damaged? I'm getting off subject of Gregintenns question. But, if you have had a rifle arrive snapped in half and it was in a card board box, and I have said over and over that cardboard is not good enough for something of value, why do you keep defending shipping your valuable rifles in cardboard. Now I have a headache, Joe.

Roy, you are correct. It is shipping failure, not by the handelers, but the shipper. I'll make a deal with you. I'll ship 7, 4 foot florescent light bulbs to you. If one is broken, I'll give you my DL in 308. If they all make it safe, you give me your 270 Titus, Joe.

While we are blaming the Gorillas for bustin up our stuff. I do believe it is still a rather severe crime to destroy interstate commerce. So, I really don't think some knuckle head is going to risk going to jail. Geeze, I don't know why I missed the obvious. All the belts and trailers have cameras in them. Theft is a much bigger issue than vandalism, so every thing is watched by big brother, if some stupid "Hub Rat" was busting stuff up he would be out of there in a minute, Joe.

A rifle isn't exactly what I'd call a delicate item. To have one broken during shipping seems like poor business practice to me. One shouldn't have to build a friggin' crate to ship a rifle.

I agree. The manufacturers don't build 2x4 crates to send rifles. And even if they have styrofoam end to end they still go out in cardboard boxes. You can't tell me styrofoam has any structural support for the scenario Joe describes "standing on it between two chairs".

Alot of manufacturers just have two or three styrofoam inserts to support the rifle inside a cardboard box. And the rifles arrive fine. How? What's the difference? When was the last time anyone bought a new rifle and when they got the box from the back room it was bent or demolished? I've never seen one, but I don't buy new rifles anymore so maybe it happens. It sure as hell happens with used guns by the boatload, every day. There's a difference in the shipping somehow to explain this, but I don't know what it is.

I think we should be able to have a reasonable expectation that our package, no matter what it is, does not end up under an engine block. That's just ridiculous to think the weight of a package doesn't play into where it goes in the load.

I'm going to go back to the start and say I believe the gorillas have the responsibility to handle packages with reasonable care. If I'm hired to do a job my job is to, DO THAT JOB. And I don't get paid if I don't do it right!!!

Clearly money and time are the #1 priorities to the shippers and collateral damage is secondary. That being said, it is what it is and it isn't going to change, so I guess we adapt or die.

One can ship a box of chocolates without the expectation of them arriving stomped flat. I know which one I believe is easier to break.

Have you pissed off someone at your local UPS hub?

I agree, Roy. At the same time I hear what Joe is saying. I too feel that the common carrier's first priority is the almighty dollar, not the safety of our goods. With the obscene profits they make, and the high wages paid to their workers, I posit that they could shave those margins and hire more people and expand their facilities to allow for a more intelligent approach to package handling. I'll bet if an upstart shipper offered guaranteed care in shipping they could beat UPS and the USPS at their own game- and break those monopolies.

Yep. UPS drivers make an insanely high amount of money. I know of one who started driving a truck in her 30s and retired in her 50s with a six digit income. This might be okay but she seems to feel entitled. A little humility in life never hurts. With that amount of money invested in drivers UPS should be delivering your packages along with a steak and lobster dinner, or at the least give you no misery when they damage your property.

I don't think the problem is with drivers, by then the package is not under any stress. I think it has to happen in the trailers. The driver does have the responsibility to pull any damaged package and return it to their center clerk. As I said before, it's in no ones interest to piss off two people.

As far as wages. Drivers make $34.79 an hour, that's a national pay scale. If you were allowed to work the legal limit of 20 hours OT per week, that would be $126,000 per year. Our drivers are restricted to 9.5 hours total per day, except the 4 weeks before Christmas. I was an overtime hound and the last ten years I worked I made about 70K for five years, 80K for 3 years, 90K my last full year, my last year I retired November 1st, so I missed 2 months.

40 percent of UPS full time employees pension is through UPS. They get basically $100 per month per year of service. That's $3,000 per month for 30 years of service, or $36,000 per year. OK pension, but a long way from 6 figures. The other 60 percent of full time employees get their pension through their local union. My local, Teamsters Local 639, has the highest UPS pension in the country. We have had really good trustees for many years. If you retire under age 60, or with less than 30 years, you pay a 5% penalty for each year under age 60. You also have to pay a penalty on your health care for being under 60. My pension with no penalties is about $5500 per month, or 66000 per year. I still have to pay state taxes.

Very good wages, very good pension and health care.

That still doesn't explain how a driver can deliver guns to a gun shop and have virtually no damage, and deliver guns shipped by regular people and have damages. Of course you don't have to ship your guns in a crate. There are probably me and 3 other people in the country that do that. But, the 4 of us never have a damage.

You also keep mixing facts up. The drivers make $34.79 an hour and they are the least likely person to damage a package, because they have the most to loose.

A hub worker makes about $10 an hour and has much less to loose. He's probably only going to work there a couple months before he quits anyway. If your package goes from one Coast to the other, it may be loaded and unloaded 6 or 8 times. The trailer that gets loaded in Corvallis, OR, does not come all the way to Laurel MD, where I worked. It will go to a big hub, get off loaded, consolidated into a more direct load, reloaded then go to another big hub, repeat, till it gets to MD. When it gets to the first hub an unloader puts it on a belt. Then it goes through scanners and to a sorter. The sorter puts it on another belt going to the trailer to continue. Then another sorter takes it off that belt and puts it on a slide into the trailer. So, from coast to coast your package can be handled by 25 to 30 different people.

You should be able to expect your packages to be handled with respect. You are right and they are. One of our managers used to say "Treat every parcel as if it were an honored guest in your home."

Our building processes 60-70 thousand pieces for delivery every day. They process another 100 thousand pieces for shipment to other hubs every night.

The easy answer is to ship it Next Day Air, it will only be handled 5 or six times and not as many belts and slides. Second Day Air is much cheaper than NDA and still reduces handling.

And, that's all I can say about that, Joe.

As far as broken guns go. You wonder why I drive any where I can to avoid shipping a gun. I'll be driving over 600 miles in January to pick up a couple to avoid shipping. BTW, the seller will be driving 100-150 miles to meet me. In the end, we'll both have full bellies and know the guns are safe. If you're going to ship, ask the seller to ship the same way Diamondjim ships. He sent me the solid frame K (which letters as such) in a custom made hard case that is so rugged I'm certain it would support being driven over by a P/U truck

Thank you, thank you, thank you. No, you "shouldn't" have to do that. No, you "don't have" to do that. But, after one broken gun, why "wouldn't" you do that from now on. I sold an antique tobacco tin for $2100, I bought a steel box to ship it in. It didn't get dented, Joe.

If I received 7 broken guns I'd take up knitting instead buying guns.

Not all of us are inclined thataway, but knock yourself out.

The more timid elements run for cover when the shipping starts.

With your track record you might want the wood shipped separate on future buys.

I can request it but it's up to the seller whether he wants to take apart the rifle or not. Only one has so far.