Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Montana Rifle Company 1999 action

BUYER BEWARE!!!!!!!!!
This story is from my 100% experience that I am dealing with right now. I would not trust Montana Rifle Company to put air in my bicycle tire, nevermind buy and action or rifle from them. My story started about 10 months ago when I bought a stainless steel long action, left hand, I wanted to build a 7mm Rem Mag, after coming back from Africa I decided I wanted a 375 H&H instead. I contacted my custom gunsmith and told him to please return the original action to MRC for another one that could be chambered for a 375 H&H. I was told all they had to do at MRC was change out parts. They sent the new action out to my gunsmith and they billed me for another action even though they had already received the original action back. I had to call them to ask why I was billed twice when they already had the action in their shop. They said sorry we will take care of it.( 30 days later they sure did) that is the start of my horror!
As time is going on I called and ordered a 270 win. Summit rifle that would be completed from them for a quoted price of ($1699). I have receipts to prove it all. As I was making payments on the rifle someone at MRC changed the price to $1899. When I called to ask what was going on noone knew who changed anything. After speaking with previous owner several times the person in their billing department told me that he(the former owner) would personally put in the $200 difference ( I have papers to prove that also) That is now strike two.
Fast forward 10 months and my rifle is finally complete and has been shipped to me with MRC left hand 1999 action, in 375 H&H, with a Lilja ss #5 contour, recessed target crown, teflon coated and stocked in a very well named stock maker ( will leave names out) First day at the range the gun does not feed or eject correctly. I called custom gun maker and MRC and I am told to send rifle back to MRC to find out that the wrong follower is in the rifle. Rifle is shipped back to me and I go to the range again and the same problem arises. I call custom gun smith and send it to him. He polished ejector blade, ejector blade needed to be polished. Sends gun back again. Take it to the range the following Sunday and the gun does the same thing. Ejector blade is destroyed,bent beyond belief. I send it back to my custom gun maker again and he said that the ejector was longer, wider and thicker than what the two MRC long actions he has in his shop now. Once again the wrong piece. Now I call MRC to cancel my Summit rifle in 270 because of the problems I am having with this action. I am LIVID! I was told they (MRC) do returns once a month.
I waited 30days for my refund and still nothing. I had gotten on the phone with the owner of the company and was told there is no money in the account for a refund can I pay you a little at a time over the next few weeks.I was also begged to please not cancel my order and give MRC another chance and told when I returned the original action they never switched out the parts. Follower, spring, bolt stop, and bolt ring. He did not want to get into why they did not change it. That is definitely strike 3 and I am down for the count. So now I had to get the Credit card company involved and contact the Better Business Bureau.
I am now waiting for my 375 to come back from the custom gun maker(again!)and hopefully for the last time. I told him to change every last piece out with m70 parts. I would NEVER DO BUSINESS with their(MRC) company again. My personal opinion...It's JUNK! Please beware. Think two or three times before you decide to buy. Their quality control is horrendous.

I've read others opinions that are sure different than yours, though I'm not calling you a liar and don't doubt your experience. To bad you experienced it. Hope all turns out ok.

I'd take up bow hunting if the only way I could get a rifle is to buy one from MRC. Heard ownership has changed and some the idiots I dealt with are gone, but there are FAR to many other rifles out there to even entertain it.

Had a similar problem with MRC in that they unilaterally increased the price of a barreled action over what had been agreed on, and charged my credit card for the higher amount.

Got my credit card company involved, and MRC told a string of lies to justify the increase. Fortunately, I had documentation that refuted their lies, and the credit card company supported my position.

The bad actor involved was the son of Brian(does that make him an SOB?) who now runs the action side of the house.

So when it comes to MRC, it looks like 7remmag and I have both been there, and done that. Unfortunately, so have a lot of others.

Concerning MRC, be afraid, be very afraid.

Steve

With out getting into the details, I will never consider doing business with MRC again.

Where were all of these threads before I bought my 264WM? You folks are making me afraid to shoot it and just list it on Gunbroker.

I hope my experience is better is all I can say. I do know that once I got the correct follower and mag box the rifle feeds like butter.

I guess we'll see.

Robert

Too bad. Their business concept was an intriguing one. I considered buying a barreled action from them. No longer.

Bruzer,
You should have searched here on the Campfire. MRC seems to be very hit or miss, not much in the middle. I had a similiar experince with them. I was finally thinking of giving them another chance because I want a CRF rifle. But I'll take this as a sign and stay away.

7Mag. I live in Kalispell MT, and I didn't even know there was a change of ownership... Who bought it? I'm assuming Brian is gone? I know his son is still there... I saw him and their gunsmith with 4-5 "returns" at the range 3 weeks ago. Those actions have come a long way in the time they were introduced. IMO, they could come quite a ways furhter (as I said on the other post)

Brian, I refuse to do business with. I would put the quality of his barrels below Douglass on my "list" His son is a little hot tempered, but I always figured that a lot of that came from doing business with his old man. On some level, I hoped that he expected more out of those actions since he took that end of the shop over.

The one thing I'll never forget was when I was in Brians shop (in back of the old Lasalle Tool building on HWY 2) when he told another customer in the shop..... "Hell, I taught Dan Lilja everything he knows..." I really wanted to call bullshit right then and there.

Then there's the guys over at McGowan rifle barrel. I'm within inches of ordering a 6.5 barrel from them, just because they're local and can have the barrel done in 3-4 weeks. I want to give them a try, I really do. But they learned how to make barrels from Brian. I guess, if they were paying attention, they know what NOT to do. So I'm waiting patiently to hear what others have to say about them before I pony up my money. (sorry for the hi-jack)

7mmRem,

Sorry for your experience but don't you think a major part of the problem is your custom gunsmith? If he didn't know that the wrong parts were in your action, what the heck was he doing making custom rifles? What kind of custom gunmaker does not test fire his work especially in a DGR - calibre? I'd stay right away from him.

Whilst not the greatest, I have 2 MRC actions from their Charter Special days & they are certainly functional and one in particular shoots rather well. They need finishing but are otherwise sound and they did try to accomodate your changes of mind. I don't know why you are upset at MRC but not your gunsmith. He's the "REAL" turkey!

Dan - totally agree with you on the MRC barrels. Mine was supposed to be hand lapped, match grade. It's a POS. It may have been pointed at a lap but none ever went through the barrel. Verified with a bore scope. Never again.

I have not heard that MRC are in trouble & I hope they are OK. They provide a good alternative for the custom gun trade.

Regards
JohnT

As far as I know it is nothing more than a magazine swap. Your "custom sunsmith" couldn't handle that?



Your "custom gun maker" never test fired it, or checked it for function??



Again, you have the "custom gun smith" work on it, and he sends you back a rifle that he obviously STILL is not function checking. Not only does he not bother to check his own work before sending it back, he doesn't even know which parts are "wrong".



If it were me, yep, it WOULD be the last time this so-called "custom gun maker" ever touched any rifle of mine.



Sounds like you are mixing up MRC with your hack of a gunsmith.

How many times are you going to send something to a "custom gun maker", only to have him tell you that he fixed it, but obviously is not checking anything? How much have you paid this joker? HIS quality control is non-existent.

Nope, your rant here is misdirected. I'd be addressing this with the guy that kept telling you he fixed it, yet kept returning faulty work, not the maker. Then I'd be finding a new gunsmith.

My thoughts exactly.

The owner of MRC is Brian Sipes son Jeff. The other owner used to be Devin Antonovich who is no longer with the company.
I posted this letter for others to use as a tool and I am glad I am getting the responses that I am getting because now I know for sure that I am not the only one who is experiencing this. Everyone that has a negative post is agreeing with me that the action does not feed or extract correctly. As a right handed shooter there should be no reason for anyone to look any further than a model 70 Ruger or Dakota to start their process of building a custom rifle. As for myself, a left handed shooter, we are painted into a very small corner of options to use for a Mauser 98 style action without breaking the bank and keeping it as a working mans rifle. But it is the Devil in disguise. My personal suggestion to anyone save your money, buy a Dakota action or hunt around for a used model 70 ( because it just works)
As of today I am still waiting for my refund on my cancelled order. It is of course over 30days. Is this the kind of company you would want to be dealing with?
This is not an angry post. This is a post to keep others from getting into my situation. Trust me you don't need the headache.
For the person who just bought the MRC from Guns America I hope you got a good one. I know not all of them cannot be bad but so many people have the same opinion I do, they don't function correctly.

7RM,

I bought the rifle here and not on Gunsamerica.....

As others have stated it sounds as if your problem is with the gunsmith and a financial transaction that hasn't been resolved to your liking rather than a faulty or poorly designed action.

I can assure you that my MRC feeds as well or better than my other rifles now that the correct items are in place.......Again an issue created by a gunsmith and not MRC.

Good luck resolving your situation.

Robert

What you really mean is that you are using us as a "tool" to speed up your refund by disparaging MRC. Great one!!! If you want to be treated fairly the place to start is with you treating others fairly.

Actually, one might say "You got exactly what you deserved!"

Regards
JohnT

I have heard so many bad things about this outfit I would never consider going there for anything and I live in Kalispell 10 min away from them...It's not just 1 or 2 complaints it's a pile of them..

Yeah, I'd never go the MRC route either. I bought a barrel from them and it was a nice one, but they can keep the cast actions.

I think the gunsmith is critical to good results with a MRC action or barreled action.

I have a custom rifle from Serengeti Arms on that uses a MRC barreled action. It will shot three different factory loads into clusters that hover around half an inch at 100 yards.It feeds perfectly,even upsidedown or sideways and it is a 270WSM.

Mule Deer has one a lot like it in 7x57,he now hunts with it more than any other rifle he owns from what I understand.

Hill Country Rifles offers synthetic stocked rifles on MRC barreled actions that are fine guns too.

If I were going to do a custom on a MRC action,it would be with one of these two firms,they keep actions in stock and will stand behind what they sell. Both of them have for me.

I did not deal directly with MRC,but if you do buisness with Hill Country or Serengeti,I think you will be delighted. I sure was.

i take it you had the wrong follower as well?

yes the b/s gets real thick over there!!!