Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns Kimber has built 743134 1911's

In one factory I worked in about 2 years ago, they were implementing statistical process control. One job went to QC, and because the customer was expecting statistical proof of process capability, QA took samples of the lot. No parts actually were found out of spec, but predicting the lot's variation - easy to do if you have real skills, like math - suggested there were a fair number of bad parts in the lot. QA rejected it.

The plant supervisor was furious, called the inspection BS, and said he'd check all the parts himself, to prove they were all good. He spent three days doing it, and wound up finding slightly more bad parts than the statistics predicted. He admitted defeat.

If I was trying to claim that a slight difference in failure percentages was a big deal, after checking 50, 100, or even 500 guns, I'd being trying to read too much info into the data. But when a couple hundred people report on a product, and almost half have complaints, that's not "meaningless".

Are you being serious or sarcastic?

How many they've produced means nothing to me if 125 out of a random 284 have "failed". That's a 44% failure rate.

And that is the problem with the "poll" - it is totally meaningless.

If I was thinking of buying a new truck and asked 284 friends how they liked their Fords, and received 125 negative responses about Fords, I'd hesitate to buy a Ford truck. Regardless of how many they produce every year.

And you would too.

While they've built a lot of pistols and 284 units out of 750k isn't alot - consider that those 284 units are spread across the country here and about 50% of them had a failure.

It don't give the warm fuzzies and that's from a guy who bought 2 of them in 1998/9 and had zero issues.

Fact is, today, Kimber isn't the only place to get a 1911 with semi-custom touches at a good price with good results. In 1998 they kind of were the only ones and that's why people flocked to them.

I'd take a NM serialized Springer or Ruger anyday and not feel bad that it's "not a kimber" - actually, rather than drop the money on a Kimber - I'd save a bit and get a Les Baer.

1900 or so gets you a new Les and I can't say that I know of anyone who'd claim that Kimber does the 1911 better than he does. Wicked accurate pistols from the results I've seen.

So is a sample size of 284 valid for 743000 units?

For one thing, Kimber magazines are pure schitt & I throw all of them I come into contact with into the trash & magazines are likely the #1 cause of 1911 function issues.

MM

wouldn't you agree that it should come with at least two serviceable magazines?

but I do think there's more here than meets the eye & it's likely in the definition of the defect

Doesn't your sample size require a frequency to be valid?

You have a sample of 284/743134 produced over a 13 year period.

Worse, you have no standard definition of what constitutes a "failure" (you basically have 284 untrained inspectors giving their opinion).

No, you do not have a or sample size of 743,134; you only have a sample lot of 284 of which 44% have been reported as bad from a total production run of 734K.




Statistically, it doesn't matter how many were produced; you only have a sample of 284 & the data contained in that sample.

The only way the data would not be valid is if it was all from a period of, say 2005-2012 & you were able to get another sample from, say 1999-2004 & that data (rejects) was substantially different.

So if there was a circumstance as above, the number of defects might be substantially different, but assuming the original 284 defects were taken from production over most of the total timeframe in question then the total produced is not really relative.



But you have to accept that, within reason, the same standard for a malfunction is more or less consistent across all manufacturers listed in the poll; in other words, the Kimber reporters were no more or less critical or -ill-informed than those reporting on other brands.

And no, I don't agree that the 1911 is an "inferior" design; your opinion or view doesn't make it so.

MM

Did the poll include the date of manufacture? If not, then you again have a totally meaningless sample. Why? Because you are not accounting for model type, or manufacturing runs. Kimber didn't build a single run of 743134 Kimber Classics ya know.

So your sample of 284 could all be from one problematic model produced in a couple of months of high workforce turnover. You just don't know. Meaningless.

...and "malfunctions" have more to do with break-in, or lack of lube, or magazines - none of which is really the pistol.