I can't wait to hear the rest of Rancho's story. He has had the patience of Job up until yesterday, so Forbes must have really screwed the pooch with him.
I tend to be a perfectionist. I have a practical side as well, but just to play Devil's Advocate...
You guys are a tough crowd.
Forbes is attempting to supply a semi-custom production rifle for 1/2 price, and still sell it through a dealer network as well. Does current production from any of the big names compare in any way to the design of this rifle? Action? Stock? Barrel?
Not sure what caused RL's failed extraction, and while that can be somewhat disheartening, there's not much there to go wrong...it sounds like an out of spec extractor, and that's not a big problem. I have a Remy with a bad extractor that needs replacement, and I have a few spares on hand, but it still works so it's left as is for now. I wouldn't send a rifle 6k miles round-trip for that...Forbes is taking care of the customer, unlike most of the major names, but if you send a rifle back to the factory, expect some time to pass by regardless of who the maker is.
A little wet paint on the barrel channel?
That's considered a major defect?
It sounds to me that they were somewhat overwhelmed with early demand, and they are shipping out the wine before it's time. As time goes by, Forbes will shake out these small glitches in their production line, and the rifles will be better.
I wouldn't let any of this stuff keep me from owning one if I wanted to rock the design...it's a very cool rifle.
It seems to me that folks must have otherwise picture perfect lives if small stuff like this gets under their skin.
After all this I will stick to my Kimbers. I rolled the dice once with a start-up rifle company. I promised myself never again after the fiasco with George Sandmann.
No, I agree the extractor needs to be fixed one-way-or-the-other.
It kind of sounds that way, but I'm not being critical of you, RL, in any way, I'm just playing Devil's Advocate and offering a different POV regarding the overall tone of the thread.
All I'm really saying is that this is really a minor issue and not to get discouraged about the rifle.
Compounding things, I agree that it's obvious that Forbes seems to not have the right people in place to earn an A+ for CS hand-holding. If it were my company I would put that at the top of the manpower list, especially if I planned to screw up, but new start-ups are almost universally plagued with glitches, and it sounds like they have a lot on their plate at the moment. I wonder if they test fired the piece, how hard is that to do?
There are masterpieces of precision and perfection in manufacturing available from the likes of Borden, Surgeon, etc, and the like, but the bare actions are over a grand or thereabouts. A rifle like yours would be pushing 5k, but it's available if anyone want it.
I have simple requirements, so I think could do 90% of what I need to do with an out-of-the-box Ruger American, and that's out of the 100 or so odd rifles in my safe, but I think Forbes does offer a unique product for those that want one, and since you seemed to get the short straw here, I hope your rifle turns into one that you might eventually like once the issues are sorted out.
I've seen so many pitiful examples of obviously defective, abused, neglected, or just otherwise fubarred stuff that I was able to turn into something functional and useful, that I am somewhat immune to minor issues; but almost nothing is ever perfect to my eye and might need a little tuning-up.
If not you can always ask them to give you a new rifle and see how they handle that, and if I was running CS that's what I'd do for you, in fact, I'd probably insist.
You sometimes get what you pay for. If you really want to make a Remy right you have to throw out everything but the bare action tube, and even that one piece still needs work, and that's after all these decades of refinement.
A shooting buddy bought a Perazzi and they flew him to Italy and put him up for a week to make sure everything was perfect...now that's some right proper CS right there for a mere 27 grand.
By your own writing you don't sound like a perfectionist to me.
Thanks, that's a fair comment.
I figured I'd get some flack for playing Devil's Advocate in this thread, but what I really said was that I tended to be a perfectionist with a practical side.
Form Follows Function...
I think a NULA is more than fairly priced and a real bargain at $2500 or whatever they cost now...a Forbes is around $1500?
I have lived in the south, never had a problem with southerners. I have heard it all. The reality of it is those that really throw it around are just plain azzholes. As the same is true of the yankees that do the same about southerners. Where a person comes from doesn't dictate what the character of the person is.