RECALL ALERT

1. Not so cool they seem to have a waiting list for repair, have had my email with S/N for a while with no instructions on how to ship. I’m not impressed.

2. Thanks. I just went to the website you included, signed up, and got complete instructions.

   Of course they have a waiting list. Mk-IVs have been flying off the shelves, and Ruger has to manufacture parts and install them correctly. You want it done fast, or right?

3. My experience with Ruger customer service has been positive. I purchased a used Blackhawk and then found a problem with the loading gate. I contacted Ruger about the issue and even though I was not the original owner, they emailed me a prepaid FedEx shipping label to send in the revolver. They not only fixed the loading gate, but also checked and tested the firearm for safety function , as well. All this at no expense to me.

   Yeah, they get a thumbs up from me also.

4. Corrected a typo in my prior comment: should be “newly designed product.”

   From time to time all firearms manufacturers have had new product design flaws like the Ruger Mark IV, but it appears Ruger increasingly has been plagued with that problem. The cause, I think, is the company’s rushing new products out the door without spending enough time testing them. A few years ago I had a similar experience with a brand new Ruger Single-Ten. Despite three returns to the factory that handgun’s lock work consistently jammed and could not be released. Fortunately, Ruger’s customer service was, and probably still is, excellent and they eventually replaced the Single-Ten with a Single-Six. My advice is to never buy a newly designed product (and not just guns) until a few years have passed and all the bugs have been corrected.

5. This is very unfortunate for Ruger, yet it is exemplary how they’re handling the issue…

   This is just a wee hiccup for theMark IV. All shall be well, I’m sure.

   Thanks for the heads up, Mas!

6. This is off-topic but Mas sometimes recommends interesting books on this blog. I thought that i would follow his example. I am reading a novel (currently) that is interesting. It is People’s Republic by Kurt Schlichter. It is available on Amazon here:

   https://www.amazon.com/Peoples-Republic-Kurt-Schlichter/dp/1539018954/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1497358420&sr=8-1&keywords=peoples+republic

   Mr. Schlichter’s work reminds me (somewhat) of the novels of Stephen Hunter. I think that most of the reader’s of this blog would find this novel a “good read”. I say “most of the readers” because I am quite certain that my friend Liberal Dave will not enjoy the plot line of this novel! 🙂

7. To Larry,

   I spent 700 bucks on a pistol with a safety defect that should have been caught in Engineering, might have killed someone, and now may take months to repair and I should be happy.

   Standards have slipped into the good old USA.

8. Standards in the good old USA have been slipping for many years, for many reasons, but it appears our national dry rot will continue its decay until nothing works at all. Then welcome to the Age of the Great Crappiness.

9. @ Steve and Spencer,

   You are (perhaps) being a little harsh with Ruger. The Mark IV was a major re-design not just a minor modification of an existing design. On products that are brand-new or that consist of a major re-design, it is quite common for a bug to become evident only after the product “hits the market” and starts being used my thousands of people. It is (perhaps) a wise course of action to not buy such a product immediately. Waiting a few months gives time for the bugs to be worked out and for prices (for the latest and greatest) to come down a bit.

   As for “slipping standards”, I think that “nostalgia” may be coloring your perception of past standards. It is common to think that “things were much better in the old days” but, objectively, is it true?

   During the Civil War, all kinds of “war profiteers” were selling substandard products to the Union just as fast as they could. They called it the “Age of Shoddy” back then! 🙂

10. Those are valid points, TN_MAN, that you raised. And it’s true that many of today’s USA-made products are better than comparable ones built years ago.

    But my reference to “standards” had more to do with ethics and personal behavior in America (yes, I know, a little off topic), which in my more than 60 years of residence in this country seem to be rapidly deteriorating. However, I live in Portland, Oregon, where extreme weirdness is celebrated, possibly more often than anywhere else in America. Just about anything goes—and nothing matters–in the Rose City!

11. TN_MAN,

    I agree with what you said. I’ve seen people look at a well-made antique piece of furniture and say, “They made such quality in the old days.” They probably made a lot of crap in the old days, but the quality items remain with us. The crap was thrown out long ago. When we hear old songs, we only hear the best music from the past, not the forgotten stuff.

    I once had a teacher question the phrase, “old days.” He said the earth was younger then, so now we are living in the “old days.” In the past, things were younger, they are just old now if they are still around.

    A Korean pointed out to me that we are little weird when we say, “that thing went off.” The alarm went “off.” Wait, wasn’t the alarm “off,” then it sounded, so making the sound, the alarm is really “on” not “off” right? Now you turn the alarm off, so it’s not sounding anymore, right? So, the alarm went “off” and made a sound, then the fire department arrived and turned it “off” so it was no longer sounding.

    Wouldn’t you hate to learn English as a second language? I still haven’t mastered it.

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