SAM Thunderbolt = MAJOR major disappointment

[ted_dent]

Long story as short as I can make it, I already own 3 SAM 1911s (Stainless Enhanced Commanders in 9mm & 45 & an Omega 6 in 40 S&W all bought from Wolverine). All three are well fitted, well finished and shoot like champs plus none of them cost me over $600. I have recommended SAMs to my friends who have been similarly satisfied. For this reason I did not hesitate to order a 9mm stainless Thunderbolt even though it came in at almost $950 without shipping.

Anyway, it arrived and upon stripping it down to clean it I found the following:
1. one of the barrel lands actually had a chip out of it
2. the extended magwell fit poorly
3. when I removed the grip screws one of the bushings came out with it
4. worst of all, the chamber on the barrel looked like it had been cut with a rat tail file. It was actually that bad, with gouges and scratches the entire length of the chamber

I immediately contacted Wolverine and was told to send it back, which I did at a cost of $38.

Shortly thereafter I received an email from Wolverine stating that "You were right about the barrel, it is awful. We were going to give you a
replacement, but that proved to be troublesome as well. 1st pistol selected had a crack in the feed ramp, and the 2nd had issues feeding practice shells. On the 3rd one, our gunsmith could not find any issues as found in the first 2. Transfer on that firearm has been started."

Shortly thereafter the second gun arrived. Upon stripping and cleaning the gun I found that, once again, the barrel chamber was incredibly rough (even worse than the first one). Again I contacted Wolverine, explained the situation and told them I was still interested in the gun if they could get me one that did not have this problem. They opted to refund my money, stating "In this case, we will ask that you send us back the handgun, and we
will completely refund your purchase."

I explained that I did not blame them for SAM's poor (non-existent?) quality control but couldn't understand how their gunsmith could have missed the rough chamber on the second gun given that was the major problem with the first one.

Yesterday I received my MasterCard statement and found that all I had been credited was the original cost of the gun ($834) + tax ($108) but not the original $30 shipping or my extra $38 return shipping. So after all that time and effort I ended up with no gun and out $68 in shipping costs. To add insult to injury, because the Thunderbolt has an odd rail size I had ordered a custom holster for it (from Solely Canadian, great holster & company, BTW) which set me back another $104 for a gun I now don't have.

So this little adventure with SAM junk cost me over $170. I recommend that if you buy a SAM pistol you examine it very carefully because it appears that their quality control has gone in the toilet and don't expect to get your ancillary expenses like return shipping back from Wolverine either, even if none of the fault is yours. MAJOR disappointment all around on this one.

[Mr Wolverine]

Please e-mail me direct so I can look into this for you. Under these circumstances our standard policy would be to refund you your shipping costs as the "fault" was not your responsibility, this is our loss, the cost of doing business. Not sure what went wrong here with your full refund, but a call to us would have resolved everything. I do know that we did have some problems with some of the last SAM 9 mm barrels. I will be forwarded this all on to SAM.

[John Deer]

Oh come off it,

Wolverine tried every reasonable way to fix the issue.
SAM's quality control is not their issue and they still went above and beyond.

Don't slam wolverine when they obviously spent a great deal of time trying to make it right
100% refund - shipping is the cost of doing business online.

Think about all the money you save by being able to conveniently purchase things online, and then ask yourself if paying 60$ for that convenience and being able to get a 100% refund is unreasonable.

Keep in mind that if you used a credit card on the purchase it probably cost wolverine money in transaction fees as well.

[6MT]

Doesn't appear to me that he is "slamming" Wolverine.

[Craig0ry]

Doesn't appear to me that he is "slamming" Wolverine.

I think he is in the last two paragraphs for sure, Also sounded like he wanted to complain he didn't get a refund on shipping here before even contacting Wolverine about it

[Flattbed]

Hey I would be very annoyed also. Let's face it $1000 bucks is not a drop in the bucket for most people. You purchase a product it should be perfect. And let's not mention all the time having to go into this also!
That being said Wolverine stepped up like they usually do and is remedying the problem. I say good on ya Wolverine I won't hesitate to make a purchase from ya.


Let's face it John Deer if that was you I'm sure you would feel the same way.

[BillD]

Sorry to hear about the problem - frustrating no doubt, but yes I would have given Wolverine a call first before posting they way you did in reference to the full refund issue.

[Robert777]

Sorry to hear about the bad SAM experience. I was hoping to purchase a LongSlide .45.
Have there been any other problems with other SAM models that you have heard of Mr. Wolverine?
Or is this isolated to the 9mm model?

[Haagen_Dazs]

Wolverine is one of the best stores in Canada, been there in person once, wish they were not in Virden! Glad to ehar they are refunding the shipping, like he said, cost of doing business.

If it makes you feel any better my Ruger 1911 is having feed issues with all ammo, just doesn't return to battery all the time.

[redruns]

Suck up the shipping costs. Be a customer that a business wants to deal with.

You bought a bargain pistol at a bargain price which didn't come with the fit and finish you would expect from a Sig or a Colt or a Kimber, sent it back and complain publicly about your missed expectations from a store who bent over backwards to try and make you happy.

Maybe in the future when you purchase a product you could get a contract which indicates which party is responsible for shipping if you decide to return it.