Spank, I never thought of the Le Baron's folks running the browning service centre but you definitely have a good point. I met old Mrs. Le Baron many years ago when she was expanding the Toronto stores. She was a tough no nonsense women. I think she kept her husband around for breeding purposes and as her personal assistant.
The Browning I had issues with was a M-12 20ga grade V, beautiful gun, light weight and pointed and handled naturally. It was without doubt the nicest single shot gun I have every had, despite the fact it held 3 shells. It would fire the first round eject the empty and then jam up the second round. At times it would dump the second round out on the ground. I had bought the gun used off an old fella who just looked at it and had never fired it. At times it worked okay, but usually not. I tried many brands of ammo to no avail. I finally sent it back to Browning in Montreal with a detailed letter of the issues. The gun was gone for over six months without a word. Then it arrived one day by UPS out of the blue with a note saying there was nothing wrong with the gun, but as a good will jester there would be no charge for examining the gun. I felt so honoured by this good will jester....! Well they had done something to it as worked okay for a couple pheasant hunts but it was stiff to pump, not smooth like M-12's are known to be, it then went back to it's old habits. It sat in the vault for many years. Then I took her up to Epps and turned it into a new M-70 Alaskan, as I wasn't wasting anymore time dicking around with Browning.