How a German Sig is made.
- Thread starter loki_81
- Start date
- Location
- West Quebec
Exactly what I was thinking..
Nothing other than some workers get sauerkraut and beer break and some get French (freedom) frys and coke break. Now if they could only offer a non rail version.
OccasionallyOnTarget
CGN frequent flyer
- Location
- Burnaby, BC
This video raised a lot more equestions than it answered.
I was hoping to see a bit on their polymer frame manufacturing process.
The biggest pet peeve I'm always hearing about the US made Sig is their mags, but there's no denying that very high quality of the German made ones!
Everything in the video would almost certainly be exactly the same.
Differences would be in two main areas
small parts - US Sig started using Israeli MIM shops (which then subcontracted the work to even cheaper Indian MIM shops) for small parts
QC - SIG Germany had a three-stage QC process which involved paying an outside company to find flaws. SIG USA does not have anything like that QC process and no longer even test fires guns before shipping. The guns are simply assembled and shipped. IIRC, in Germany, they were partially assembled, inspected, partially assembled further, inspected, had final assembly, then testing, then the guns shipped.
The 226, however, is an extremely robust design which has survived pretty well despite the use of increasingly cheap parts and processes.
The "outside" testing done by Sig in Germany is a European requirement and not something Sig DE does out of the kindness of their heart. My last two Sig's; one manufactured in 2012 and one in 2013, had most certainly been test fired so I'm not sure where you are getting that idea. As for the MIM shop thing how could you possibly know that? I have been to the Exeter plant and they certainly do not give away any trade secrets and only allow very limited areas to tour as they are very protective of their processes.
I don't really care what motivates SIG Germany to carefully QC their pistols...they could be relying on the recommendations of Ronald Reagan's astrologer for all I care. I just care that it gets done and that the pistols work.
I can think of a fair number of examples in which Sig pistols (in two cases not just individual guns but departmental purchases) have been shipped in un-test-fireable condition...therefore a large number of Sigs don't get test fired before shipping anymore. They may have gone back to batch test-firing, though.
As for how I know about the MIM stuff...part of my business is to track that kind of thing. In many cases I have spoken directly to the people involved in production or testing phases of different pistols. In other cases I have collected reports from secondary sources involved in the purchasing phase.
I can think of a fair number of examples in which Sig pistols (in two cases not just individual guns but departmental purchases) have been shipped in un-test-fireable condition...therefore a large number of Sigs don't get test fired before shipping anymore. They may have gone back to batch test-firing, though.
As for how I know about the MIM stuff...part of my business is to track that kind of thing. In many cases I have spoken directly to the people involved in production or testing phases of different pistols. In other cases I have collected reports from secondary sources involved in the purchasing phase.
OccasionallyOnTarget
CGN frequent flyer
- Location
- Burnaby, BC
Like why can't we see the finishing operations and what happens if the de-burring robots become self-aware?
As has been explained it basically comes down to number of inspections and quality control.
If you get a chance to handle a German Sig you'll quickly notice that the frame, barrel, and slide have matching serials and proofmarks. The serials and proofs are what's known to a Sig owner/collector in North America as "triple match" (in Europe they call it "normal"
). This shows you that someone physically inspected and passed all of those parts, which were inspected at different processes during assembly including having all of the small parts attached.German Sig also come with the test target, proving that it was free of manufacturers defect and working as it should when it left the factory.
European proofmark law and German firearm law ensure a higher quality of inspection and sub parts that assemble the pistol.
