The expectations of gun owners are ridiculously high. We have been spoiled by two plus centuries of interchangeable parts and high quality control. Guns are the best example of durable consumer goods. One hundred year old military surplus rifles are invariably as safe as modern firearms. The exceptions are noted and studied, and only very rarely are there the equivalent of a recall order.
Case in point, when the New Zealand range authorities issued a ceasefire for every single Lee Enfield on military ranges on the grounds that there was no reliable way to evaluate safety over an unknown number of shots, it was met by howls of indignation and genuine discussions of what constitutes safe. The Kiwi authorities got roundly beaten up by people who actually did know better, but the regulators 'knew best' and refused to budge. And, people wonder why the New Zealand police haven't collected nearly as many firearms as they'd hoped.
There are tales of unsafe designs, like the Carcanos and Rosses, but these are generally disproved as false engineering reports or just plain bad luck magnified. Likewise there are tales of unbelievable strength with Arisakas, based on a scant few overly exaggerated reports. Few Cold War era recruits hadn't heard that Russian "7.62" would fit the FN C1. Balderdash, but tales persist.
Civilian makers are constantly under pressure to increase margins. I watched a video from the Savage plant and you could count the number of CNC work stations for a receiver on the fingers of one hand. Not the number of steps, but how many times a human put a work piece into a machine. That is a long ways away from the hundreds of set ups, jigs and specialized cutters used to make a Garand receiver.
