Shotgun Correspondence

Sent: Tuesday, May 03, 2011 1:53 PM
To: Emedia Rifleman
Subject: Better Editing?

As an NRA member, attentive reader, and firearms enthusiast I was rather insulted by this month's issue of American Rifleman. The age-old "ads on the same page as positive, 'unbiased' reviews" routine (i.e., Rhino write-up on page 88) is to be expected in any gun magazine, but I feel we've had the wool pulled over our eyes a bit too blatantly in another example. How can the trusted editors at your publication call the Remington Versa Max "Shotgun of the Year" in the 2011 Golden Bullseye Awards article when on page 94 of the same issue there is a factory recall on the very same shotgun which states the possibility of property damage, personal injury, or death? Those conflicting messages imply one or both of two things about your staff: they're ignorant, or think their readers are. This type of behavior isn't just misleading-- it's irresponsible. Please consider yourselves caught, and hopefully not just by one avid reader.

Regretfully yours,
Mike Vahsen


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Dear Mr. Vahsen,

Thanks for your note. The voting for the Golden Bullseye award occurred before the recall came out.
We seriously considered rescinding the award, but chose to go forward after long discussions between our staff and Remington.

Essentially, early in production, first several hundred guns, there was a burr on the cartridge carrier that could cause the carrier to hang up on the receiver's interior, thus retarding the forward movement of the bolt. If this occurred, the hammer had already been freed and could travel forward and "follow" the bolt after its movement had been slowed. Our samples did not exhibit this issue.

Essentially, the gun would not fire, then the weight of the bolt would overcome the friction of the burr on the receiver's interior, and then it would fire--not an ideal situation, obviously.

Remington implemented a production fix as soon as it was known and got almost all of the VersaMax guns back before those with this condition entered commerce.

But they didn't get them all, thus the recall. Comparatively, Remington is not a huge advertiser with Rifleman, nor would we play monetary games with NRA member safety.

We judged the problem to be one that was easily corrected and that Remington got out ahead of the issue quickly enough not to merit revocation of the award.

Sincerely,

Mark Keefe

American Rifleman