TC refuses to do an upgrade

[cynthialee]

I wrote TC for a manual on their recomended loads for thier Hawken and they told me to look it up on line. Not even so much as a link to where I could find said information.
Not exactly what I expected. I expected to be sent the small manual they give out with their rifles.

I was not impressed. I had been told a number of times over the years they always are agreeable to sending such things and stand by their products. I dont believe it is the case any more.

 

[flyfisher76544]

Here ya go Cynthialee, you can go down the list and pick the one ya need.
http://www.tcarms.com/manuals/

Now for the other situation;
Wow, I understand being loyal or a fan of a product that you own...but this is a little extreme. Especially when someone questions a persons honor especially after they stated several times that they would pay for the work being done. Personally if I owned a TC and someone posted this scenario I would start becoming concerned about parts and if possibly they wouldn't cover my warranty in the near future.(i.e. no parts to make the repair) I checked the TC website and they are still making a Hawken rifle, but didn't see the Renegade listed at all.
I had a similar situation just like this a few years back(15 to be exact) with another Company here in the states but I won't mention the name.... :dead: :dead: :dead:

 

[cynthialee]

Thank you. I found the information I needed awhile back. I was just joining in on the bag on T/C bandwagon.
I am mad at them for becoming a second rate buisness with a flawed coustomer service.

 

[Sperit de bois]

Everything,just about is done on line...and you don't have to wait for the mail...
Think about this,,when was the last time anyone wrote you letter,or you called someone and didn't get an answering machine!!!!!!
Got a new computer not to long ago,,,the Owners Manual is in the hard drive,,no printed book!!!!!!!!!!!!
Game cameras out,still no deer,season starting 27 Oct,frost this AM
Have we gotten off the original posting!!!! :dead:

 

[zimmerstutzen]

ebiggs response to my statement that the older TC flinters were POS's.
"I will expect my original, unaltered, TC lock to fail any day now. By the way it has only been working for 20, give or take a few, years now."

Odd the frizzen on my brand spankin new 1978 TC hawken didn't last 50 shots. After a few weeks without a gun to shoot, I got my lock with a new frizzen and it lasted about the same. I half soled the frizzen with clock spring and gave it to my brother. It was a POS. I have half soled at least a half dozen frizzens for older TC flinters. The older guns would not need it if the frizzens had been made from proper steel. I have about a thousand shots on my North Star trade gun. No problem. Same frizzen for many times the life of an older 1970's TC frizzen.

If TC was not concerned with the design and quality of their flint locks, why did they change the configuration?

 

[Greg Blackburn]

Wow,

We really may be left with custom gun makers if we want American made.

If we could each lobby our states to add a 1 week flintlock only season, I wonder if that would help....just a thought.

Greg

 

[ebiggs1]

I do realize you are the authority on POS's. :grin:
And TC locks are among them. But the fact is, you had a ½ dozen or even 12 that failed does not make the entire line a POS. If you only consider the 1000's, no more like tens of thousdands of rifles TC has made, your pitiful sample is meaningless.
I have had to send every L&R lock I have bought, 100%, back to them to get sorted out. But I still don't classify them as a POS. :hmm:
Even if you replaced every frizzen on every lock you owned, that is just one part. The entire lock is a POS? C'mon on! And why can't or why shouldn't a company improve on their design from time to time? Is that not allowed either? :idunno:

I better quite shooting my old original right now because it is bound to fail any day now.

 

[Geraldo]

ebiggs, I don't know if you just like to argue or if you consider yourself the TC apologist. Either way, Zimmer is right about the 1970s and early 1980s TC frizzens. I knew a lot of people who did as Zimmer did, or rehardened them time after time, or replaced the frizzen entirely. I don't know if it was just one batch or a continuous problem, or if it caused the 1990s changes to the cock and frizzen, but the problem was real.

 

[Sperit de bois]

:dead: :dead: :dead: :surrender: :surrender: :surrender: :stir: :stir: :stir:

 

Your second post should have been the end of this discussion about TC. :shake:

Apparently one cannot even pay for an upgrade as I asked. "We don't stock those parts."

As for what to do - If you want a different lock - buy one somewhere else.

Bada Bing, Bada Boom.

 

[Sperit de bois]

They don't stock them,,,,,you ain't getting what they don't have,,,move on,get over it,,,,

 

[Leatherbark]

ebiggs, I don't know if you just like to argue or if you consider yourself the TC apologist. Either way, Zimmer is right about the 1970s and early 1980s TC frizzens. I knew a lot of people who did as Zimmer did, or rehardened them time after time, or replaced the frizzen entirely. I don't know if it was just one batch or a continuous problem, or if it caused the 1990s changes to the cock and frizzen, but the problem was real.

Count me in as a disgruntled T.C Flintlock shooter from the 70's. Rehardend the dirty thing with casenit a dozen times. Learned flintlocks the hard way. But to give T.C credit I never tried an English flint. Always used the T.C.agates. They were good for one or two burning steel embers into the pan.

Today with a deluxe Siler and a sharp flint I can say I have 100% confidence my flintlock is going to fire. Back then it was 50-50. I do think the T.C gun was a whole lot better than the CVA's thats for sure.

Knowing what I know now I could make the T.C work, but back then I struggled and went back to caplocks for 10 years or so before wandering back to flintlocks.

Bob

 

[ebiggs1]

ebiggs, I don't know if you just like to argue or if you consider yourself the TC apologist.

You did read the entire post? :idunno:

 

[Dphar]

I do realize you are the authority on POS's. :grin:
And TC locks are among them. But the fact is, you had a ½ dozen or even 12 that failed does not make the entire line a POS. If you only consider the 1000's, no more like tens of thousdands of rifles TC has made, your pitiful sample is meaningless.
I have had to send every L&R lock I have bought, 100%, back to them to get sorted out. But I still don't classify them as a POS. :hmm:
Even if you replaced every frizzen on every lock you owned, that is just one part. The entire lock is a POS? C'mon on! And why can't or why shouldn't a company improve on their design from time to time? Is that not allowed either? :idunno:

I better quite shooting my old original right now because it is bound to fail any day now.

Why bother to send locks back to people who screwed them up in the first place?

Its far faster for me to fix them myself then they are actually upgraded rather than "fixed".
I use L&R if there is no other option for the job and their #1700 is probably the best pistol lock on the market. But it invariably needs to be reworked at some level and sending it to L&R will not address all the problems since some were inflicted on the lock by L&R changing the original design which was excellent. L&R did this after the initial release of the lock. So the locks now are not what they were before the change. I am not sure that L&R even KNOWS they made a mistake in changing the mold.

Unless things have changed recently the quality control is non-existent.
So I buy them and rework them as needed. This was part of the rework of the last one I used.

Welded the hole, trued the tumbler shaft to remove the casting flash on the bearing surface. Drilled and reamed the hole to size and then the tumbler was square with the other parts and the sear engaged the notches as it should. Reworked the cock, refined the sear engagement, rearched the main and frizzen springs. Polished, fitted it to the stock, engraved it and had the cock and lockplate casehardened in colors.

TC locks were ALWAYS designed to be sold at the lowest possible price and to assembled by people with not more knowledge than "part B goes in this hole in part A and part C goes on top of that".
If they are so great why would L&R have a complete line of replacement locks to these and other cheap MLs?

POS? Since for decades all the assembed locks I bought were essentially assembled kits I expect it. But the cheapo mass produced stuff goes beyond that.
Just because something goes bang most or all the time does not remove it from the POS category. Making "side lock" locks is an art. Its the LITTLE things that often separate a POS from a lock that can be reworked.
In 1832 W. Greener wrote that it took a practiced eye to tell a first quality lock from a 2nd-3rd quality (they went farther down than that and many of these export locks were used here on "American" rifles etc.).
So its not easy for someone with limited experience to tell one from the other. Other than perhaps one or two people who rework locks, like the L&R 1700, into high grade locks there are none available here. Partly because the average ML maker/buyer does not want to pay $250 and up for a lock. So the guy I know of that does this sells most of his locks to Europe.
So our own cheapness inflicts us, in too many cases, with marginal "critical" parts ranging from barrels made of substandard materials to locks that the holes are not even drilled so the parts line up properly.

Dan

 

[Greg Blackburn]

So, I can get a new lock that will fit my TC and be super reliable?

TVM (?) said they could make a stainless steel sideplate, hammer, and pan. Is there a maker that can make me a stainless steel, octagon, muzzleloader barrel with a removable breech plug? (Please no TC suggestions, I don't want QLA, a single trigger, and only .50 caliber).

Greg

 

[ebiggs1]

So, I can get a new lock that will fit my TC and be super reliable?

In spite of what Mr. Phariss says, the "new" style TC lock is reliable as it comes. He and many others may not like that fact but it is a fact.
The only other lock that will fit without modification is the L&R replacement lock. The three that I have bought have all, 100%, had to go back to L&R for "tweaks". Afterwards they work pretty well.
The L&R is not a better lock, it is a different lock with a different feel to it. Some people prefer leaf springs for example.
I currently own six different "brands" of locks.
I use and shoot all six. I only try to report the facts about each.
I don't really care one way or another which lock you decide on but this is what I have personally observed.
Others seem to be agenda driven. :hmm:

 

[Stony]

To be honest, if you have the money, you can get just about anything made the way you want. The problem with most folks is they don't enough money, so they compromise.

 

[BrianL]

It may be that I got special treatment by being a 'local' from NH, but I was able to upgrade my lock last summer with one email requesting the procedure for exchanging my lock, a return email the next day with instructions, $3.00 in postage. I received a form letter acknowledging receipt and saying it would take up to 2 weeks and actually got the new one in 5 working days. This was just last summer, not in the 70's or 80's. It may be that they are indeed out of stock

 

[Greg Blackburn]

Well that's cool man. If I have trouble when I do get to shoot these rifles I'll contact TC again.

Greg

 

[svashtar]

Hi Guys,

First post here, and was going to start a new thread but this is one of the things I wanted to ask about. I just bought a '79 TC Hawken Flintlock in nearly new condition. It had never been fired and the bore and stock are pristine, and it seemed to work fine the other day when I first took it out. My serial # is in the mid 18,000's.

I'm still learning, but found that mounting the new TC flint bevel down and in the new leather placed the flint 1/16th from the frizzen and hit it higher of course, so seemed to give a better spark than mounting it bevel up. I did have two failures to fire, but maybe I didn't put enough 4Fg in the pan on those.

Q: I take it the lock change happened much later than my rifle?

FYI, I've made 3 calls to TC/S&W in the past week: the first time was told they weren't stocking any parts and were going to discontinue the Hawkens.

The second call the guy told me that they were going to discontinue them, but the lifetime warranty would always be in effect and you could always get them fixed and get parts. He said he had never heard of the stock cracking / upgrade.

The third call today another guy told me he had never heard of an "upgraded lock", but that they would always have plenty of replacement parts EXCEPT for stocks and barrels. He said be sure to take care of your stocks and barrels because you could never get another. So 3 different S&W guys, 3 different stories.

(So how do they have stocks and barrels for the new ones they're making now???)

So, final Q: What was the problem with the original locks, do you know? And when did they change them over? Is there a way to tell them apart at a glance? And finally, if you could get a new one could it be self-installed? BUT... maybe I'm looking for a solution to a non-existent problem!? :idunno: I've put a whole 10 rounds through mine, so am hardly an expert, but I'll bet the previous owner probably dry fired the thing a hundred times and it still seems OK. More on that on another thread.

Thanks for any info. I know how irritating the same newb questions can be (I spent a boatload of time and a few thousand posts on Bladeforums back in the day so am familiar with new guys asking the same questions over and over), so tried to research as much as possible before jumping in.

Best regards,

Norm