Heartbreak Hotel

[doghawg]

Yes, I need a room at the hotel. I have a .44 Mag Henry single that had a couple trips back to Rice Lake for the terrible trigger and hammer pull. After the recall it's just fine and I'm happy with it. My recent production .357 has been a real joy right from the start. So I had to push my luck. Three decades of prairie dog trips had left a quite an inventory of odds and ends and partial boxes of j-words that are gathering dust so I ordered a H015-223. The plan was to use it as a plinker and maybe to experiment with cast. The gun showed up today and wood was nice and the trigger pull light and crisp. My elation didn't last long though. The stock had two nasty cracks by the tang. The box was in good condition so it wasn't shipping damage. I can't believe the assembler didn't see this and how it ever got past the Jan 26, 2022 inspection. FFL said he has had good luck with Henry service and is going to ask them to send a replacement butt stock. We shall see.

[sharps4590]

I guess I'm just old and have owned and handled too many German and British single shot rifles and '86 and '92 Winchester's to get very excited about Henry. They just feel....not right. Lots like 'em and that's a good thing but, I don't think I could ever buy one.

[georgerkahn]

Yes, I need a room at the hotel. I have a .44 Mag Henry single that had a couple trips back to Rice Lake for the terrible trigger and hammer pull. After the recall it's just fine and I'm happy with it. My recent production .357 has been a real joy right from the start. So I had to push my luck. Three decades of prairie dog trips had left a quite an inventory of odds and ends and partial boxes of j-words that are gathering dust so I ordered a H015-223. The plan was to use it as a plinker and maybe to experiment with cast. The gun showed up today and wood was nice and the trigger pull light and crisp. My elation didn't last long though. The stock had two nasty cracks by the tang. The box was in good condition so it wasn't shipping damage. I can't believe the assembler didn't see this and how it ever got past the Jan 26, 2022 inspection. FFL said he has had good luck with Henry service and is going to ask them to send a replacement butt stock. We shall see.

My dealings with Henry (corp :)) were back when they were fledgling in Brooklyn, New York! I bought a .22 which came with a side-bent lever. In addition to gratis repair, I got a personal (computer generated, I am sure... but the thought was great) letter from Anthony Imperato and a gift of a Henry gun sock plus a few other goodies. (This was at the time you could, too, call and speak with Mike Dillon ;)) (Times have :( changed)
Anyhoos -- my experience with Henry was in fact one of my -- if not "THE" -- best repair experiences I've ever had!
Re your tang cracks, just a hunch is that they were assembled sans any, but the furniture was perhaps under a bit of tension. Most sadly, in today's warehousing snafu practices, it may have been subjected to tremendous temperature storage changes... enough to cause the cracks. Bion, I had similar cracks on a rifle a few years back, and this is what I was told.
Best wishes!
geo

[ScrapMetal]

I wouldn't blame Henry for that damage could have easily happened in shipping (getting repense from Henry will be a lot easier than getting if from FedEx though). That long box can be "bent" or stepped on or had something dropped on it just enough to do damage without leaving a lot of marks on the box. Dealt with it before myself.

Sad to see that though. Hope it gets fixed quickly for you.

-Ron

[MrWolf]

I guess I'm just old and have owned and handled too many German and British single shot rifles and '86 and '92 Winchester's to get very excited about Henry. They just feel....not right. Lots like 'em and that's a good thing but, I don't think I could ever buy one.

I feel the same way. Henry's are only OK, they just don't fit me right. Kinda like a Glock, they dont feel right either.

[hc18flyer]

Two years ago I sent my Henry single shot back for the recall. While it was there they found a crack in the butt stock and replaced it. They sent the original back too! I have had excellent experience with Henry! hc18flyer

[sharps4590]

I'd be very inclined to agree with george and scrap. My recent experience with Fed-Ex has not been good.

[NSB]

I received an 1885 one time and the box wasn’t damaged, but the stock was cracked at the wrist. The company sent me a return label and I sent it back and got a new gun. They told me that a break/crack in the wrist area is the most common type of damage report they get. You can flex the box enough to crack it without damaging the box.

[John Taylor]

Fedex broke a very expensive stock several years back. The rifle was double boxed and had some kind of mark across the box where the stock was broken. They said is was not boxed properly. UPS delivered an empty box that had been tapped closed, should have had an 1892 Winchester in it. USPS tore a box in half and delivered half. The part that was missing had the action for a Winchester 52 sporter.

[NSB]

Ever notice that every single shipper denies it was their fault? Got to wonder why you even bother with insurance. They don’t want to pay the claims.

[doghawg]

I really don't think it was shipping damage but am often wrong. The box was in pristine condition.

[dverna]

I really don't think it was shipping damage but am often wrong. The box was in pristine condition.

With an attitude like that, your wife has little to complain about...lol

[marlinman93]

If it was inspected on Jan. 26, 2022 I doubt the damage was caused by storage in a warehouse. Can't imagine it even spent any time in storage if it's in your hands just over a month later?
I do think it's possible the through bolt might have been over tightened, and the crack didn't appear until after it was inspected though. It's not unusual for a stock using a through bolt to crack from being tightened to much, and it wont usually happen at the time it was assembled. So could easily have cracked days, or weeks after inspection.

[dverna]

I learned my lesson when I shipped a M70 and it arrived with a broken stock. It was a laminated stock too!

When I ship a long gun now. I either put it in a cheap hard case or if the buyer wants the factory box, I put a few pieces of pallet deck boards top and bottom before over wrapping.

[missionary5155]

The extra wood liners are the key. I have received a box with wood liners that clearly showed the lugged sole of a boot marked on the box. USPS was the offender. Happily the rifle survived.

[doghawg]

UPDATE.....I guess I may have underestimated Henry's customer service. I just spoke with Stacey and explained the situation to her. They are sending me a new stock. AND...after closer examination of the box I can see where the hammer was almost poking through the side of the box. Whether that caused the crack or if there was some over tightening of the stock bolt plus the shock the box took I'll never know.

EDIT to add...Everyone has their own preferences but I think the little blued Henry singles are elegant rascals. Maybe it's because the break action single takes me back many years to being a farm boy and wandering the area woods with that old Iver Johnson.

[osage]

Nice to hear they responded so quickly. Hopefully the replacement is well packaged.

[sharps4590]

One or some baboons who work for Fed-Ex hit a box hard enough to split the head of the stock and pop one side out of the mortise on a $3500.00 Merkel O/U double rifle. The box was severely creased on both sides where the break was and the end was CUT open. It looked as if someone had tried to get the rifle out of the box. Much to the credit of the seller/shipper it was packed so tight it wouldn't "sling" out. I had to cut the box from around the rifle. I told the seller, thanked him and contacted my gunsmith. He repaired the stock with a cross bolt that looks factory and I just paid for it. I think it was $75 or $85. I had experienced Fed-Ex's insurance claims before and knew it would come to a urinating match and I'd lose anyway. Sooo.. I just will not use them and encourage anyone else to not use them. I'd bet $1,000.00 it happened in the Kansas City facility. Lots of stuff goes into that black hole never to emerge.

[john.k]

It pretty certain that anti gun fanatics work in these places ,and try to bust guns..........fella here had a costly English double rifle run over by a forklift at an airport baggage facility....The union that covers baggage handlers also has truck drivers and refuellers....so is just about untouchable.

[marlinman93]

The extra wood liners are the key. I have received a box with wood liners that clearly showed the lugged sole of a boot marked on the box. USPS was the offender. Happily the rifle survived.

The real key is to never ship a long gun with the stock attached to the barreled action! I always demand sellers split them and send them well packed together. This way the stock never gets broken, and the shipping cost is cheaper because the overall length is shorter too.
Never had a broken stock since I started doing it this way. But back about a decade ago I sent two single shots to a buyer in Va. and FedEx broke both stocks, even packed each in their own cases! I built packing crates of wood for each gun, with all the sides and bottom glued and screwed together. Then I packed the guns inside with foam rubber, and bubble wrap. Screwed the lids on, and felt they could run over them with a small truck and not hurt them. I also slipped each in a cheap woven sleeve I happened to have. Buyer told me when he received the two guns both stocks were hanging out the ends of the boxes like they'd been tossing the boxes like javelins! Neither broken badly, and he didn't want to mess with a claim, so he fixed them and just forgot about it. Never used FedEx since, and never will again.

[Jack Stanley]

Talking about black hole of shipping ......... the Detroilet USPS facility comes to mind .

Jack

[popper]

Wait till you get a 'return' crate that had fallen off a train and run over by the train - shipper claimed no shipping damage.

[fiberoptik]

Had a box of books delivered from overseas. It shows up with 1 side ripped wide open and missing 1/2 the books. Uninsured of course.

Muzzleloader arrived with the end ripped open and most of the balls rolled away. Back sight fell out when I pulled out the rifle.
Black rubber tracks across the boxes.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[marlinman93]

I got a shipment of Lyman #2 via UPS that was dropped on my porch. When I heard the truck I stepped out to see if my package was here and the driver was running to his truck, and sped off. Picked up the box and it was empty, with a hole in one corner. I'm sure there were bars of #2 in numerous UPS trucks and conveyors as it moved from Rotometals to my door.

[atr]

When I ship rifles I build a wooden box for shipping, not cardboard. Yes it adds to the weight and cost but that small price to pay is better than having the shipment damaged.
the best cardboard shipping box I have seen came from Savage, it was a heavy cardboard box within a cardboard box.
I hope Henry does right by you
atr

[marlinman93]

When I ship rifles I build a wooden box for shipping, not cardboard. Yes it adds to the weight and cost but that small price to pay is better than having the shipment damaged.
the best cardboard shipping box I have seen came from Savage, it was a heavy cardboard box within a cardboard box.
I hope Henry does right by you
atr

Even wooden crates, well built wont stop these goons. Read my post earlier of how FedEx destroyed two glued, screwed and well built shipping crates with guns I shipped.

[Jedman]

Just since early 2020 when Covid screwed things up, USPS has lost 3 items for me. One was a single shot receiver shipped in a flat rate box from a friend that lives in my state so it didn’t need to go through a FFL.
One was a chamber reamer I bought on eBay, and one was a set of rifle sights I sent someone in a small box.
Even though they all had tracking numbers they were shipped uninsured and USPS refused to do anything about them. I filed lost package claims and called and bugged them many times but they say they are just the courier and have no responsibility for lost items.
Being I hear the same kind of troubles with UPS and FedEx what do you do to ship something and not have to take a loss when it’s not your fault ?

Jedman

[marlinman93]

Just since early 2020 when Covid screwed things up, USPS has lost 3 items for me. One was a single shot receiver shipped in a flat rate box from a friend that lives in my state so it didn’t need to go through a FFL.
One was a chamber reamer I bought on eBay, and one was a set of rifle sights I sent someone in a small box.
Even though they all had tracking numbers they were shipped uninsured and USPS refused to do anything about them. I filed lost package claims and called and bugged them many times but they say they are just the courier and have no responsibility for lost items.
Being I hear the same kind of troubles with UPS and FedEx what do you do to ship something and not have to take a loss when it’s not your fault ?

Jedman

They're full of crap. All flat rate boxes automatically have insurance on them. Might not cover the total value, but they start at minimum $50, and up. So they have to pay the minimum if your parts were worth more.

[sd5782]

Retired from 42 years at UPS. Yes, people can get careless, but 90% of the damaged stuff is from the machinery. Imagine a conveyer belt 50 yards long and loaded with packages, and then something creates a jam. All the weight of the packages behind it are forced into the front packages. Long boxes aren’t good. Separate action from stocks. The advice here on packaging are good. Packages can fall 15 feet from belts and chutes. The equipment can cause more damage than a person. It is just how the system is designed. Square, regular shaped boxes work best. Long and skinny, watch out. The workers don’t really touch the packages too much at all, and wouldn’t have much knowledge of the contents, or even much interest in abusing them as that would mean more work on an otherwise physical job. Good packaging is the best insurance, and separate the action from the stock.

[marlinman93]

The workers don’t really touch the packages too much at all, and wouldn’t have much knowledge of the contents, or even much interest in abusing them as that would mean more work on an otherwise physical job. Good packaging is the best insurance, and separate the action from the stock.

Considering the boot prints I've found on boxes delivered to me or to guys I sent to, I'm sure handlers didn't "touch" them with their hands either. More like they jumped up and down on them.

[doghawg]

I'm unable to detect any movement in the wrist of the stock and it's a .223 so the Henry is going to the range tomorrow. I dabbed some Old English dark furniture polish on the cracks and an old Japanese made Nikon 4X on a Henry rail. The replacement stock hasn't arrived yet.

A friend of mine is awaiting shipment on a rifle and his ffl told him they've had a rash of shipping damage lately on rifles.

[sharps4590]

Boy..."elegant" is hardly the description that comes to my mind on 98% of American made, break open single shot rifles or shotguns. Serviceable, iconic, blue collar, nostalgic, you betcha but, elegant? no.

[sd5782]

Marlinman, my post wasn’t to exonerate the workers at ups or fedex for that matter. I have received packages with boot prints also. Workers are careless for sure, and the quality of the part time help has gotten much worse over the years.

I was trying to point out that the equipment can probably do more damage to packages than a human can in most instances. A longer box can and does invite much worse stresses as it passes through the system.

Running the system full and fast is a cost/profit business decision. Right or wrong , that is how it is. Some things I would never ship through ups, and I would certainly keep my fingers crossed if having one delivered. I am actually surprised with all shippers that stuff I have received has been pretty good, but I am not getting volumes of stuff.

That brings me back to packaging. Pack for the worst. Most times things can flow smoothly, but if things get jammed up, it is quite often an odd shaped package that takes the massive forces of the packages behind it.

You don’t see the worst stuff because that is repackaged and returned or dealt with as undeliverable. Much of this stuff was sturdier than guns and still destroyed. I’m just explaining how the system works. The best insurance is good packaging with the stock separated, and then a prayer that your package travels smoothly through the system.

[marlinman93]

My local UPS tries to rip me off every chance they get. I ordered some auto parts for a hotrod I was building recently, and accidentally ordered the wrong bolt pattern for disc brake rotors. Seller said they'd take them back, but I had to pay return shipping. Since they came UPS I printed out return labels, and stuck them on the same boxes they came in. When I got to the UPS outlet the girl tells me the total for shipping and insurance, but then tells me they wont pay if there's damage, unless they do the packaging!
I looked at her and asked why they accepted these parts in this packaging insured, and shipped to me, but now wont let me ship them back without paying her blackmail to repackage them? She simply said, "Well we will make an exception this time."

[sd5782]

Once again not trying to make excuses. Lots of stuff like that goes on. One thing that people seldom know is that those UPS stores are private contractors and not ups employees. They ship exclusively with ups and use the name but are not ups run in any way. UPS is expensive, but they are way more as that is how they make their money along with packaging and boxes and such.

My purpose is not to argue or even to defend ups, but just to get the info out there for others so they can make their own informed decisions. UPS doesn’t really want the walk-in small guy kind of business as it is low profit or even a money loser. They want bulk supplier to business sort of stuff. Pick up 100 boxes at one place and deliver 10-20 to a business. I usually ship post office.

[doghawg]

Boy..."elegant" is hardly the description that comes to my mind on 98% of American made, break open single shot rifles or shotguns. Serviceable, iconic, blue collar, nostalgic, you betcha but, elegant? no.

Well, I guess we're all made a little different. Along with the adjectives you listed I would have to add....accurate. After dialing in the old 4X Nikon at 50 yards I went to our 200 yard swinger and ran 30 rounds of old prairie dog loads through the Henry. The dark spot on the freshly painted swinger was about the size of a tennis ball. My rest was hastily improvised and the wind was raw and nasty so it would appear the cracks in the stock hasn't affected accuracy. I'm not sure whether or not the cracked stock is going to get pulled when the replacement arrives.

It's got a nice crisp trigger pull at just under 4 lbs. and really nice figure in the wood. For a little break action single shot to perform like this and for a gun in this price range I'll stick with elegant. :smile:

[sharps4590]

dog, if I ever read of one that wasn't at least "accurate enough", I don't remember it. Most I've read of were quite accurate, as you say, for the cost. I am impressed by that. It is rather amazing to me, that today an inexpensive rifle can be as accurate out of the box as what we labored to achieve from them 50 years ago. And of course we're all made different. It would be pretty boring if we weren't, huh.

[marlinman93]

If you decide to keep the cracked stock on it and use it, I'd suggest taping off the area around the cracks and then saturate the cracks with super glue until it wont soak in anymore. Wipe off any excess on the surface, and use a Q Tip to touch up any lines with stain.
Then you can save the replacement stock for future, should you ever decide to swap it on the rifle.

[doghawg]

sharps. I've got several custom built dogging rifles with trued Rem 700 actions, after market barrels, Timney triggers, and they shoot very well. I've also got a couple of box stock Tikka's that will shoot right alongside the expensive customs so I agree with your comment.

marlinman. Thanks for the suggestion. I've already dabbed some Old English scratch cover on the cracks and they really aren't very noticeable anymore. When and if the stock gets pulled I'll use your idea. There is absolutely zero stock movement right now and on a .223 the stock will probably be intact long after I've split. Thanks again.

[doghawg]

Update...Got this replacement stock in the mail from Henry the other day. They've been a first class company in my dealings with them!

[barnabus]

I guess I'm just old and have owned and handled too many German and British single shot rifles and '86 and '92 Winchester's to get very excited about Henry. They just feel....not right. Lots like 'em and that's a good thing but, I don't think I could ever buy one.

agree with you.they remind me of a bad copy of something????

[sharps4590]

Update...Got this replacement stock in the mail from Henry the other day. They've been a first class company in my dealings with them!

That speaks volumes.

[uscra112]

Back on shipping disasters. Being a Stevens single-shot collector, I always demand that a seller separate the barrel, which is easy since they're a takedown design. No troubles there. But I recently bought a Model 416 bolter on-line. Seller didn't separate the barreled action from the stock, just wrapped it loosely in brown paper and stuffed it into a box. Arrived with the (rare, original) Lyman receiver sight hanging out through a hole in the cardboard. Heart nearly stopped right there at the FFL's counter when I saw it, but miraculously no actual damage. Can't blame USPS for that one.

If a long gun is particularly valuable, (not often, I tend to buy orphans), I'll happily pay for a hard-shell case for it. Penny wise pound foolish not to.

Lead. When I do buy I get it from ZIP Metals near Cleveland, because they're within driving distance. Won't risk shipping. And my last-mile drivers have enough to cope with, what with me being out in the boonies.