Kimber Quality Control

[Dave L.]

In 2002 I bought a Kimber Eclipse Pro II. For quality and price you couldn't beat it. Because the Eclipse was such a damn good gun, I bought a Warrior in 2005. The Warrior is reliable and accurate but it seems the tolerances of the receiver and slide are not near as tight as the Eclipse. When I wiggle the Warrior in my hand you can feel the slide vibrating on the frame.
Also, the SS barrel on the Warrior looks like sh*t, it pitted with rust within the first month of owning it- the pits are so small I cannot remove the rust. I haven't seen such a poor display of barrel finish on a thousand-dollar gun in my life... At least it shoots straight.

Can someone explain what, if anything happened to Kimber's QC?

I also heard a rumor that Kimber was having parts contracted out to Brazil...and that they are not 100% USA Made anymore.

[Striker5]

I am completely talking out my rear end, but perhaps the tolerances are looser because it is the commercial clone of the Det 1 pistol? Maybe SYSCOM wanted a little more play for use in adverse conditions. That would be my guess.

[Rob96]

When I still had 1911s, I prefered the slight "looseness" of my Colts. My Colts NEVER suffered a stoppage, while 3 different Kimbers (one full size and two different Pro Carry's) suffered many failures to feed no matter what mag used.

[Nathan_Bell]

My Stainless Kimber's finish did the same thing. It is a 17 Mach2 that was having issues with reliablitly. It was sent back and Kimber did make it run correctly, new barrle, bushing, trigger, and hammer. Sadly they left the pitted up slide with it.
It is going to be getting cerakoted soon, as every time I look at it now I get annoyed.



ETA Before shipping it I had spoken to Kimber and described the problem of function and of their SS pitting up, I then attached a note saying the same thing. When I got the gun back with the slide still messed up. I called them again, and the very polite person on the other end of the phone told me that there was no mention of an pitting on any paperwork they had.

[TOrrock]

In my last 3 years in the retail end of the firearms industry, we sent more Kimbers back for warranty work than Springfield or Colt combined.

They got too big too fast I think.

I don't think they're barrels are really stainless.

[DrMark]

I don't think their barrels are really stainless.

I don't either. In fact, I've never heard them described as stainless.

I have one Kimber (pre Seires II), and it's been reliable. I've kept some type of CLP on the barrel, and no rust yet.

[Boris]

Consider the end user for which the Warrior was designed and you could justify looser tolerances. I isn't expected to be a bulls-eye gun . . . I can't speak for QC on their newer guns, but my Series 1 has been extremely reliable and is still pretty tight after tens of thousands of rounds.

My barrel has seen some slight oxidation from sweat due to IWB carry, but a good cleaning has taken that off every time.

[Dave L.]

I also believe Kimber proprietary coating is probably the weakest in the industry. The rail area where I have my X200 attached is almost bare metal. Kimpro II is CRAP.

[Dave L.]

The barrel...even says on their website "steel barrel" and "stainless steel bushing"

http://www.kimberamerica.com/pistols/custom/warrior.php

[Shihan]

I just sent my brand new Derert Warrior back as I had 10 jams on my first 150 rounds during breakin. I used 6 differnt mags and 4 types of ammo and still had problems. For the high price of their guns I think they need to spend more to make sure their products stand up to their "Out Of the Box Reliability" advertisement.


Thanks