Marlin 1895 SBL Quality Control??
 

I've been looking at one of these for bear hunting and have been reading about a lot of QC problems since Remington took over production. In fairness, most of the posts about the QC issue are a couple of years old. Does anybody know if the problem(s) have been fixed? Thanks.

CH, back last spring I bought my oldest son a brand new STBL. It's the same gun as an SBL except it has nice walnut & minus the scout mount. In fact it IS an SBL as that's what the barreled action began as & is stamped SBL on the barrel. (I want to say the STBL might've been a special order via one of the big distributors?)

The gun is a "Remlin" & stamped with the REP on the barrel. The gun has been FLAWLESS! A few months later a bought myself a brand new "Remlin" Guidegun. The only flaw in the Ggun required me to polish up the ramp/carrier, the bolt face & especially the extractor claw as the rims on carts were wedging under it when the shells were being loaded into the chamber. Now my lil Ggun is "slick as snake snot on a door knob"! :wink:

Both guns have shoot very well from day 1. Broke both of them in with a box thru each gun of 300grn powderpuffs from Rem & Win. Then sighted my sons STBL in with the 325 Leverevos & the 300 Barnes from Buffalo Bore (& BOY do they HAMMER in the lil Ggun :s12: )

Marlin quality control was on a slippery downhill slope before Remington bought the company. When Marlin was sold to Remington the company was making half the number of rifles it made in the 1970s: Marlin had financial problems for years before the company was sold.

Yep, Marlin still has some QC problems today.

Thanks for the responses guys. after the first 50 or so views with no response, I found a Marlin Stainless GG with the JM barrel stamp. The action and fit seemed pretty smooth but you can only check so much in the store. It's not the SBL that I was looking for but I couldn't find one of those and they were running $869 at the local gun store to place it on a locator wait list. I bought the guide gun and can pick it up next week. Then the fun starts. :s4:

I am kicking myself for not buying the guide gun when I had the chance when you could find them listed on Gunbroker for $350-$400 lightly used prior to being bought by Remington. Now everyone that is selling them are asking inflated prices for them since the quality control issues.

While at SHOT SHOW I picked up the Marlins and obviously these ones were not just picked off the assembly line. They looked like they were all hand fitted and polished internals. I asked the Rep if they all came off the line looking and feeling this good. All he did was smile and say Of course. He did say that yes they had some issues with QC from when they moved the plant and hired new staff to run the equipment but most problems had been sorted out. I will still wait and see before I buy one. Problem is I really want to get my hands on a good 45-70 and Marlin is about the only one out there that has an action strong enough to handle modern +P loads that is reasonably priced.

I love my guide gun. I think if I were to narrow my arsenal down to just one rifle that would probably be the one I would keep. Take the Brownings, Tikkas and Winchesters just leave my Marlin alone. It has done everything I neede of it and is capable of a lot more.