4 ms·

It's so weird that SIG didn't just mandate a recall on this issue and dealt with it. So many other gun manufacturers had recalls for less serious issues than th

It's so weird that SIG didn't just mandate a recall on this issue and dealt with it. So many other gun manufacturers had recalls for less serious issues than this and just dealt with it. How does SIG somehow deal worse with this situation than fucking taurus? This has got to be some kind of fucking ego trip by someone inside, this kind of response just doesn't make any rational sense otherwise.

andrewmcwatters 1y ago
The reputation cost will be higher than not recalling for sure.
- pensatoio 1y ago
  Their reputation is absolutely shot. It's not just the P320 either, the XM7 and XM5 were also poor choices.
  - andrewmcwatters 1y ago
    Yeah, I had at least a couple of standard issue Sig Sauer civilian equivalents on my wish list, and now I would never buy anything from them ever.
    - shepardrtc 1y ago
      I had a 365 and traded it in. Wasn't even a good pistol, just small and light. Got a S&W CSX and it's fantastic.
    - esseph 1y ago
      P226 P365 are still excellent
      - pensatoio 1y ago
        Love my P365, but I'm not buying another product from Sig after the P320. I can't trust them to make a dangerous tool in a safe and reliable manner.
        esseph 1y ago
        Okay but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIG_Sauer_P226 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIG_Sauer_P226
privatelypublic 1y ago
Most plausible (not asserting correct), is that a recall in such a context of the civilian variant would have been trouble for the military contract.
avidiax 1y ago
> Take the number of vehicles in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one. Assuming that Sig Sauer management is reasonable, we can assume that one or more of these are true: * The known rate of failure B is determined to be low. Consider that not every discharge would be from a design flaw. Many cases can be assumed or proven to be user negligence. * They assume that they can keep the court settlement costs, C, to a low value by never admitting fault and hoping that no one else can convincingly demonstrate a poor design. Many cases result in no injury or non-lethal injury, which naturally reduces C. * The number of guns produced, A, is quite large, so the cost of the recall is also quite large. * The unit cost of the recall (X/A) is much higher than known externally. This is my preferred theory (outside of corporate incompetence & malice). It could be the case that the design has an issue with tolerance stacking AND there is no single dimension of replacement part that resolves the issue. You could imagine that the replacement part needs to take up negative tolerance by being slightly larger, and positive tolerance by being slightly smaller. Without carefully measuring each unit (which is expensive), you can't determine which part to use. Or it could be that the part that would need to be replaced is a substantial part of the weapon's cost, e.g. the slide or the frame.
- jibe 1y ago
  They already did a recall for a much less serious issue, the drop safe recall, so they have proven that they are willing to recall if there is something to fix.
  - bradyd 1y ago
    They didn't actually do a recall for that. Instead it was a "voluntary upgrade" program. That is also not a less serious issue.
- cmcaleer 1y ago
  I always thought that Fight Club quote missed a crucial extra number: D, the cost of brand reputational damage. Maybe best expressed as multiplier <1 on revenue that converges towards 1 over time. Maybe a decade from now this becomes a semi-obscure bit of gun lore and SIG US more or less recovers. But right now? If you’re in the market for a handgun, or any gun for that matter, are you going to touch SIG US’s stuff? Maybe, but there are customers who might just say that they don’t want to take that chance and go with Glock or whoever else. Do those customers come back? Why doesn’t this get brought up at every single bid for a contract SIG US makes from now on? It’s possible that they’re still making the right EV call of course, but the medium-term hit they’re taking from a flaw like this that you don’t make right has to be massive.
Edman274 1y ago
It may shock you to learn that the top level executives of arms manufacturers have a somewhat different attitude towards human life and protecting revenue than you or I do. Such a person may be puzzled by the outrage and actually lack the insight to understand that a single accidental death because of the flawed design would be enough to imperil contracts, because the ratio of intentional fatalities to accidental fatalities is still like 100000 to 1.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
michaelt 1y ago
> It's so weird that SIG didn't just mandate a recall on this issue and dealt with it. I wouldn't be surprised if gun companies get a constant stream of fake complaints. I didn't have access to guns when I was a 17-year-old, but if I had I'd certainly have tried twirling them like a movie cowboy. And if I accidentally shot myself while doing that, I certainly wouldn't tell my parents what I was doing at the time, that would make me look like a total dumbass, completely irresponsible. I'd say it went off while I was putting it into my holster, or something. Then my parents would have complained to the gunmaker, repeating my cover story, and the gunmaker would find it impossible to reproduce or fix. Perhaps gunmakers don't always realise when they're getting legitimate complaints, because they get so many 'creative' complaints?
- lenerdenator 1y ago
  If you go to most gunmaker websites often enough, you'll eventually see at least one safety recall notice banner or something similar. Ruger had one for the SR22 not too long ago. It's a .22 handgun that is more-or-less a range toy. A cool range toy, but a range toy. There was some sort of dead trigger problem that could pose a safety issue. Did Ruger deny it at every turn? No, they put out a notice and offered to fix the firearm free of charge. Now compare that with how Sig's handled the P320, which is a service pistol and used daily in life-or-death situations. If you make new-design firearms in any real volume, you will find yourself issuing recalls. Batches of parts get out of spec, things wear out, and you get reports that it can become dangerous. The good gunmakers stand behind their product.
  - lupusreal 1y ago
    .22 handguns are extremely popular personal defense weapons. Nobody with sense would say they're great at it, but they are nonetheless extremely popular in that role.
    - SoftTalker 1y ago
      If you're in a situation where a gun would help you, a .22 is better than nothing. I mean, I certainly would not want to get shot with a .22.
jibe 1y ago
That assumes there is an issue to fix. No one has identified an issue that would cause the gun to fire without actuating the trigger. There was a recent huge thread on HN around the Air Force incident, we now know the guy was playing with the gun, shot and killed someone, then lied about it going off sitting on the table. If there was some defect that Sig could fix via recall, they would be stupid not to recall. Maybe there is just nothing to fix, and they aren’t stupid.
- wl 1y ago
  It's hard to tell what people are talking about when they talk about problems with the P320. The documents in question here deal with, among other things, the drop safety problem rather than uncommanded discharges you're talking about. If we're talking about the drop safety issue, it does make sense to ask why they didn't issue a recall instead of their not-a-recall "voluntary upgrade."
  - jibe 1y ago
    Thanks for the correction, Sig did call it a voluntary upgrade, not a recall. The do have other actual recalls, like on the Sig Cross rifle, so they are willing to do it when there is an issue that calls for it. https://www.sigsauer.com/blog/safety-recall-notice-sig-sauer-cross-bolt-action-rifle https://www.sigsauer.com/blog/safety-recall-notice-sig-sauer... They would have been in a better spot today to defend the P320 if they had made it a mandatory recall, so they probably should have done it.

andrewmcwatters 1y ago

The reputation cost will be higher than not recalling for sure.

pensatoio 1y ago
Their reputation is absolutely shot. It's not just the P320 either, the XM7 and XM5 were also poor choices.
- andrewmcwatters 1y ago
  Yeah, I had at least a couple of standard issue Sig Sauer civilian equivalents on my wish list, and now I would never buy anything from them ever.
  - shepardrtc 1y ago
    I had a 365 and traded it in. Wasn't even a good pistol, just small and light. Got a S&W CSX and it's fantastic.
  - esseph 1y ago
    P226 P365 are still excellent
    - pensatoio 1y ago
      Love my P365, but I'm not buying another product from Sig after the P320. I can't trust them to make a dangerous tool in a safe and reliable manner.
      - esseph 1y ago
        Okay but https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIG_Sauer_P226 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SIG_Sauer_P226

privatelypublic 1y ago

Most plausible (not asserting correct), is that a recall in such a context of the civilian variant would have been trouble for the military contract.

avidiax 1y ago

> Take the number of vehicles in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one. Assuming that Sig Sauer management is reasonable, we can assume that one or more of these are true: * The known rate of failure B is determined to be low. Consider that not every discharge would be from a design flaw. Many cases can be assumed or proven to be user negligence. * They assume that they can keep the court settlement costs, C, to a low value by never admitting fault and hoping that no one else can convincingly demonstrate a poor design. Many cases result in no injury or non-lethal injury, which naturally reduces C. * The number of guns produced, A, is quite large, so the cost of the recall is also quite large. * The unit cost of the recall (X/A) is much higher than known externally. This is my preferred theory (outside of corporate incompetence & malice). It could be the case that the design has an issue with tolerance stacking AND there is no single dimension of replacement part that resolves the issue. You could imagine that the replacement part needs to take up negative tolerance by being slightly larger, and positive tolerance by being slightly smaller. Without carefully measuring each unit (which is expensive), you can't determine which part to use. Or it could be that the part that would need to be replaced is a substantial part of the weapon's cost, e.g. the slide or the frame.

jibe 1y ago
They already did a recall for a much less serious issue, the drop safe recall, so they have proven that they are willing to recall if there is something to fix.
- bradyd 1y ago
  They didn't actually do a recall for that. Instead it was a "voluntary upgrade" program. That is also not a less serious issue.
cmcaleer 1y ago
I always thought that Fight Club quote missed a crucial extra number: D, the cost of brand reputational damage. Maybe best expressed as multiplier <1 on revenue that converges towards 1 over time. Maybe a decade from now this becomes a semi-obscure bit of gun lore and SIG US more or less recovers. But right now? If you’re in the market for a handgun, or any gun for that matter, are you going to touch SIG US’s stuff? Maybe, but there are customers who might just say that they don’t want to take that chance and go with Glock or whoever else. Do those customers come back? Why doesn’t this get brought up at every single bid for a contract SIG US makes from now on? It’s possible that they’re still making the right EV call of course, but the medium-term hit they’re taking from a flaw like this that you don’t make right has to be massive.

Edman274 1y ago

It may shock you to learn that the top level executives of arms manufacturers have a somewhat different attitude towards human life and protecting revenue than you or I do. Such a person may be puzzled by the outrage and actually lack the insight to understand that a single accidental death because of the flawed design would be enough to imperil contracts, because the ratio of intentional fatalities to accidental fatalities is still like 100000 to 1.

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]

michaelt 1y ago

> It's so weird that SIG didn't just mandate a recall on this issue and dealt with it. I wouldn't be surprised if gun companies get a constant stream of fake complaints. I didn't have access to guns when I was a 17-year-old, but if I had I'd certainly have tried twirling them like a movie cowboy. And if I accidentally shot myself while doing that, I certainly wouldn't tell my parents what I was doing at the time, that would make me look like a total dumbass, completely irresponsible. I'd say it went off while I was putting it into my holster, or something. Then my parents would have complained to the gunmaker, repeating my cover story, and the gunmaker would find it impossible to reproduce or fix. Perhaps gunmakers don't always realise when they're getting legitimate complaints, because they get so many 'creative' complaints?

lenerdenator 1y ago
If you go to most gunmaker websites often enough, you'll eventually see at least one safety recall notice banner or something similar. Ruger had one for the SR22 not too long ago. It's a .22 handgun that is more-or-less a range toy. A cool range toy, but a range toy. There was some sort of dead trigger problem that could pose a safety issue. Did Ruger deny it at every turn? No, they put out a notice and offered to fix the firearm free of charge. Now compare that with how Sig's handled the P320, which is a service pistol and used daily in life-or-death situations. If you make new-design firearms in any real volume, you will find yourself issuing recalls. Batches of parts get out of spec, things wear out, and you get reports that it can become dangerous. The good gunmakers stand behind their product.
- lupusreal 1y ago
  .22 handguns are extremely popular personal defense weapons. Nobody with sense would say they're great at it, but they are nonetheless extremely popular in that role.
  - SoftTalker 1y ago
    If you're in a situation where a gun would help you, a .22 is better than nothing. I mean, I certainly would not want to get shot with a .22.

jibe 1y ago

That assumes there is an issue to fix. No one has identified an issue that would cause the gun to fire without actuating the trigger. There was a recent huge thread on HN around the Air Force incident, we now know the guy was playing with the gun, shot and killed someone, then lied about it going off sitting on the table. If there was some defect that Sig could fix via recall, they would be stupid not to recall. Maybe there is just nothing to fix, and they aren’t stupid.

wl 1y ago
It's hard to tell what people are talking about when they talk about problems with the P320. The documents in question here deal with, among other things, the drop safety problem rather than uncommanded discharges you're talking about. If we're talking about the drop safety issue, it does make sense to ask why they didn't issue a recall instead of their not-a-recall "voluntary upgrade."
- jibe 1y ago
  Thanks for the correction, Sig did call it a voluntary upgrade, not a recall. The do have other actual recalls, like on the Sig Cross rifle, so they are willing to do it when there is an issue that calls for it. https://www.sigsauer.com/blog/safety-recall-notice-sig-sauer-cross-bolt-action-rifle https://www.sigsauer.com/blog/safety-recall-notice-sig-sauer... They would have been in a better spot today to defend the P320 if they had made it a mandatory recall, so they probably should have done it.