Quality Control (QC) in 2024 – Why is it so bad?

As part of testing things for the site, I run through a lot of gear. From holsters, to guns, to parts, to EDC gear like watches. Something that is omnipresent (especially over the last few years) is Quality Control (QC). QC plays a part in everything that is produced, and is essentially the consistency for how things are made. It could be as simple as the uniformity of hot dogs (Costco Glizzy my beloved), or as complex as a Boeing 737 Max’s production. I’ve personally run into a lot of poor QC over the years, with 2024 being the worst year for it yet. What are some of my examples of poor QC, and why do I think it’s happening?

What Does Bad QC Look Like?

Quality Control is very much intertwined with price. The more that we pay for something, the better QC we should expect. Bad QC means poor consistency and/or function.

The goal for modern manufacturing should be that every product that comes off of the assembly line is made to the same degree of quality. Repeatability is the goal, and poor QC means that “identical” products are being made with different tolerances, poor consistency, and possibly don’t work as well as intended.

Two Glock 19s coming off of the same assembly line at the same factory should be nearly the same quality. Same goes for trucks made by Toyota, airplanes made by Boeing, or handguns made by Ruger, when compared to the same model made in the same places at the same times. These things should also work to an acceptable degree.

A product being inconsistent from specimen to specimen is poor QC. A product not working out of the box is also an example of poor QC. Failures due to poor metallurgy, wrong parts, or other issues can be indictive of poor QC, but can also mean bigger issues.

My Personal QC Foible Examples

I’ve had quite a few issues over the last years. I’ll list some of them below, and provide photos when possible.

Way back in 2020, I reviewed the Holosun HM3X magnifier. I bought the optic in 2019, and it had a pretty bad QC problem. Internally, the glass had a black smudge, visible when looking at that optic.

In 2021, I picked up a Holosun 507K for an S&W Shield I had. That optic had a QC defect, in which it could not be zeroed correctly for windage, as the turret ran out of adjustment. I managed to fix it, but it was indicative of the lack of a QC check.

I’ve had plenty of poorly QC’d ammo over the last year and a half. Rimfire has been especially bad, with a lot of .22lr rounds with no primer compound in the rounds, and malformed bullets crammed into cases.

In Spring 2024, I decided to add two Smith & Wesson rimfire J-Frames to my testing regiment. Well, both had QC issues too.

My brand new 351c is missing half of the S&W logo on the left side of the gun. This is a cosmetic issue, but talk about a f*ck up. At least it worked, unlike my 43c.

My brand new 43c had to go right back to the S&W repair center, as it did not function out of box. On top of that, there were a ton of dings and dents inside of the frame, on a brand new gun.  Two months later, and it comes back functioning, but after extensive work to make it do so.

Pivoting a little, I’ve had bad luck with QC on watches this year. The above Momentum Sea Quartz 30 came with a pretty poor bezel action, and a quartz movement that misses every indice with the second hand. Nothing major, but still something that passed QC that likely shouldn’t have.

In April, I purchased a Seiko SNJ025 “Arnie”. However, it would factory reset whenever I took it outside. I sent it back to Seiko, and got it back a month later. However, it was still defective, and still resetting.

After a second time sending it back to Seiko’s repair center, they just ended up sending me a new-old stock watch. It turned out that the late 2022-2023 production Arnies had defective capacitors in the movements, and would reset. I had a flood of messages and comments on my posts & videos about the topic, as the issue was widespread.

These aren’t all of my QC issues, but a selection of some recent, and not-so-recent ones. Why does this happen?

Poor QC: What’s to Blame?

There’s a lot that goes into quality control. However, at the core of it, money is the leading factor. QC requires time, and we all know that time is money. It also requires trained workers, and/or quality machines to be performing good work, and to be doing checks to make sure that QC is being maintained. When the penny pinching starts, QC tends to drop first.

The Boeing 737 mess is a big example of this. In efforts to save some pennies, Boeing has killed people with faulty aircraft, and cost themselves significantly more money than doing it right the first time. This is an extreme example, but an example nonetheless.

We’ve seen the QC of companies like Taurus and Holosun get better over the last few years. Well, this happened because a little more money got put into the labor and tooling of machines at their overseas factories. They’re already using cheap labor, but have been working on making the QC better, with only a slight reflection of those dollars spent being factored into the prices of the end product. Meanwhile, S&W & SIG have had a ton of QC problems, while paying people US standard wages. When the cost-benefit-analysis and keeping the shareholders happy takes precedent over making something that works properly, the QC takes the hit.

Does that mean that everything from a company with middling QC is bad? No, it’s quite the contrary. It means that the consistency will not be there. I’ve handled and owned plenty of modern production S&W guns that were perfect. I’ve also owned plenty that had QC defects from jump. The “lemon rate” goes up with poor QC, and is something to keep in mind. This is why doing your research and being an informed buyer are really important these days.

The Importance of Being and Informed Buyer

In 2024, it is more important than ever to be an informed buyer. This means seeking out information for something that you are looking at, and trying to separate the junk info from the valuable info. A lot of content out there is just advertising, and not truly honest. Paid reviews run abound in 2024, and a lot of them try to hide that. As such, getting info from more than one source is important.

Here at Primer Peak, we’re not bought off. We don’t accept money from companies for reviews, and are honest with what we write. However, I would never tell you to only ever use our website as your only influence when making a purchase. You should be looking for as much information as possible when making a purchase, and casting a wide net to find it. Please keep reading our articles, but also look for more data when making a decision.

Can we avoid poor QC? Well, not really. Some brands tend to have better QC, but lemons still get through the cracks every so often. However, that lemon rate goes down when the QC is better, so we can prime ourselves to avoid QC issues when making a decision, but we cannot ever fully cut them out.

The Verdict

Whether you like it or not QC plays a part in everything you buy. Some companies have better QC, and some are worse. It can always change too, as some companies improve, and others decline. The important thing is to do your research.

Further Reading & Patreon Link

Hey there! QC is an annoying topic to discuss, but it comes up enough that I wanted to talk about it. For articles similar to this one, check out our editorial section.

If you’d like to support me on Patreon, I’ve got the link for that here. Nearly everything that I do on Primer Peak is paid for out of my own pocket, and my content is not shilled or driven by manufacturers or companies. If you decide to donate, I’d really appreciate it, as it would allow for me to continue to bring you quality work.