Anyone have recent experience with Bear Creek?

[titsonritz]

27 people taken into custody by ICE agents during raid at Sanford manufacturing company

Approximately 30 people were taken into custody by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement at a manufacturing company in Sanford Tuesday morning.

abc11.com

Not a big fan of their employment practices but it explains the trash QC

Zero surprise.

 

[64MercurysRule]

Illegals could have been using stolen SS numbers .........

 

[lucusloc]

I have said this in other threads, but I'll try to summarize here;

I consider BCA an "advanced" supplier for people who know what they are doing. I do not recommend them for people new to firearms for a few reasons we will cover, but they are fine for more experienced owners who knows how to diagnose any issues they may have. The main points to know about BCA are

• They offer lots of variety and options for a reasonable to cheap price. They often offer parts, combinations or configurations that can be found nowhere else.
• QC is all over the place. Sometimes the parts are perfect, sometimes they look like factory rejects that got forgotten about in the back lot for a few years.
• Customer service is also all over the place. Sometimes you call in and suggest you have a problem and they have a whole new part in the mail to you by the end of the call, sometimes they want you to send them a CAT scan of the part and prove there is a defect before the will even take your calls again.

This means you have to know what to look for when you order from them as well as how to work the system to get the support you need. You must be able to test and diagnose problems to ensure you are getting what you paid for, and you really need to be willing to accept you are part of the QC team as part of the cost of getting such a good deal. If you do not feel qualified or even just inclined to do that, skip buying from BCA.

I buy from BCA all the time, but a.) I like working on firearms and b.) if I have a problem I don't even start the process with customer service until I have a document written up that clearly shows why it it their problem and what I expect them to do about it. I find this short-circuits their remediation process and gets me a solution by the second or third email at worst. Usually I get a resolution after my initial complaint.

Don't give them an option to pass the issue off to you with a vague complaint of "It doesn't work!". I have seen people do that and they got the CS guy who effectively told them they didn't know how to properly load a firearm. I had to step in, help them document the entire failure, argue that yes indeed this was the original problem we were complaining about and only then get them to begrudgingly admit that it did actually look like a QC issue they should be responsible for. If you start by making them guess what the problem might be you have a 50/50 chance of getting told to go pound sand.

But once you do have parts that work out of the box I find that they are perfectly reliable for the life of the gun. I have zero issues with all my fully QC'd BCA parts.

If you can do all that then BCA is a great way to get cheap and interesting stuff that would either command a hight premium elsewhere or is simply unavailable. Recommended only for those who know what they are getting themselves into.

 

[kmk1012]

Maybe the "snobs" just know something you do not.

Quite possible, most likely true as well. How far back did you need to go to get that one?

 

[MTmountainhunt]

I have said this in other threads, but I'll try to summarize here;

I consider BCA an "advanced" supplier for people who know what they are doing. I do not recommend them for people new to firearms for a few reasons we will cover, but they are fine for more experienced owners who knows how to diagnose any issues they may have. The main points to know about BCA are

• They offer lots of variety and options for a reasonable to cheap price. They often offer parts, combinations or configurations that can be found nowhere else.
• QC is all over the place. Sometimes the parts are perfect, sometimes they look like factory rejects that got forgotten about in the back lot for a few years.
• Customer service is also all over the place. Sometimes you call in and suggest you have a problem and they have a whole new part in the mail to you by the end of the call, sometimes they want you to send them a CAT scan of the part and prove there is a defect before the will even take your calls again.

This means you have to know what to look for when you order from them as well as how to work the system to get the support you need. You must be able to test and diagnose problems to ensure you are getting what you paid for, and you really need to be willing to accept you are part of the QC team as part of the cost of getting such a good deal. If you do not feel qualified or even just inclined to do that, skip buying from BCA.

I buy from BCA all the time, but a.) I like working on firearms and b.) if I have a problem I don't even start the process with customer service until I have a document written up that clearly shows why it it their problem and what I expect them to do about it. I find this short-circuits their remediation process and gets me a solution by the second or third email at worst. Usually I get a resolution after my initial complaint.

Don't give them an option to pass the issue off to you with a vague complaint of "It doesn't work!". I have seen people do that and they got the CS guy who effectively told them they didn't know how to properly load a firearm. I had to step in, help them document the entire failure, argue that yes indeed this was the original problem we were complaining about and only then get them to begrudgingly admit that it did actually look like a QC issue they should be responsible for. If you start by making them guess what the problem might be you have a 50/50 chance of getting told to go pound sand.

But once you do have parts that work out of the box I find that they are perfectly reliable for the life of the gun. I have zero issues with all my fully QC'd BCA parts.

If you can do all that then BCA is a great way to get cheap and interesting stuff that would either command a hight premium elsewhere or is simply unavailable. Recommended only for those who know what they are getting themselves into.

Good feedback. I've been on the fence about BCA. leaning away based on what you've shared.

 

[lucusloc]

Good feedback. I've been on the fence about BCA. leaning away based on what you've shared.

Yeah, they are certainly not for everyone, and I think a lot of people get frustrated because they are not fully prepared for what they can expect from the company. BCA certainly can produce good parts, they just don't always do that. On top of that their QC and customer service are really reflected in the price too. I.E. they have no consistency their either. If you don't want to be part of the QC team then really the best option is to go elsewhere and pay more. QC is not free, and those costs have to be covered by someone. You either pay for it or spend your own time doing it yourself.

But if you do know what to expect and are willing to spend time instead of money, BCA really does make some great stuff. And if you look at it from an aspiring gunsmith's perspective, the forced QC training is actually valuable in itself . At least they are really good at making things right after you have proved that it is their problem (And sometimes they even do that without making you have to prove it!). The handful of times I have had to QC a bad part I got a full replacement assembly, not just a replacement for the part in question. And they sent the part before receiving the RMA part, so wasted time was minimized (apart from the whole "document the whole problem yourself" bit, of course). There are nuggets of really good service in there, once you know where to look.

But really that is my biggest complaint about BCA. I can understand the lack of QC due to price cutting (which they very obviously pass on to their customers; they have some of the best prices for certain sub-assemblies on the market). I just wish the customer service team had some kind of consistency. That does not seem like it would be too much of an added cost, just a memo sent out that everyone needs to be on the same page with regards to CS goals, not set their own agenda and requirements on a per-rep basis. If you are going to fix a problem no questions asked it would be nice if you did that every time. If you want me to well-document the problem that is fine too, but it would be nice to know ahead of time, not find out a half dozen emails in. I think setting clear and consistent CS expectations would solve a lot of complaints I have heard about the company, because even with their QC problems I find most people are willing to overlook that if they can get a good replacement part with as little stress and effort as possible. Making them play roulette to see how easy that process is going to be is not one way to do that.

That really sums up BCA; low consumer cost, high consumer effort.

 

[Local Loader]

Seems like they are a decent place to get cheap parts and at worst you now have some spare parts that you can use for other things.

 

[monkeybutler]

Seems like they are a decent place to get cheap parts and at worst you now have some spare parts that you can use for other things.

Eah seems like a good way to add to one's bill at the dump.

I really don't understand why people buy this kind of crap. Who wants an unreliable POS taking up space?

 

[Local Loader]

Eah seems like a good way to add to one's bill at the dump.

I really don't understand why people buy this kind of crap. Who wants an unreliable POS taking up space?

That's to do determined of its worth it out not by the user/builder.
I've got some I've built and bought for cheap that work just as well and reliably as the more expensive ones I've built and bought.

 

[Will_White]

Eah seems like a good way to add to one's bill at the dump.

I really don't understand why people buy this kind of crap. Who wants an unreliable POS taking up space?

So far, the only thing I haven't been able to fix is a barrel with a rough chamber that would only extract with steel-cased and a poorly described listing resulting in having to buy a different bolt. But with a little fitting and break in I've gotten their other parts to work reliably. The main draw for me is that they have side chargers that are milspec other then the carrier and have a wide selection of calibers.

In other news, I finally got out to the range and the 9mm upper worked great, a few hang-ups on the first stick but the next 3 ran without a hitch.

 

[monkeybutler]

So far, the only thing I haven't been able to fix is a barrel with a rough chamber that would only extract with steel-cased and a poorly described listing resulting in having to buy a different bolt. But with a little fitting and break in I've gotten their other parts to work reliably. The main draw for me is that they have side chargers that are milspec other then the carrier and have a wide selection of calibers.

In other news, I finally got out to the range and the 9mm upper worked great, a few hang-ups on the first stick but the next 3 ran without a hitch.

I get wanting to experiment with different calibers, but… I prefer to buy things that I won't have to futz with to make work. Bolts and magazines are often an issue with anything other than 5.56, perhaps largely excepting 300blk, in an AR. That gets more challenging as one descends price tiers.

I am sure many have range toy fun with BCA.

Some are perfectly happy with WangchungRoyal [insert any chinese mystery brand] household appliances. I prefer ze german schitt. My dishes have less water spotting.

 

[titsonritz]

View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6gLMSf4afzo