Bent gun barrel from airline travel...

Joined
Jul 30, 2019
Messages
823
that wouldnt happen in my rifle case..unless a luggage buggie ran it over i suppose.

no way it was intentional (okay, i suppose it could be, but i highly doubt it) ..you all are all looking for a the boogie man. i had a rifle snapped in half in shipping. it was going up the conveyor belt, when somehow it got turned sideways.. it got held up in an opening, and the next package came into it like a battering ram. T-boned my rifle, and snapped the wood stock in half. the shipper fessed up and told me exactly how it happened.

those conveyor belts have to move TONS of luggage. they have a lot of horsepower. the longer the conveyor belt, the more horsepower. damn..that SUCKS THO. i hope they were coming back from a hunt, and not headed in. sucks worse one way. but sucks nevertheless.
This ^^^^^ or it got run over. No other plausible explanation IMO. Bending a steel barrel takes some strength. we need more details.
 

MattB

WKR
Joined
Sep 29, 2012
Messages
5,491
I don't know a ton about travel gun cases, but for the amount of force it would take to bend the barrel like that, would any case hold up?
I highly doubt it. Some guys seem to have more faith in their hard cases than is warranted.
 

Quin

FNG
Joined
Jan 20, 2020
Messages
54
Not that it's any consolation but at least its clearly damaged and a claim be made now as opposed to just a slight bend which maybe isn't noticed until you're in the field and can't hit anything.

Doesn't appear to be any damage other than the barrel and it appears to be bent up... I'd expect it to be bent to the side if it got run over. I'd think getting mangled in conveyor gearing would cause a lot of scratches and such. I'm at a loss.
 

wapitibob

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Joined
Feb 24, 2012
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5,419
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Bend Oregon
Who has had a gun damaged during airline travel? My buddy just had one ruined (broke the travel case in pieces and severely bent the barrel). Just wondering how generous/stingy the airlines will try to be with replacement cost.

As noted, the case was in pieces. The issue should have/may have been handled at the airport immediately.
 
Joined
Jan 30, 2019
Messages
669
Location
Wisconsin
Reminds me of the fishing pole I got at baggage. Case was creased like it was bent over and straightened. It was a super heavy rigid cardboard tube, strength of a 2x4.

My guess is, it was sticking out of the luggage trolley and caught a pillar in route.
 

Boog304

FNG
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Mar 2, 2019
Messages
31
Was on a return trip from key west with several fishing rods in a heavy pvc 8’ rod tube (schedule 40 pvc that a passenger vehicle wouldn’t crush) anyways setting in Charlotte waiting for connection and I see my luggage as that rod tube really sticks out. Guy driving the luggage tug comes wheeling up to my rod tube laying on the tarmac leans over to look at his front wheels as he pulls right up to it and gassed it to get over the rod tube. 100% undeniably intentional. I kinda laughed about it then because I thought no way he crushed that tube. Landed at final destination and grabbed the rod tube saw that it was creased a bit and went directly to customer service to reveal any damage. There were 5 rods in it and everyone was crushed I was shocked and pissed. They ended up valuing each rod at total new value so I was made whole again. Still not worth the frustration but at least they made it close to right. I think total value was like $600 so but sure how they will handle that.

some have said that your situation was not intentional but I tend to disagree.
 

KBC

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Mar 8, 2017
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BC
Get them to replace the whole thing and put a new barrel on that one. Seems like a bit of an inconvenience but a win to me ;)
 

Milhouse58421

Lil-Rokslider
Joined
Jan 17, 2019
Messages
193
Location
North of you
I'll say this... 3 days ago, I scoped a rifle for a friend of mine. I work in a firearms shop. Said rifle was a standard contour Remington 700 barrel. The story behind the rifle is that it basically saved his brother's life. His brother was deer hunting, and the rifle was between him and the windshield of the vehicle he was riding in, when he was involved in a head on collision. No seat belt, the rifle kept him from being ejected through the windshield. The stock was snapped in two. This happend several years ago. Big news in small town ND, where everyone knows everyone. This year, the family finally put a new stock on the rifle, and brought it in for a new scope. My friend was worried it was tweaked from the accident.... I installed new mounts/rings, mounted the scope, and bore sighted it. I can usually guess which rifles will shoot well, by how far I have to move the windage and elevation adjustments. This one was balls on... barely had to move either. So much for the barrel being bent or tweaked... my point here is, if a rifle that kept a 275# guy inside a vehicle, in an approximately 35-40 mph head on crash, and it didn't tweak anything, the damage to the pictured rifle almost has to be either deliberate, or, at best gross negligence.
 
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rob86jeep

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Joined
Dec 19, 2017
Messages
611
Location
Georgia
Just got back from the trip. We think the barrel had to have been crushed by something hydraulic as there was no tire marks or even scuffs on the case which there should have been if it fell off something or got run over. This doesn't mean we think it was malicious though, could have still been a freak accident. The warranty claim is started so we'll see if it's hassle free or not. It was with United, but so far they've been easy to deal with.

Luckily we had a spare gun so the hunting trip wasn't ruined.

Oh, and the case was one of the cheaper SKB lines (not the real heavy duty ones). However, after thinking about it, I would imagine the heavy duty SKB/Pelican cases wouldn't be able to survive something that has enough force to severely bend a barrel like it did. So I doubt a better case would have prevented any of the damage.
 
Joined
Oct 6, 2019
Messages
305
I’ve had my rifle case broken by British Airlines, but there was no damage to the rifle. Now I only use a Pelican case.
 

Cdroot89

Lil-Rokslider
Joined
Mar 24, 2019
Messages
125
If it was an SKB that is ATA rated don’t they have a $1500 contents warranty? You have to file through the airline first but if that doesn’t work out hopefully SKB with have your back. That warranty is one of the reasons I would consider paying that much for one of their cases.
 
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