Originally Posted by WR Moore

Well, as the old saying goes, "Do you want it done right or done fast?"

On the concept of the authorized repair centers. They might have been authorized and hopefully trained once upon a time. The question is are the folks who got trained still doing the work and were they any good in the first place?

As for the manufacturers, their quality varied over time. I once bought a number of 1911 slides direct from Colt. I ended up on the phone with their parts manager outraged at what came out of the factory. Was told I could send the bad ones back, but there wasn't any guarantee I'd get anything better in return.

As Dorothy Sayers had Lord Peter Whimsey say: "The quality guarantees the name, it don't work the other way around."