Folks,
Due to a few different issues I'm going to have to go with the "long cylinder" plan instead of "short cylinder". The basic problem with the short cylinder and recessed barrel setup is that it would mean a new tube made that is barrel-threaded on the outside and has an inner thread to hold the barrel core. Trying to get that absolutely dead-nuts-on concentric would be just crazy, plus there wouldn't be a lot of extra metal available to hold everything stable.
That's OK. My research says that when you shoot 9mm out of a 357Mag-length cylinder that has a long throat, the bullet accellerates strongly while still in the cylinder. The S&W factory 9mm snubbies with 2" barrels are producing bullet velocities on par with a 4" barrel Glock 19!
So this is also why I'm going to run a 3.5" barrel on my gun, not including about 1/2" to 3/4" worth of "gas cap".
The gas cap is rather complicated, and also had to be concentric it's whole length. Turned out to be a tricky beast but I've got one now that I'm very happy with. This 9min video shows how it will go together and what the shop looks like:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgNS1KMhZhs
The goal is to assemble all the small bits (barrel, gas cap, barrel shroud, etc.) before taking the gun apart and swapping the caliber over.
I also exchanged Email with Dave Manson of Manson Reamers. Great guy. It turns out the 9mm chamber reamer of his I have now ($70 Brownell's) can't do a long enough throat for a revolver cylinder. But that's OK - he explained that I could get a chucking reamer of either .355" or .356" to finish the long throats once I have his chamber reamer cutting to the right depth.
$25 got me a good US-made chucking reamer of .3555" - yeah, I split the difference
. It should shoot .356" lead rounds exceptionally well, and jacketed of .355 or .356 just fine.
Due to a few different issues I'm going to have to go with the "long cylinder" plan instead of "short cylinder". The basic problem with the short cylinder and recessed barrel setup is that it would mean a new tube made that is barrel-threaded on the outside and has an inner thread to hold the barrel core. Trying to get that absolutely dead-nuts-on concentric would be just crazy, plus there wouldn't be a lot of extra metal available to hold everything stable.
That's OK. My research says that when you shoot 9mm out of a 357Mag-length cylinder that has a long throat, the bullet accellerates strongly while still in the cylinder. The S&W factory 9mm snubbies with 2" barrels are producing bullet velocities on par with a 4" barrel Glock 19!
So this is also why I'm going to run a 3.5" barrel on my gun, not including about 1/2" to 3/4" worth of "gas cap".
The gas cap is rather complicated, and also had to be concentric it's whole length. Turned out to be a tricky beast but I've got one now that I'm very happy with. This 9min video shows how it will go together and what the shop looks like:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgNS1KMhZhs
The goal is to assemble all the small bits (barrel, gas cap, barrel shroud, etc.) before taking the gun apart and swapping the caliber over.
I also exchanged Email with Dave Manson of Manson Reamers. Great guy. It turns out the 9mm chamber reamer of his I have now ($70 Brownell's) can't do a long enough throat for a revolver cylinder. But that's OK - he explained that I could get a chucking reamer of either .355" or .356" to finish the long throats once I have his chamber reamer cutting to the right depth.
$25 got me a good US-made chucking reamer of .3555" - yeah, I split the difference
. It should shoot .356" lead rounds exceptionally well, and jacketed of .355 or .356 just fine.