Nagant revolver question

I like my Nagant. Having previously fired only semi-automatic pistols, it was weird at first for more than one reason. If only ammo was cheaper and easier to find. Haven't found any local sources so far, only online.
 
It is entirely possible that 100 years ago men were MEN, hairy chested, knuckle draggin', mouth breathin', MEN with sloped foreheads and one heavy eye brow. Even more probable, Russian men were manliest of all. Living in a frozen waste land with only the hair on their back to keep them warm. Living in a place where they wrestled bears for food gave them giant hands and forearms thus requireing them to build robust pistols, because a lesser weapon would not hold up to their massive mitts
 
Old Russian saying: "Better is the enemy of good enough." Apparently, they viewed the trigger as good enough for dispatching the Huns trying to crawl over the top of your trench or popping political dissidents in the back of the head. Anything requiring more precision than that was a job for the SA trigger or better yet the rifle. The gun obviously wasn't intended to provide a high volume of fire, it's a gate-loader for goodness sake.

The French Model 1892 "Lebel" is not a Nagant design, but is in the same class of smaller caliber revolver. It is, incidentally, one of the earliest swing cylinder revolvers, with the cylinder swinging to the right. Some folks say that a cylinder should swing to the right, and that the Colt's leftward swing was due to Sam Colt being left handed (although he had been dead 30 years). Nonsense, of course, and anyone who thinks a right swing would be superior has probably never tried the French revolver.

The Mle 1892's cylinder swung open to the right because the revolver was intended to be used in the left hand. French military doctrine of the time still viewed the saber as the officer's primary weapon and thusly the sword was intended to be wielded by the right hand.
 
I have ten of them and would argue that they were the sturdiest handgun design of their age. Open one of those suckers up and count the parts

Wildicanhitamansizetargetat100yardswithonebutthebulletsbounceoffthecardboardAlaska TM
 
Here's my question about the Nagant. Virtually everything you read about the Nagant online, will mention the slow unloading process for the Nagant. They'll complain about using the ejector rod, which is indeed a multistep process, but does one really NEED to use it? With mine, I've observed once you open the loading gate, hold the gun with the barrel point upward, and rotate the cylinder and the spent casings will just fall right out one by one, occasionally when they don't fall right out, since they seem to "peek" out a little from the front of the cylinder, a single little tap with a finger will be enough to make them fall out. It's effortless. It seems almost as though the ejector rod is there only if something goes wrong. I've put 100 rounds through my Nagant thus far, and never once had to actually use the ejection rod. It's still not lightning fast to unload, but much faster and simpler than most make it out to be. So what's the deal? Is it just the ammo I am using? Or are that many people just mistaken?
 
With mine, I've observed once you open the loading gate, hold the gun with the barrel point upward, and rotate the cylinder and the spent casings will just fall right out one by one, occasionally when they don't fall right out, since they seem to "peek" out a little from the front of the cylinder, a single little tap with a finger will be enough to make them fall out. It's effortless.

Nagant cases stick in mine every time, but 32 s&wl will fall out "sometimes" if they don't bulge too much. I will agree that the ejector rod is useless. Nagant cases get stuck so tight that I use a dowel instead.
 
noelf, what kind of Nagant ammo have you used? I've only used the Hot Shot 7.62 Nagant kind, and the spent casings fall right out more than 9 times out of ten.
 
I've used Fiochi and Hotshot. Both stick in mine. The ejector rod will work but is a pain. A dowel works better for me and is a bit quicker.
 
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