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Range Report: Irritations and acceptance
- Thread starter jmstr
- Start date
Niner4Tango
New member
If I'm reading this right you had 7 different handguns (Post 1) and 14 different types of ammo (Post 19)? That's 98 different handgun/ammo combinations! You got some good trends identified. I'd be on overload, so you're making good progress!
Last edited:
Hello All,
I forgot to mention that the Model 357 was worked on by Frank Glenn, of Glenn Custom/Accuracy International. It was tuned to be 'service' reliable- as opposed to his federal primer only/target competition only tuning package.
Thanks again for all the insights shared.
L. Boscoe, it is funny you should mention firing pins...
The 586 owner and I did some talking/reading/tinkering.
He decided to go with an upgrade to the Apex firing pin after reading about the more consistent length and how many reported C&S firing pins breaking.
Today I got the message: the Apex arrived and was swapped out for the factory one, which was something like .015" shorter than the Apex. [does this make sense? I would have thought it would be .07" shorter or so.]
He promised to share his results from the next range trip, in case I couldn't join.
He also told me to look into this for my 686+. I tried, but my firing pin is on the hammer- like all the rest of my non-.22lr S&W revolvers.
The goal of the outing was to figure out how reliable the firearms were with a variety of ammo brands. With modern prices, a group outing made it more cost effective- as we could fire 8 different revolvers from a complete box- so each person only needed to bring 1-2 boxes to really test reliability.
Out here in California ammo is expensive, we have to do a background check to buy it, and an 11% luxury tax will be applied to all guns/ammo/accessories sales starting at the end of the month. Oh, and all ammo sales have to go through a local gun shop- no delivery of ammo to our doors.
I remember when I could buy S&B .357mag ammo for around $26/box- and now I am lucky to find .357 ammo on the shelf under $40. .44Mag ammo is now generally over $50 box of 50, unlike the prices around 2016/17 when I could order it to my door for $29-32 a box.
I was thinking of the amount of money we spent at the range that day: close to $500 I think. glad my share was under $200!
I forgot to mention that the Model 357 was worked on by Frank Glenn, of Glenn Custom/Accuracy International. It was tuned to be 'service' reliable- as opposed to his federal primer only/target competition only tuning package.
Thanks again for all the insights shared.
L. Boscoe, it is funny you should mention firing pins...
The 586 owner and I did some talking/reading/tinkering.
He decided to go with an upgrade to the Apex firing pin after reading about the more consistent length and how many reported C&S firing pins breaking.
Today I got the message: the Apex arrived and was swapped out for the factory one, which was something like .015" shorter than the Apex. [does this make sense? I would have thought it would be .07" shorter or so.]
He promised to share his results from the next range trip, in case I couldn't join.
He also told me to look into this for my 686+. I tried, but my firing pin is on the hammer- like all the rest of my non-.22lr S&W revolvers.
The goal of the outing was to figure out how reliable the firearms were with a variety of ammo brands. With modern prices, a group outing made it more cost effective- as we could fire 8 different revolvers from a complete box- so each person only needed to bring 1-2 boxes to really test reliability.
Out here in California ammo is expensive, we have to do a background check to buy it, and an 11% luxury tax will be applied to all guns/ammo/accessories sales starting at the end of the month. Oh, and all ammo sales have to go through a local gun shop- no delivery of ammo to our doors.
I remember when I could buy S&B .357mag ammo for around $26/box- and now I am lucky to find .357 ammo on the shelf under $40. .44Mag ammo is now generally over $50 box of 50, unlike the prices around 2016/17 when I could order it to my door for $29-32 a box.
I was thinking of the amount of money we spent at the range that day: close to $500 I think. glad my share was under $200!
Originally posted by jmstr
Getting tired, but just logged in so here is more info.
In .38special:
Blazer 158gr
Federal 158gr
Winchester white box
Speer wadcutters [probably from 80s?]
HGM 158gr 'FBI Loads' [LSWC-HP]
Armscorp 158gr.
In .357
PMC 158gr
Fiocchi 142gr truncated cone
Speer 125gr Lawman ammo
Armscorp 158gr.
MagTech 158gr lrn.
S&B 158gr
Winchester white box
Remington
OK, of the ammo listed we've already established that the Armscor doesn't have a good reputation for reliability. I would also note that S&B has a reputation for having "hard" primers and therefore light strikes with that could be considered an "ammo issue" too (though I personally have shot a lot of both their loaded ammo and used their component primers without issue). I cannot comment on Fiocchi, Magtech, PMC, or HGM primers as I don't know how relatively "hard" or "soft" they are, I can only say that I've not personally had any issues with Fiocchi, Magtech, or PMC ammunition nor with Fiocchi component primers.
Of the American brands of ammo, the Blazer and Speer should be the most likely to have issues as they use CCI primers which are known to be harder than other American brands (though again, I've used a lot of them without issue). Federal should be the least likely to have issues as they're known to be the "softest" hence the references to "Federal primer only" trigger jobs. IMHO a 'service' reliable trigger job should not have light strikes, at minimum, with Federal, Remington, or Winchester primers and I personally would strongly prefer it to pop CCI primers too.
I forgot to mention that the Model 357 was worked on by Frank Glenn, of Glenn Custom/Accuracy International. It was tuned to be 'service' reliable- as opposed to his federal primer only/target competition only tuning package.
I suspect that it probably was 'service' reliable when Mr. Glenn was finished with it but that, as the spring has worn over time after Mr. Glenn likely lightened it, it's become unreliable. As I understand it, the Colt "v-spring" mainspring functions as both the hammer spring and trigger return spring. While a different design, my experience with the Ruger Redhawk in which one spring also serves both functions makes me suspect that this design is likely less tolerant of reducing the spring tension than others like S&W or most Rugers which use separate spring for these functions.
The 586 owner and I did some talking/reading/tinkering.
He decided to go with an upgrade to the Apex firing pin after reading about the more consistent length and how many reported C&S firing pins breaking.
Today I got the message: the Apex arrived and was swapped out for the factory one, which was something like .015" shorter than the Apex. [does this make sense? I would have thought it would be .07" shorter or so.]
He promised to share his results from the next range trip, in case I couldn't join.
As I understand it, S&W began putting shorter firing pins in many of their scandium-framed models in order to pass California's drop-test requirement in order to make it onto their "safe" handgun roster and thus be legally eligible for sale in that state. None of the S&W revolvers with frame mounted firing pins that I have owned or that my friends/family have owned have had reliability issues with their factory firing pins though none were scandium-framed. I did replace the firing pin in my 442 with an Apex one though only because the new pin came with the Apex spring kit I installed, it had been perfectly reliable with its stock pin previously.
He also told me to look into this for my 686+. I tried, but my firing pin is on the hammer- like all the rest of my non-.22lr S&W revolvers.
Because the hammer is physically held back by both the rebound slide and hammer block unless/until the hammer is cocked and/or the trigger is pulled, there would be no need or reason to put a shorter firing pin on a gun with a hammer-mounted one. As such, unless your revolver's firing pin has been modified or damaged, there should be no need to replace it as it should be plenty long enough.
One possibility that I hadn't though of before is endshake. I suppose, theoretically, if a revolver had severe enough endshake that the cylinder could move forward enough when the hammer falls to "cushion" the blow of the firing pin to the primer enough to cause a light-strike. That being said, I've never personally seen a revolver with endshake this bad (and I've seen some pretty bad ones) and other symptoms of excessive endshake like intermittently heavy trigger pull due to the cylinder dragging on the forcing cone should manifest themselves well before light strikes occur.
As I said before, I think the first step should be replacing the mainsprings with ones of known factory weight. The fact that all the revolvers that had light strikes were known to have had trigger jobs of one sort or another while the Rugers were reliable despite having lighter springs installed tells me that the revolvers which had light strikes almost certainly had lighter springs installed, had their factory springs lightened, or, in the case of the S&W's, had their strain screws shortened. I think this because the Ruger's transfer-bar design is generally less tolerant of lightened springs than the hammer-block design of S&W and older Colts. This is because hammer's energy is more directly transferred to the primer with the S&W/Colt design while the Ruger's transfer bar will "soak up" some of the hammer's energy.
S&W mainsprings are widely available and relatively inexpensive (the same mainspring is common to the K, L, N, and X-Frames). While the Colt "v-springs" have long been nearly impossible to get, there are apparently reproductions now available.
https://www.gunpartscorp.com/products/1365010b
I also note that the new 2020 Pythons seem to have gone back to using a "v-spring" type mainspring so perhaps one of those could also be used as-is or modified to fit an older Colt.
Interesting results. I used Armscor .38 Super ammo once. I was unimpressed and had no desire to purchase more. I haven't used Armscor .38 Spcl. or .357 ammo.
I have used several other major manufacturer .357 offerings over a period of many years. I don't recall my S&W K, L, and N-frame revolvers, with factory springs, ever failing to fire using factory or reloaded ammo. Same with my Ruger SA and DA revolvers, Colt Troopers and a Colt 3-5-7 model.
I have witnessed "slicked up" revolvers fail to fire due to light strikes. IMHO, there may be more than just the ammunition responsible for the failures to fire...ymmv
I have used several other major manufacturer .357 offerings over a period of many years. I don't recall my S&W K, L, and N-frame revolvers, with factory springs, ever failing to fire using factory or reloaded ammo. Same with my Ruger SA and DA revolvers, Colt Troopers and a Colt 3-5-7 model.
I have witnessed "slicked up" revolvers fail to fire due to light strikes. IMHO, there may be more than just the ammunition responsible for the failures to fire...ymmv