S&W's worst years

[tubeshooter]

Radagast has a great point, which is well taken.


I had almost no family members and friends who were really into guns (still don't, really) so the magazines were how I got a lot of my initial knowledge and interest in my early years of getting into this. We have THR and other sites now, but you didn't have that 20 years ago.

 

[joed]

I don't think you can say any years were worse than others. I've owned a lot of S&W revolvers from the 50's to present day. I had a model 19 bought new in 1982 that I always thought was the worst gun S&W ever produced. The first time I fired it the cylinder fell out when I tried to eject the shells.

I've had revolvers without the pinned barrel have the barrel start to unscrew. These were from late 80's into the 90s'.

Have to admit though no problems with any of the 2000 era revolvers.

 

[trapper500]

I saved up for 2 years to buy the Performance Center 10.5" SS 500 S&W Mag it cost me $1150.00 before tax I finally paid it off & took it home & started shooting it & the cylinder time went nuts & the screw came out that held the cylinder in place so i sent it back & they repaired it & i got it back {after 2 months} and took it to the range & started shooting & after just 2 cylinders full it done the same thing again now iam a little upset & thats putting it mildly so i called S&W this time & said to send it back {they sent me a prepaid Shipping label i printed out} & this time it only took 9 weeks to get it back when i finally came i was nervous about even shooting it but i had to see if it was fixed so here my brother & I went to the range once more & the BLANK BLANK thing done it this time after 3 shot I was rabid at this time i call S&W and said some choice words & they sent another prepaid label & i sent it t othem this time it only took 3 weeks to get it back but this time i took it & sold it & i lost my butt on it . NO MORE S&W for me never again

 

[CSA 357]

the year they went to mim and need a key was when i stopped buying new ones, but im still looking for the older smiths got a pretty good pile of them now

 

[Gordon]

Sorry not ONE current S&W i'd buy, and I have almost 50 S&Ws and used them since 1963. When they started chemically rifling the barrels, and using weird looking castings and everything either looks rougher than a cob or like a cheap Chinese knock off of the real thing I'm out of there. Sue there always were lemons that got past QC, and after about the early 60s for some reason more went out bad than before. The closest thing I have seen from S&W in the last few years is the Model 40 Lemon Squeezer looks kinda decent on the outside, at least. S&W might as well sell out to Cerebrus like Remington and Marlin ect. and be done with it!

 

[fastbolt]

Sort of a timely occurrence, but I was just talking with a close friend of mine who was a long time (retired) S&W and Colt revolver armorer back when we carried revolvers.

The subject turned to revolvers at one point, and how the earlier guns were being turned out compared to more recent ones.

He commented that during the "BP years" he saw a lot of S&W revolvers that had barrel/cylinder gaps that were too tight. He said he remembers a lot of instances where firing only 2 cylinder loads (Magnum loads) would heat up the guns enough so the cylinders started dragging against the back of the barrels. B/C gaps were just too tight for extended shooting sessions in some of those guns.

I thought of this thread ...

 

[Gordon]

Tight B/C gaps are real easy to fix!

 

[Old Fuff]

Tight B/C gaps are real easy to fix!

But not the other way around...

Actually I saw a fair number with what today would be considered excessive - around .009" to .012". But in an era of mostly lead bullets being used in revolvers these wide gaps were considered adviseable if not necessary.

I have a finish worn Model 10 in the D serial number range that's about .011", but it shoots fine and so far I've been to lazy to set the barrel back.

 

[FIVETWOSEVEN]

Even at their worst, their revolvers make everyone Else's look stupid.

Like when they mismatch flutes as seen in another thread here?

 

[Onmilo]

Jeff Quinn has written a number of articles for Gun Digest, he is a contributing writer on staff.

Bangor Punta and everything they have cranked out since the convict CEO stepped down or basically, everything since SAF-T-Loc got involved.