Model 10: Light primer strikes indicitave of too much trigger job?

[Pendragon]

Well, I took my model 10 out today and took my father in law shooting - he said he has not shot a gun for 35 years and he loved it.

The only problem was - we had about 10% dud rounds.

They were not actual duds, but light strikes. If I shot them again, they shot or if we shot SA, they worked.

How bad an idea is it to refire a light strike round in the same gun or another gun (my 638 ate em right up).

My M10 is extremely smooth - I am wondering if they previous owner had a little too much put into the trigger - is this common on "worked on" revolvers?

I had shot 300 rounds previously and never had this problem - but today was my forst time with my .38 hand loads (158gr LSWC on ~3.4gr Bullseye)

Any other possibilities? Advice?

 

[Tamara]

How bad an idea is it to refire a light strike round in the same gun or another gun (my 638 ate em right up).

It's fine.


You might want to check the strain screw on your Model 10...

 

[Bob C]

Repeating Tamara's advice, check the strain screw, which puts tension on the mainspring. Turning this out a bit reduces the trigger pull, particularly on double action, but can lead to problems, including a light strike.

If the screw isn't in all the way, turn it in, and then check for misfires on double action.

Another possibility is that a lighter aftermarket spring has been installed, and if that's the case a replacement may be needed.

 

[Al Thompson]

Sounds like one of two things to me. The strain screw may have backed out or your primers in your handloads may be the problem. What sort of ammo was the previous 300?

 

[clown714]

what type of primers are you using?

i had a bunch of CCI's do this to me

now i use winchester wsp's

just my $.02

clown

 

[Blueduck]

Ditto everything including the CCI primers which I only use for testing these days.

Something else that I've seen is so much end shake that taking up the slack steals too much energy from the firing pin. Betting it's one of the more common above though.

 

[bountyhunter]

Even if the strain screw is in tight, it may have had the end filed down by a gunsmith doing a trigger job. Could also have lightened the mainspring. In either case, a new screw and spring will fix it (can get both from Brownells).

 

[HSMITH]

A Piddle poor trigger job will cause light strikes. If the trigger job was a target trigger job it can go light enough that some soft strikes will occor with hard primers. A trigger job on anything but a gun used strictly for target shooting should work 100% with ANY primer.

There are a lot of hacks out there posing as gunsmiths and a lot of good revolvers molested on kitchen tables by guys that don't know what they are doing, THAT my friend is where light primer strikes come from not primers or anything else. If the gun was built for targets only the sin is forgivable........

 

[Blueduck]

There are a lot of hacks out there posing as gunsmiths and a lot of good revolvers molested on kitchen tables by guys that don't know what they are doing, THAT my friend is where light primer strikes come from not primers or anything else."

If I understand your statement HS I'd have to politely disagree. MOST cases of light strikes are caused by bad trigger jobs and especially playing around with the strain screw or aftermarket springs but not all.

I had an older model 19 that had never been apart (bought new by my dad and he never fiddled with them) that had light strike problems finally traced to having so much endshake that it was basically coushing the blow on the primer when the hammer came forward.

Rare but does happen that occasionally a factory spring will simply loose enough tension that it causes light hits. During annual qualification they check how much pressure the hammer (not trigger) exerts. If I recall correctly 6#'s is our minimum. First thing they try if a revolver fails is a new strain screw (suspecting filing on it) but I've seen a few fail with stock springs even on newer guns meaning one thing, the spring had sprung with no help from the kitchen table

I tend to suspect there are other mechanical things that could happen to a revolver over the years with no help that could also cause light strikes to develop.

Best, Blueduck

PS but I do think your right 95% of the time

 

[Mike Irwin]

Good post, Blueduck, and my findings exactly.

I've worked on close to 100 Smith revolvers now, in more than just a few cases fixing the "action jobs" done by people who aren't qualified to pick their own noses much less take the side plate off of a Smith & Wesson revolver.

 

[HSMITH]

If I understand your statement HS I'd have to politely disagree. MOST cases of light strikes are caused by bad trigger jobs and especially playing around with the strain screw or aftermarket springs but not all.

Actually we agree 100%. Maybe I should try to be a bit more eloquent next time. My whole point was bad trigger jobs by people that do not know what they are doing are where light strikes come from, there is a VERY small percentage that come from other sources, and NONE from primer manufacturers.

EDIT: that old 19 your dad sold you has seen its fair share of heavy loads they don't get that way on accident, and you and I both know there are not enough days in the week for a non-professional shooter to loosen one up with less than gnarly loads.

 

[Blueduck]

Regarding primers I did have some problems only with CCI primers and light strikes but this was in a gun that got a aftermarket Wolff Spring installed at my.....kitchen table.

Called Dillion and the tech said they did not reccomend CCI primers for a number of reasons. Later I learned from several folks who reloaded way more than me that they had no issues with CCI primers E-mailed CCI and communicated with a very opionated (and nice) fellow who told me to tell Dillion that he didn't particularly reccomend the SDB priming system Regardless on my particular setup the two just don't get along as well as they could which is not really a hit on either company. Just makes me more comfortable that Federal or Winchester primers seem to have a little more forgiving nature on borderline strking force.

Your 100% right on the 19, my dad put well in excess of 10,000 rounds through it over a 20 year period, virtually all of them factory 158 grain 357 hollowpoints. He had a real "If I wanted a 38 I'd have bought a 38" attitude. After a trip to S/W the problem was solved at little cost and the 6" gun is back with him again. I got my own 2 1/2" and 4" now which I'm a tad easier on.

Best,

Blueduck

 

[Pendragon]

Thanks for the info guys.

I clearly need to get a SW book. I am not comfy with messing with any screw at this point in time.

I think primers were Winchester - thats the royal blue box right?