Gordon
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Can anyone say "Lewis Lead Remover"?
Pro's & Con's Of Shooting .38 Special's In .357 Magnum Cylinder's?
- Thread starter Ala Dan
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Stainz
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I have been shooting 'short' cases in firearms for years - and one such pairing is possibly the most dangerous. I bought my first DA revolver several years ago after enjoying .45 Colt SA Rugers... and it was a SRH in .454. My reasoning was that it would be a great .45 Colt launch platform, with occasional .454 Casull's. I quickly discovered that bronze chamber brushes dipped in Hoppes and pulled through will clean quite effectively - sometimes, after many .45 Colts, chucking the brush in a small drill motor helps. The carbon residue, etc, buildup forward of the cartridge's opening will prevent seating a .454 - which is a good thing, as any additional pressure spikes can really hurt that cylinder (Recall that .454 Casulls are 65 kpsi rounds.). A later discovery for me - the excellent Lewis Lead Remover - is also indispensable.
My other short cases in long chambers involves my .44 Special (24, 296, & 696) & .44 Magnum (629MG) revolvers - again, the bronze chamber brush, slightly larger than a bore brush, and occasional uses of the Lewis Lead Remover, is the answer. I load my few .44M cases relatively light... and I bought 500 .44 Russian cases in anticipation of a .44 Russian Uberti piece, which never made it to my collection. I load them as simple low-level '.44 Specials', shooting them in everything but that tempermental 296. I really enjoy shooting .44 Specials in that 629 Mountain Gun... but I keep it clean for 'anything'.
Finally - just after Labor Day - I got a new pair - my first revolvers smaller than .44's - a 2" 10 and a 6" 66. The only .357's the 66 has seen in it's chambers, since leaving S&W, have been my wimpy 'Cowboy' level - .38 Special equivalents. Oddly, I was given a bunch of .38 & .357 cases some time back... I have only purchased one box of ammo ever in .38/.357 and they were .38's. That 6" K-frame is a .38 fun-plinker; the snubby 10 is a house gun my wife will use (She won't touch my 296!).
In summation, I agree with several other posters here - that .38/.357 bronze chamber brush and a .38/.357 Lewis Lead Remover will keep your .357 ready for .357's after a diet of .38's. The corrosive primers/powder are a thing of the past. Fire/lead etching is a real problem in alloy revolvers - with heavy bullets and no top strap protection over the cylinder/forcing cone gap. A simple way to avoid any problems there is to keep those pieces for CC - buy blue steel or SS for 'fun'!
Happy New Year!
Stainz
My other short cases in long chambers involves my .44 Special (24, 296, & 696) & .44 Magnum (629MG) revolvers - again, the bronze chamber brush, slightly larger than a bore brush, and occasional uses of the Lewis Lead Remover, is the answer. I load my few .44M cases relatively light... and I bought 500 .44 Russian cases in anticipation of a .44 Russian Uberti piece, which never made it to my collection. I load them as simple low-level '.44 Specials', shooting them in everything but that tempermental 296. I really enjoy shooting .44 Specials in that 629 Mountain Gun... but I keep it clean for 'anything'.
Finally - just after Labor Day - I got a new pair - my first revolvers smaller than .44's - a 2" 10 and a 6" 66. The only .357's the 66 has seen in it's chambers, since leaving S&W, have been my wimpy 'Cowboy' level - .38 Special equivalents. Oddly, I was given a bunch of .38 & .357 cases some time back... I have only purchased one box of ammo ever in .38/.357 and they were .38's. That 6" K-frame is a .38 fun-plinker; the snubby 10 is a house gun my wife will use (She won't touch my 296!).
In summation, I agree with several other posters here - that .38/.357 bronze chamber brush and a .38/.357 Lewis Lead Remover will keep your .357 ready for .357's after a diet of .38's. The corrosive primers/powder are a thing of the past. Fire/lead etching is a real problem in alloy revolvers - with heavy bullets and no top strap protection over the cylinder/forcing cone gap. A simple way to avoid any problems there is to keep those pieces for CC - buy blue steel or SS for 'fun'!
Happy New Year!
Stainz
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