Weird problem - Primers not going off in two different Smiths

[LoneStarWings]

I have two revolvers, a S&W 327 5" .357 and a S&W 340 1.875" .357.

The 327 is brand new. I took it to the range today for the first time, where I attempted to shoot 150 rounds through it.....100 remington UMC 130gr .38 Special and 50 Fiocchi 125gr SJSP .357 magnum.

To my dismay, of the 18 or so cylinders I shot through the 327, only 2 cylinders fired all 8 rounds successfully. The rest of the time one, sometimes two of the rounds would fail to fire, both with the remingtons and the fiocchis. There would be a visible indention in the primer. Usually the rounds still would not fire after a second or third attempt, however about 10% of the time they would.

I tried firing the dud-rounds in my 340 as well (which has never had problems in the 500 rounds or so I've shot through it, many of them this same type of ammo) and to my surprise they wouldn't fire in the 340 either! The ammo is not that old, I bought it from stores within the past 6 months and it appears to have been recently manufactured.

What could be going on here? Could there be something wrong with the way I'm storing my ammo? Could there be some simultaneous problem with my revolvers? What could be the issue? Thoughts, ideas, comments?

 

[dfariswheel]

I have no idea what could be wrong, but if you tried the ammo in three guns, one known to be reliable and have mis-fires in all three, there's not much doubt it has to be the ammo.

The old tale about lubricants or bore solvents "killing" the primers is pretty well disproven, and unless the ammo was stored in some really extreme conditions, all I can suggest is buying new ammo somewhere and trying that.
If the guns work, I'd either send the ammo in to the manufactures or just pitch it.

 

[Jim K]

If the headstamp says "REM-UMC" the ammo is pretty old or has been reloaded. Remington has not used that headstamp for around 50 years.

Jim

 

[LoneStarWings]

Headstamp on the remingtons is R-P 38 SPL.

I don't think that I any solvents or fluids got on the ammo, although I had cleaned the 327 with hoppes #9 and CLP a few days before I took it to the range. I wiped all the cleaning fluids off at the end of the cleaning, though.

 

[RippinSVT]

Mine does it too. I'm still looking for the problem. I think it may just be primer hardness, but it doesn't help that the springs are light in those guns.

 

[Starter52]

+1 to RippinSVT. I suspect primer hardness is messin' with your lightweight guns.

See if you can find someone with a larger frame .38/.357 revolver. I'm betting the ammo with dented primers will fire when hit with a heavier hammer. I've used that same 130 gr. UMC ammo in my K-frame S&W revolvers without a single misfire.

Jim, nowadays Remington sells its lower-priced .38 ammo in boxes marked UMC.

 

[Shear_stress]

I suspect it goes something like this: lightweight handguns + MIM (i.e. lightweight) hammers + magnum ammunition = backing out of strain screw = light strikes.

 

[jad0110]

Yeah, I'd check to make sure the strain screw is nice and tight on the 327; the 340 doesn't have a strain screw, so I'm a bit puzzled on that one.

 

[GJgo]

I only shoot Federal primers in my S&W revolvers for reliability.

 

[DAdams]

100 remington UMC 130gr .38 Special and 50 Fiocchi 125gr SJSP .357 magnum.

You have recieved some wise counsel thus far. This having happened with stated rounds may not come as a surprise although unwelcome to be sure.

Grab some of your favorite Gold Dots, CORBON, Buffalo Bore, Federals etc and see how things pan out.

Light strikes and hard primers make a bad combination.

I have not experienced similar problems with the same Remington and my 340 nor 642-2.

 

[LoneStarWings]

Actually I did shoot off one cylinder of Gold Dots in the 327 and three cylinders in the 340 that same afternoon and they all fired OK. So at least those work, although it really wasn't enough rounds to make a solid determination.

 

[LoneStarWings]

I checked the strain screw and it is still really tight.

 

[rcmodel]

Measure the rim thickness on the offending ammo.

If it is less then .058" thick, it is creating excess headspace in all your guns, and the frame mounted firing pins cannot reach the primers.

rc

 

[LoneStarWings]

One more thing, I was not using moon clips but my cylinder on the 327 is machined for them. I don't know if that would effect things or not.

 

[rcmodel]

Fiocchi may have out-of spec rims.

Again like I said in post #13, measure them and they should be .058" thick.
The diameter should be .440".

If they are much less then that, or have a pronounced taper on the edge of the rim, they might be missing the step without the moon clips to hold them back against the recoil shield where the FP can reach them.

Still, that doesn't explane why they also mis-fired in other guns too..

BTW: I have heard of Fiocchi .38 Spl not working in speed-loaders to well because of the goofy non-spec rims.

rc

 

[Stophel]

Depending upon who you talk to, the firing pins may be too short. Supposedly, this can be a problem with the new floating pin S&W's. Longer pins are available, but these also get mixed reports.

I only have two new N frames (the smaller frames are simply too ugly with the rear of the frame extended back so far around the hammer to accommodate that silly lock), and my pin is fine, though I did get a longer pin and try it....had bad hang up problems, so I quickly took it back out and put the standard pin in and all has been well.

 

[Stophel]

Oh, I just saw the moonclip note. I am inclined to wonder if the cartridges are just shoving too far forward in the chambers without proper support of the clip? The first thing to do would be to just try shooting it with the clips.

 

[LoneStarWings]

Well it was still doing it today. I shot another 100 rounds of .38 special and 50 rounds of .357 magnum. Brands included Monarch 158gr .38, Remington UMC 130gr .38, Cor-Bon DPX 125gr .357, Fiocchi 125gr .357, and Speer Gold Dot 135gr .357.

All ammo brands exhibited what I'm now going to call light primer strikes. I had about 40 failures out of those 150 rounds. Out of about 18 cylinders, only 4 fired all 8. The rest had anyone from 1 to 4 failures.

I called smith and they are sending me a return label. I'm disappointed that the 327 was not good to go right away, but I think S&W deserves a fair shake at making things right.

As for the 340, it would fire about 30% of the ammo that the 327 failed to fire, the rest of those it still wouldn't shoot.

When giving the 340 its own clean ammo, I did have one light primer strike out of fifty rounds (all monarch .38 special). This is a bit disconcerting, but I will give the 340 a litte more time before i send it back too.

 

[S&Wfan]

Firing pin too short to get the job done, and for whatever reason. S&W should be able to fix this problem.

 

[Jim K]

Hi, Starter 52,

Yes, but I AFAIK the cases are headstamped "R-P", not "REM-UMC".

It does seem that the 327 at least has problems; no way that variety of ammo could all be bad.

Jim