I think those vertical lines S&W cut on the front strap of many 3rd gens are completely useless. Further I think cutting those was a utter waste of machine time that could have been spent elsewhere to greater benefit.
Anyway... In effort to increase the "gription" on my 4506 I considered a few options. Much as I like hand cut checkering that's about impossible here due to the forward curve at the bottom of the frontstrap. Hard to get in there with a checkering file to cut the verticals when ya cant lay the file flat on the work.
Although I probably could do diamonds by hand but, that pattern wouldn't have a lot of coverage here. Machine cut checkering is out too, I don't have the fixture or tooling for that just yet.
So, plan "C" is try my hand at stippling. I used a swiss Badeco hammer handpiece powered by a Foredom LX motor (low speed & high torque). The toolbit used is badeco HSS that I fiddled with quite a bit grinding and re-shaping until I got the profile just right. I didn't want the tool stabby sharp but more of a blunted conical shape so the result on the workpiece would be somewhat like a miniature meteor craters. It took a good deal of trail and error on some scrap steel to get the point just right.
In the end... increased gription acheived and doesn't look half bad
What do ya think?
Cheers
Bill