A friends son had bought this revolver earlier in the summer and it seems to have slight timing problems. If you cock the pistol slowly single action the cylinder does not completely index on some chambers. Other than the bluing missing on the front of the grip strap the finish looks to be 95% or better with no signs of ever being taken apart or abused. As the grips are one of the upgraded versions with a slight thumb rest I expect this was someones target pistol back in the day. I suggested he remove the grips and de-gunk the innards with a good spray cleaner. He got distracted “married” and didn’t want to fool with the pistol and when he offered it to me for $150 I decided to take a chance. By the serial number this pistol was probably made in 1937 or 1938. I’m hoping my advice actually works and a careful cleaning corrects the timing issue.

Just picked up an old High Standard Sentinel for $150 recently- heckuva fun little 22.

Check the hand in the face of the breech and see if it has any spring tension on it.
The hand spring (at least on the post-war guns) is nothing but a short piece of piano wire attached directly to the hand in a small hole and crimped into place.
The wire/spring can get lazy after years of use allowing the hand to skip off of a ratchet tooth here and there leaving the cylinder out of time in no particular order.
Simple packed in dirt and oil accumulated in there will also stop it from functioning right and give you the same thing.

The hand is attached to and works off the motion of the trigger. If the fit between the hand and the trigger is excessive and sloppy, you can get timing problems.

The very tip of the hand that pokes through the window of the breech face may be worn. It's almost a sharp point when right as it gets under each ratchet tooth and lifts the cylinder upwards to rotate it..
They just plain get worn over from use like everything else can. Not the hardest metal part ever made either.

To rebuild a few of these, I used to cut the upper edge of the worn hand off and face it w/a tiny layer of steel from a power hacksaw blade. Silver soldered in place, quenched when the solder just set, it left the tip hard.Then draw it back a bit and refit.
Lots of work for one of these but there just weren't any parts available.
The last one I worked on was bought for $14.95 in a LGS 'cause the timing was off a little. It was a while ago.

Now they sell the hand w/spring attached for something like 10 or 15bucks... ! Must have been hiding the parts stash.


Check the ratchet teeth for wear. Many of the ratchet 'stars' are case (color) hardened but the wear thickness of the hardening is thin. If needed, you can carefully peen any obviously out of wack tooth back into position, reshape and polish it to match the others.

These revolvers use grips that you can change with the single screw through the bottom . They had 6 or 7 different styles to choose from.
The grip styles and the interchangable system was the work of some guy named Roper IIRC.

I purchased an H&R Revolver and was so happy to get one I never checked what I should of before I purchased it. I found out later the cylinder was not numbered to the frames serial number. We took it shooting and found out it shaves lead at the cylinder gap at the barrel. A closer look it seemed one of the cylinder locking grooves was off do to some butcher working on it. It was also loose when the lock up was in place. I was able to repair the slot which fixed the barrel alignment too. I replaced the lock up cam too it's much tighter now when it locks up the cylinder. I had to refit the cylinder slots to the new locking cam. I checked the bore alignment to make sure each cylinder chamber was lined up to the bore exactly when I fitted the cylinder grooves to the new locking cam. I now have a great shooter. Luckily numrich e-gun parts had the nw locking cam. My point Is never leave your eye glasses at home.

I purchased another one that I knew needed fix in. It's an 1894 h&r 22 revolver. Numrich had all the parts for this one too. The spring that keeps the loc up cam in the up position after firing is broken. It's an easy repair.

I purchased another h&r 22 revolver were the PO told me it was nickel because it was tarnished so bad. When I got home and a starting cleaning it I found out under the tarnish was an excellent chrome finish. I took some semi-chrome polish and went to work.
The chrome finish is in excellent condition the revolver looks like it's brand new.

It's a 50/50 chance in finding an h&r revolver still in New condition or in well used condition. Just make sure all the serial numbers match and the lock up on the cylinder is ok and it's not too loose. If it is loose make sure the cylinder grooves are ok. So it may need just a new locking cam. I put moly on my locking cams and some in my cylinder grooves to prevent wear. I lube the cylinder index stars and levers on all my revolvers even the new ones to prevent wear. Moly my guns never leave home without it. Bb

My dad won a H&R Sportsman as a prize in the company he worked for back in the 60's. I remember it came in a beautiful purple box, he gave it to my mother for home defense...it was basically unfired until I reached about 12 years old and would secretly "borrow" it and take it out shooting. I was already an old hand with the .22 rifle and really enjoyed shooting the devil out of the H&R. 12 year olds being 12 year olds it wasn't long before I started trying stuff like fanning the action and to make a long story short H&R did not make their pistols very 12 year old proof because before too long it would not hold the hammer back in single action mode and only became a double action revolver. I fessed up to my mother and she told me that she knew it all along but had faith that I would use it safely.
I've often thought that instead of the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval what they oughta have is a Sign that states that "This product is 12 year old proof". If anybody can break something or mess it up its a 12 year old.