Normally I'd say its from cleaning tool hitting... but I clean from breach to muzzle (Otis system) and very careful not to damage around the firing pin. Initially I wasn't too concerned but its getting worse and worse every time I look at it.

Here is a pic.. basically a dent/scratch around the firing pin cover:


I'm obviously contacting S&W about it, but I'm asking you folks in case they just repair it without giving me an answer. Anyone know?

Kind of frustrating.. this will be the second time this gun is heading there. I love the gun.. but for such a nice piece.. you'd think there'd be more stringent QC (first time was because hammer was off center).

I've seen the bushing hole itself chewed up because the owner used the el cheapo steel shafted cleaning brushes. The tip of these is usually just cut off and can ding the bushing. The good quality cleaning brushes has the brass shaft and the end usually terminates in a loop. Sometimes leaking primers can cause bushing damage by gas cutting. Frank

As mentioned, I clean from breach to muzzle. I have a scrubbing brush but even that is completely plastic and brass.

I'm curious about the primer... but the thing is, I've pretty much been using the same ammo for a while and my GP-100 shows no issues with it.

Are you referring to the area to the right of the pin?

That looks to me like erosion from a leaking primer pocket.

I do not see a problem. Looks much like any S&W revolver I use.

I updated the pic with a red circle. It dents in and isn't just cosmetic blackening.

It looks like the bushing chipped. Maybe bad metal.

Please enlighten me. How do you do this on a revolver?

Otis uses a cable to pull the brush/patch through the barrel from the breach end.

I'm with the "bad metal" comment. If you aren't seeing spent primers that have ruptured then it has to be brittle metal that isn't treated right.

As mentioned earlier, I use the Otis cleaning system. Great setup once you get the hang of it and I can clear everything quite fast now. I use FrogLube as my CLP.

I guess I'll just attribute it to bad metal as I'm seeing it continually get damaged when all my others are fine. Sigh.. another trip back to S&W.....

Gorenut... you and that Froglube...

Maybe it's the wrath of all those frogs...

Hahahhaha, perhaps.

Would be funny if S&W replies back that they don't condone my treatment of frogs, therefore voiding my warranty. Well.. I guess not funny for me, but everyone else can laugh at my expense.

That's exactly what I was thinking.

Someone may have gotten this, I didn't read all responses.

That is erosion from a leaking primer, or, more accurately, several. It has nothing to do with a manufacturing defect or poor materials. The only defective metal was in the primer cup, not the revolver. It also has nothing to do with cleaning.

This only is seen at the primer annulus, the groove between the primer cup and the the edge of the pocket. It is typically seen in Magnum caliber revolvers. because standard pressure loads don't operate at high enough pressure to cause the gas cutting when a primer cup fails.

I assume that is a 686? Do you hand load, or only shoot factory ammunition? If you reload, change your primer brand. If you shoot factory loads, change brand. Remington primers seem to be the worst offender in my limited (50 years and several hundred-thousand rounds loaded) to the point I will not load them. I have had as high as 10% failures with Remington.

What you see is purely cosmetic and causes no harm. Even if you send it to S&W and they replace the firing pin bushing you will shortly have the same thing if you continue to shoot the same ammunition.

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Gunsmithing since 1961

Thanks for the insightful tidbit. I shoot factory ammo. Well, the 38s I shoot are factory reloads but the 357mag I shoot are Sellier and Berlot. I never had any issues with any other guns before. Strange.

Just to reiterate.. in person, it almost looks like someone took a flat-head screwdriver and drove it in - not like normal breach-face wear in a semi (for lack of better comparison for me).

From a couple cracked primers - which could be due to bad brass.



More 329pd info

but I clean from breach to muzzle (Otis system)

Still don't get it.

I use the Otis cleaning system on my rifles, you push a plastic coated wire cable from the muzzle down the barrel to the breach, thread a wire brush or patch jag to the wire cable and then pull the wire brush back towards the muzzle. I keep a Otis gun cleaning kit in my backpack while hunting just in case I get any debris in my rifle muzzle (as in dropping a rifle from a tree stand and it lands barrel first into mud).

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"Life is short, hunt hard"

S&W fixed the problem.. but also.. the list of stuff they fixed included "Frame repaired" - no clue there was any damage anywhere else.. but the very strange thing is that I asked a few weeks about wiggle room on wood grips. Well, now my Hogues have no wiggle room... so I really have no clue what happened. Their list was vague as usual.

You're right, their list is always vague.

Not to highjack or say bad things, but I never liked or would use S&B ammo. Just dont like it

First time I've ever heard about anything like this happening to a Smith and wesson revolver although I'm not surprised about the fact that its a 686, I've always had a bad feeling about that one particular model

Seriously? There are a ton of these out there. Got to be considered a tried and true model by now.

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That is a prime example of making sure you are using good primers when you reload and also I would not use S&B ammo. I am not a fan of that ammo for several reasons and if you look hard enough you can get a lot better ammo for cheaper than S&B. Only ammo I shoot and like are Federal big big fan, Fiocchi the same huge fan and also pmc is alright 357/38 do not like their 9mm. I do not care for the others and find Fiocchi to be one of the cleanest and better quality.
Eric

Sorry but theres just something about the 686 that looks wrong to me and I just get a bad feeling about it everytime I see one

plus while my father doesnt know what model 357 SW locked up on him in the late 1970's/ early 80's he did say it was a brand new model and a stainless gun which means it could have been the 686 that locked up on him since I doubt it was a model 66, the stainless version of the K Frame model 19.

basically what he said happened was he bought a brand new, new model stainless 357 magnum and after putting 6 rounds of factory ammo through it the clyinder binded up on him and after that he wouldnt even touch smith and wessons till I came around and told him about the good ones about 20 years latter

and also he said there was a recall for that very model gun after he got rid of it for that very problem, problem is I dont know what model gun got recalled for that problem but as I said I doubt it was the 66', plus the 686 is on a different frame that was at that time brand new and untried while the N and K frames had most of their problems worked out so I wouldnt be surprised if that was one of the 686's early teathing problems

and both me and him share the same mentality if it seriously fails in any way its typically out of the question, so when it comes to 357's its either go with the Model 19 with 158 gr bullets

(look up an articile on gunblast called Use of Magnum Loads in S&W Model 19 to find out why I specified the 158 gr bullets with that one)

or the model 27/28, NOT the L frame.

There were some early problems with the 686. One was an inadequate barrel/cylinder gap, which led to the type of binding your father experienced. A coworker had the same experience. There was a recall about that same time (~1982-3), but the bugs were worked out. If the Wonder-Nine revolution hadn't happened, the 686 or its descendants would be the LE standard today.

To the OP: I have had negative experiences with S&B's primers in the other direction (FTF). Maybe a change of brand would be a worthwhile experiment.

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I need ammo, not a ride.

If it was the late 70's it wasn't the 686 either.

While it is true that 686's had a recall early in their life cycle, the recall was a simple fix and it worked. The revolvers that were particular to liking the 158 grain load's too were not the 686. I have no idea what model your father had issues with but two things you note in this post make me think 66. That said, nothing wrong with a 66 either when following S&W's instructions. The 686 is still going strong. I just can't imagine getting a bad feeling looking at this particular revolver. I'm not making a case of L frame vs. N frame. Both are great pistols to own.

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He wasn't sure what the time period it was hence why he said either late 70's or early 80's as he couldnt remember which as that was 30 some years ago and he didn't take note of the model number either as he'd only owned 2 Smith and Wessons before that point, a steel framed model 39 (which he still has) and a model 52 which bought at the same time that he had gotten rid of when he was working in Alaska along with a Browning Medalist for his mothers sake, she didnt like them being in the house and now he says that he wished he had put them in a bank vault instead of getting rid of them as he didnt know that fine works of craftsmanship like those two would have become so rare and valuable

plus he only knew what the model 14 was called back in the 1950's (as the K38) before smith and wesson started using model numbers, so I'm not surprised he didnt take note of the model number.


and he did say it was a damn nice gun, expensive too so the pieces do point towards the 686 as I think the 66 was first introduced sometime in the early 1970's, not the late 70's or the early 80's although I'm not a 100% sure of that.

and the only reason why the 19 had that problem is because the shorter 128 gr bullets caused the weaker part of the cone that smith and wesson cut down to fit the 357 clyinder into the K frame to be exposed to more heat than usual with the longer 158 gr bullets, plus the practice of crushftting made that particular part even weaker as well, agrivating the problem even more.

although the scary thing is that problem with the 686 might have cost someone their life, so as he said that's when him and smith and wesson parted ways as that really shouldnt of happened period, as theres no excuse for a problem that serious to be overlooked like that on a brand new high quality model, even if it was a simple fix.

plus that k22 from that time period his good friend sold him when he couldnt shoot anymore that never fired all cylinders, ever, that he sent back to smith and wesson 2 times and to a "master" gunsmith twice and neither of them fixed it and he said he thought his friend had never shot it once hence why he didnt know it was defective like that

so its little wonder why he lost all faith in modern smith and wesson, hence why I made a point to look up why that was and basically I came to the conclusion that its best to avoid the post 1980 guns because of the practice of crushfitting the barrel, the fact that they started focusing more on semi autos and the craftsmenship of the revolvers started suffering because of that and the tooling wore out for the old guns.

and the same thing happened to colt as well with their pythons in particular.

You can still run into a problem, even with the Otis system. I bought an Otis system, but it ended up on the shelves of the cubic ton of stuff I've bought but never used. That otis system, and the bore-snakes shotgunners and lever-action shooters use can actually erode one (or bothe if you alternate) side of the forcing cone on your revolver, and one side of the chamber on the rifles. You can mitigate this a lot by making sure you wipe your plastic-covered cable squeeky clean after every pass, so it doesn't drag grime and grit with it and act like a round file, only with a much, much slower erosion action.

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Ralph J.