Anyone out there put one of these in their Model 617? If you did how were your results?
I got one last week and was very impressed by the quality of the part but after I put it in my 617-6 was very disappointed with the results.
When I first installed it there was interference between the rebound slide and mainspring (the geometry of the APEX hammer/mainspring interface is different) so the DA had a hitch at the end of travel and you couldn't cock the hammer for SA without excessive force. Fixed that problem by slightly stoning the rebound slide for clearance.
I also installed the "competition" rebound spring that came with the hammer kit. This spring was much shorter than the 11lb. Wolf bring I already had in the gun. Checked the trigger pull before and after with just trigger, cylinder stop and rebound slide/spring in the gun. This spring alone reduced the rebound resistance on the trigger by a full 1lb.
Assembled the gun and took it to the range. Had to bring the DA TP up to 7lb. 9oz for reliability with CCI mini mags but to get it this good I had to put the factory firing pin back in. The C&S extended firing pin I already had in the gun didn't work well with the APEX hammer (hits on rims where light). This was only about 1lb. lower than it was with the factory hammer, C&S extended firing pin, 11lb. rebound spring and reduced power Wolf main spring (whose tension was adjusted with 8-32 set screw instead of a standard strain screw). Also the trigger reset with the APEX rebound spring is was marginal. So it looks like I paid $150 for about a 1lb. DA trigger pull improvement (with a slower trigger reset) that I probably could have gotten by cutting a few coils off the wolf 11lb. rebound spring using the factory hammer.
Note: This gun had the usual internal parts polish job I do on all my centerfire revolvers that I usually get a (federal primer reliable) 6.5 to 7.25 DA trigger pull on with a wolf 12lb. rebound spring and reduced power mainspring (tension adjusted with 8-32 set screw instead of STD strain screw).
APEX Mass Driver Hammer for M617
Linear Mode
