I thought this would be interesting for the rest of you to know about. I am also interested to find out if any of you have had the same issue.

I have a 14" S&W 460 performance center with a crooked barrel. What I mean is that the barrel is cocked to the right in the frame.

I originally had a scope mounted on the integral weaver rail and noticed no issues other than difficulties dealing with a short eye relief.

Not long ago I bought a Wiegand "wieg-a-tinny" scope base and had it modified to fit the gun (unmodified it won't clear the integral rail). Once I had everything set up I found it impossible to zero my scope for windage. It was initially shooting 27 moa to the right! I lapped my rings and rechecked and remounted everything and the problem improved by only 3 moa.

I then decided to check things out with a set of scope levels and my scope was all level and mounted straight when checked with the gun mounted sideways in a vise. Then for the heck of it I decided to check the gun to see if it was level end-to-end. I discovered at that point that with the gun mounted right side up in the vise and the frame leveled that the barrel pointed upward (to the right side of the gun) very noticeably.

So go figure I have a bad gun. I got a shipping label from S&W today and sent it in with a note describing these issues.

The way I see it either the back of the barrel shroud isn't square, the front of the frame isn't square or the threads in the frame aren't square.

Has anyone else had this issue with their extended barrel 460?

get a piece of 7/16 round stock or even a 7/16 dowel (.4375 od). use a grinder or sander to put a point on the center of one end. Slide point end down barrel with cylinder open. It should hit the firing pin hole. I would suspect either the barrel liner itself or the frame to be threaded out of square to cause this. It could be the shroud, but it would have to cause the barrel to pull to the side when torqued. Most likely to me is the frame being miss drilled and treaded.

That's a lot of crooked barrel.


Rarely someone will post a similar problem but I have never seen it posted here with an extended barrel 460?

Sending it back to S&W sounds like the best option.

Good luck.

__________________
Scoundrel & Ne'er-Do-Well

The first level on the frame as clamped and leveled in the vise



The second level on the muzzle break. Before anyone says anything I swapped levels end for end and even stuck the levels on the barrel and the barrel shroud and the second level is off the entire length.

If I level the barrel in the vise then the frame is off by the amount seen in the second picture.

Do you have any better pics??? Say a pic showing the whole pistol from the top looking down from the frame to the barrel tip. I see what you did in the pics there but they far from tell anything very useful.

Photos are big & clear to me. I like all posts on gun problems. Each seems to be different..

I do not nor would it be very helpful.

Looking at the gun from the top you cannot tell there are any issues with the naked eye. The barrel is off center by maybe .050" if I did my algebra correct for a ~24moa deflection. Maybe someone else can figure the math better than me.

The fact the problem is not apparent with the naked eye caused me to first have to eliminate the rings as the issue, then the base and finally the gun it self.

Initially I discovered the real problem when running a machinist rule along the integrated rail edge toward the back of the frame and noticed the gap (between the ruler and my scope base on the frame) on the right side was smaller than on the left

When it comes to problems like these there are very few people out there who know enough to help trouble shoot.

I'd like to thank "ruggy" he did his best to walk me through this and eliminate the simple stuff first.

M1--l believe your barrel is actually three pieces. Brake, shroud, inner liner.

lnner liner screws into frame. Shroud slips over liner and the brake acts like a NUT.

Holding it all in place by tension...The liner stretched between frame and brake..

0dds are likely ZERO for a crooked barrel under tension...Shroud might not be SQUARE.

Would cause barrel to be off center of frame and misaligned.

These barrels/liners are made by Lothar Walther in Cumming Ga..

Kinda like the old Dan Wesson revolvers.. Only S&W can remove yours tho

So how this one is attached to the shroud is by the barrel nut at the end of the shroud which in this case happens to be the part of the barrel with the weaver rails on it.

I do get what you are saying though. I suppose I'll see what S&W has to say in a few weeks when they get done looking it over.

Keep us posted to how S&W does at helping you .

I got my 460 back about two weeks ago.

They replaced the barrel, barrel nut, compensator and jam nut, cylinder and crane.

Apparently it failed their test fire twice and was spitting lead badly according to the notest they included.

I called S&W and they didn't have any other notes on it.

When I got it unboxed and put it in the vise again to check it with the levels it was a lot closer to straight than before and I can actually zero it now.

Also S&W didn't charge me for anything to include the shipping both ways from Alaska. I will say I'm very happy with the experience

M1... Will be happy to verify Smith&Wessons' work for ya.. All you gotta

do ls pay MY FREIGHT to Alaska from Augusta and back:-) Seriously, l am

happy they made good on your gun... Hopefully you can put some meat

on the table by the time, as Gene Autry used to sing when I was a boy,

''Santa Clause Comes To Town''

I sure hope to. Maybe some hogs or axis deer once I get moved to Texas this fall.