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S&W-Smithing Maintenance, Repair, and Enhancement of Smith & Wesson and Other Firearms.


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Old 09-16-2012, 05:24 AM
Monad71 Monad71 is offline
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Default Polishing, Springs & Trigger Pull

After installing Wolff springs in my S&W J frame models 442 and 342 and lightly polishing all critical surfaces with my set of ultra- fine Norton Hard Arkansas gunsmithing stones, I was able to achieve really smooth trigger/reset action while reducing the factory trigger pull from over 12 lbs. to approximately 9-1/2 lbs. on average. The work was further confirmed with firing a variety of my personal defensive loads with no FTF.

I next proceeded to work on my new S&W 351C, which is a 7 shot hammeless .22 magnum load. The average trigger pull on this firearm measured 16-1/2 lbs. After careful polishing, I installed a 8-1/2 lb. Mainspring and 14lb. Rebound spring. The trigger pull was reduced to 11-3/4 lbs. on average, was very smooth, and fired without flaw a variety of CCI, Speer Gold Dot, Remington Premier, and Hornady Critical Defensive loads.

With 3 outstanding trigger/action jobs now completed, I turned my attention to my wife's S&W 317 J frame .22LR. It had an out of the box trigger pull of 12-3/4 lbs. So, I felt confident that after carefully polishing all the critical parts and surface areas, I could smooth and reduce the trigger pull with a combination of selected Wolff main and rebound springs. I selected the 8 lb. Wolff mainspring and a 14 lb. Wolff rebound spring. The factory springs are said to be a 12 lb. mainspring and 18 lb. rebound spring. When the firearm was assembled, I loaded some empty casings into the cylinder and measured the trigger pull for the 8 rounds in the cylinder. The trigger pull had increased! It now averaged 13-3/4 lbs. I removed the Wolff springs and reinstalled the factory main and rebound spring. The trigger pull averaged 12-1/2 lbs. with the factory springs. The trigger had a smaller standard deviation in the results, indicating a smoother action overall.

In closing, I was surprised that the Wolff spring substitution did not offer any improvement in the trigger pull. Rather, it resulted in an increase in trigger pull weight by some 1-1/4 lb.

Any thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Last edited by Monad71; 09-16-2012 at 07:39 AM. Reason: ask for help
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Old 09-17-2012, 05:12 AM
Monad71 Monad71 is offline
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Default End Result

Well, after looking over some notes, I chose to exchange the mainspring and rebound spring with a Wolff 8 lb. mainspring and balance that with a Wolff 13 lb. rebound spring. After reassembling the firearm, the cylinder was loaded with some spent casings and the DA trigger pull results were recorded. The trigger pull has now been reduced to a smooth 10-1/4 lb. pull as measured on my Lyman digital gauge. Much better!

I'll be going to the range later this morning to check reliability with some ammo.
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Old 09-17-2012, 07:46 PM
brucev brucev is offline
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I commend you on your enterprise and results. This is something i simply have not been willing to try on my revolvers. I hope your efforts will yield the results you want at the range. Sincerely. brucev.
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Old 09-21-2012, 05:28 AM
Monad71 Monad71 is offline
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Default Range results

I brought some CCI Stingers, CCI Mini-Mags and a box of Federal target ammo to the range. I shot numerous rounds of the Federal without issue, so I then tried a box of Stingers followed by a box of Mini-Mags. All rounds went off perfectly. I think in total, I shot a couple hundred rounds through the pistol.

With the 8 lb. Wolff mainspring and 13 lb. rebound spring installed, I tried fring off as fast as possible, the 8 rounds in the cylinder. Never a problem with outrunning the trigger reset.

As a last note, I installed a set of Crimson Trace LG405 grips on the revolver. Once I adjusted the laser to point of impact, at 10 feet, I could point that red dot at the bullseye while holding the revolver waist high, and hit that bullseye, time and time again. The target's bullseye was about the size of a quarter. I thought this was pretty neat, as it will allow my wife to point shoot this revolver with tremendous accuracy. She was pretty accurate with this gun at 7 yards, right out of the box. Now, with the action nicely polished, a respectable DA trigger pull, and lastly, some laser grips, this little S&W 317 will become her pocket companion!
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Old 06-27-2015, 08:11 AM
G-ManBart G-ManBart is offline
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I'm reviving this thread because I recently purchased a 351C as a practice gun for my wife. She normally carries a Smith 640 that I had Dave at D&L Sports fit with a set of custom night sights. The problem is she has a compressed disc in her neck that for some odd reason causes arm/shoulder pain if she does much shooting with any sort of recoil. She can get away with 20-30 shots of mild .38Spl, but that's about it. She carries the gun with .357 full power loads, and she shoots them just fine, but we were looking for a way to get her more training rounds without aggravating her arm/shoulder.

The plan almost worked because the 351C has enough recoil to know you're shooting something, but doesn't seem to bother her arm/shoulder. Problem is, the trigger pull is so heavy she literally can't get through a whole cylinder with stopping for a rest (she's very petite at just under 5'2" and like 110lbs). I did a quick test and it was something like 16lbs.

So, I'm off to a revolver specialist (Magna Port here in Michigan) to play with some springs to see if we can get it more manageable for her.

The one thing I wanted to point out that is something of a dirty little secret about most gun spring manufacturers including Wolf....there is very little quality control on spring weights. They take X diameter wire, made of Y kind of steel alloy, heat treat it following Z protocol, and label that a particular weight, i.e. 14lbs. They don't test the springs to make sure they fall within the correct range. I learned this a while back and built a spring tester to confirm it, and sure enough, take a couple of springs that were sold as the same weight, and they vary considerably...as in several pounds plus or minus.

I suspect the "14lb" spring Monad71 put in the first time was likely several pounds heavier, and that caused the increase in trigger pull over factory. I wish I had seen this thread at the time...would have been interesting to see if he could test it and compare (a tester only requires some nuts, bolts, washers and a fish weighing scale).

If anybody has a 1911, AR-15, Glock, Beretta (and some S&Ws) in their safe, just FYI, but Sprinco springs (not the recoil reducer gadget) are actually tested, and marked for weight and only cost a couple of bucks more than Wolf, ISMI, etc. They also offer moly treated and cryo stress relieved options. I've been running them for 7-8 years now and they've been perfect at the high round counts I go through (USPSA shooter). These better springs are in their Tactical Springs section (I have no affiliation with them).

I'll report back what we find out on the 351C today.
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Old 06-27-2015, 09:26 PM
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shovelwrench shovelwrench is offline
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I do the same light polish on most mating surfaces, de-burr and "break" all the corners.

BUT, never mess with the mainspring. I put a 12 or 13# rebound spring in and to the range I go....

Never ran into overunning the reset, but I feel a proper clockwork cleanup takes care of that possibility....

My 640 is 10lb 10oz pull
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