I now have had the gun for 2-1/2 weeks. 10 days ago went to the range and shot 300 rounds of CCI mini mags. The gun was a delight to shoot with no problems at all. Came home, cleaned it,oiled it, and put it in the safe. Yesterday I took it to the gun range and shot 250 rounds, same ammo copper plated 40gr round nose mini mags. Perfect performance. This morning I went to clean it. I use a Hoppe's 22cal snake for the barrel. It seems the brass leed would not go through so after a few minutes I finally got it to come out the crown end. As I'm pulling it through it became very difficult. I pulled much much harder and it finally came through with slivers of metal that looked like the rifiling was coming off. They were about 3/4" long and 1/16" wide plus smaller slivers. Called S&W, sent me a return label, its on its way. I have never had anything close to this with any of my handguns. I clean all my hand guns with the appropriate Cal boar snake and Hoppe's #9. They are all in pristine condition and when you look down the barrells of all of them they sparkle inside. I can't imagine I did anything wrong. I thought at the end of my session on the range yesterday it seemed the last 100 roungs were on the quiet side. I just shrugged it off as maybe my ears were plugged. May-be NOT. I'll keep you all informed. Between the TD Screw that kept coming loose and now this its been a bitter sweet ownership.

Are you sure the strips of metal are not lead? I just can't believe you could remove rifling with a bore snake. I sure nope not and I have 6 of them.

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USN Retired/VN VET
M&P X5

It's probably lead that had built up in the barrel. I shoot only lead projectiles out of my 629 and sometimes when I'm cleaning it, long slivers of lead peel out out the barrel.

It's a lead build up. Your barrel is fine.

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Mike
S&WCA #3065

No doubt about it, it's lead. Even the copper colored bullets can leave lead, as they aren't plated, it's a copper wash. With standard velocity ammo, leading is less prevalent than with the high velocity due heat and friction. Also, if you have a rough finish on the barrel lands and grooves, the barrel will tend to lead worse.

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So many S&W's, so few funds!!

Guess I will wait longer to buy a Victory...at least until the problems subside a bunch! Regards, Ed

Well that's exactly what it looked like what you guys showed in your reply's. Damn !!! I sent it in for nothing. Does that mean a snake is not a good thing to use on the victory? How do I get that lead out without damaging the boar. This is a new thing for me. I have a ruger 22LR rifle and have shot 3-4 hundred at a time with plain lead bullets, and never had this problem. Is it because of the bull barrel on the Victory that it heats up and causes this mess? Well....it will be interesting to see what Smith & Wesson has to say. I'm learning the hard way. Thank you Guys for these great reply's. How does one break through that lead? It was amazing I got the snake out. I do have a 22cal bronze brush and rods, seems that would be the more effective thing to use. I use Hoppes #9 but their must be something better to use for this gun with the lead problem. I wonder if S&W will clean it for me. LOL!, and hopefully do something with the TD screw. I'll be crazy for the next several weeks till I hear from them. So......if anyone has cleaning tips for this Victory for me I would appreciate your reply's. Thanks so much everyone.

Hey Paul, don't feel so bad. None of us are perfect and neither is the Victory. When I bought mine a few months ago, the additional spare magazine that I bought as well wasn't properly assembled. The base plate was half on and half off. Poor quality control on S&W's part. As far as the leading in the bore is concerned, it can happen. It has happened to me as well and believe me the snake is a terrific cleaner for that issue....

My Victory has been perfect, shoots like a dream, almost as accurate as my Mod 41.

You would think Customer Service would have caught it, maybe they have some policy that dictates when we have a problem, just send it in.

Targets guy: That one was really leaded up.

You won't be able to pull out rifling. What you did pull is strips of lead. Just brush and elbow grease would fix "the problem" I'm surprised that copper plated bullets leaded barrel so much.

It was worse than it looked. I got the cleaning rod so stuck in the barrel I had to take it to a gunsmith. He had to put it in his barrel vice and get a "puller" to finally remove the cleaning rod (a one piece rod). The rod was totaled but the barrel was fine. That build up was caused by Remington Thunderbolts and me shooting about 150 of them at once. Now for every 50 rounds I put through the barrel only ten are T-bolts. That really helps. Once the last brick of T-bolts are gone no more of those for me.

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Mike
S&WCA #3065

Paul, take a look at a product called "Strike Hold". I am very happy with the results it has given me. Especially on the cylinder of my .357s when I fire .38 specials in them. Amazon sells it.

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Mike
S&WCA #3065

My 617 yields strips of lead like that. I imagine S&W wants to look at any "problem" reported on the new Victory model in particular. Version 1.0 of anything gets a lot of scrutiny to correct any problems that may occur with actual use. That and the liability gorilla in the room on any product these days.

Sometimes I have had a bore lead badly at first, but after 'breaking it in' no more problems. May not be the Thunderbolts fault.

I shoot Thunderbolts in my Victory and Mark III and a Beretta U22 and have seen no leading. I mostly shoot Norma Tac 22 but still have 1500 rounds of Thunderbolts to shoot up.

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USN Retired/VN VET
M&P X5

I've been paying a lot of attention (something I'm rarely accused of doing!) to what people have to say about .22 ammo since I bought my first Model 41, and a lot of people have made disparaging remarks about Thunderbolts. I bought some when I first came out, and have used in my Browning Challenger and a couple target rifles, and haven't had any problems, but most of the reports seem to come from people who have purchased it more recently. For that reason, plus the fact I have several thousand rounds of Winchester Wildcat, I don't think I'd buy any and try something else, at least until the reports start indicating better luck.

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So many S&W's, so few funds!!

I've been one of those bad mouthing the Thunderbolts and believe me I don't enjoy doing it. But I don't enjoy cleaning out the fouling either. It leaves deposits on both my SW22 and my .22 M&P compact. None of the other ammo does.

Now I will admit on both of those pistols I fire 50 rounds very quickly; going through the mags at about two shoots per second and shooting through five mags at a time. The barrel is very warm when I stop to reload the mags. That may have something to do with it as the Thunderbolts are not nearly as bad in leaving deposits in my revolvers which I shoot much more slowly.

Still I have no leading problems in my pistols with TAC-22, Aguila, Remington Gold, CCI mag or Lillier and Bellot. Only the Thunderbolts; three different brics worth.

So bye-bye Thunderbolts; about 275 rounds left to go.

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Mike
S&WCA #3065

You may have hit on something here. Rate of fire might do it as I never load more then 5 rounds, 5 shot groups, and shoot those petty slow.

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USN Retired/VN VET
M&P X5

Use a wire brush in your barrel with the No.9 cleaner which will strip the lead out of the barrel Before long it will probably stop doing this but those Thunderbolts are about as Bad as you can get for being dirty and leading problems as you may ever see from any one brand. I have some in stock and thats where its staying unless I can find a buyer for it.

Hey Kidcom, I purchased two extra mags when I bought the Victory and that is exactly what happened to me.The base plate was half on and half off on one of them. Kept giving me problems when in the gun. A simple fix, took it apart, cleaned it for I thought something was inside causing it to bind,saw the problem, reassembled and was fine. Their is a video on youtube about cleaning lead out of gun barrels. This guy used a product called CHORE BOY copper pot scrubbers. You take a small amount of copper and wrap it around a brush and put it through.The copper gets the lead completely out. He showed the inside of the barrel before and after WOW! It look ed like my victory did (a disaster) and sparkled afterwords. Their are other videos using the copper material and several other reply's of how well the copper cleans lead and does not damage the boar. I found the scrubbers at ACE hardware today.

Just found this old thread but thought I'd reply and maybe get it going again. I have a one year old Victory 22 that has had about 4 or 5000 rounds put through. The last two times we took it to the range, I started pulling the same metal shavings out of it and noticed an odd spot on the muzzle crown. Accuracy was also not as good as it was.
Just got back from my gunsmith who determined it was excessive lead spall. He cleaned it up and lapped the muzzle crown. It looks pretty good now but he feels there is possibly a manufacturing issue with the barrel. Going to take it to the range once or twice more to see what happens before contacting S&W.
Anyone else still having this problem?

Please keep us informed as to how it goes.

Took it to the range today and put 500 rounds through it. Didn't notice all the lead chips and when I took it home to clean, just found the expected soot from gun powder. Comparing this gun to the M22 it replaced, the barrel runs much hotter and the rifling seems much lighter. I think it is because of those two things, this gun will not just eat whatever ammo I give it. I have typically bought anything available including non coated (I don't think 22 are actually jacketed) stuff like Thunderbolts. This time out I had nothing but Herter and Remington. Hopefully that is the cure.

One thing I normally do, is to run a soaked patch of Hoppe's through the bore and let is soak there for a couple ours before running a bore snake through it. If it is initially rough a tight patch with bore shine run back & forth many times can slick up a bore and cause less leading.

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H Richard
SWCA1967 SWHF244