Today was another nasty February day, rainy and cold as my mother in law's heart, which meant that after the chores were done it was time to get inside the 6" bicentennial Ruger. This was also supposed to be just a quick cleaning to allow for a baseline range trip before any modifications happened. Yeah right. You should know by now that my life doesn't work that way.
Dry firing this one made me think that someone has already been inside. Double and single action trigger pulls were better than usual for a Ruger revolver but were not as smooth as a Smith. The trigger pull gauge confirmed what the calibrated finger told me: 3 lbs 6 oz for single action, 8 lbs 12 oz for double action.
The pull weights weren't bad but it felt somewhat gritty. This leads me to believe that it had just a spring swap and not much else.
Hammer tension was quite a bit lighter than the 4" gun. The same high-low breakover point was observed at the midpoint of the hammer travel. The high side was 40 ounces, the low side was 32 ounces.
Taking the grips off revealed the usual mung around the edges and a pretty normal looking inside. The normal part stopped when the hammer spring and strut were removed. Instead of the usual pear-shaped strut end, this one has been shaved and threaded to allow a nut to thread on and form the top spring stop.
If the rest of the gun had been pristine and the trigger pull smoother I would think that this was a really cool gunsmithing trick. As it is, I'm more inclined to think that this was a home expedient repair for a spring that was just a wee bit too short to be reliable. I think I would have shimmed the spring at the bottom instead of threading the top. The threads at the very top may be rubbing on the hammer and contributing to the un-smooth action cycling. We'll put some Dykem on that later and find out.
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