What's the consensus of this gun: Rock Island Armory M206 6RD 38Spl 2" Barrel

Is it worth 200 bucks?

I'm not expecting it to equal the famed Chief's Special, which is one of my all time favorite handguns.

I closely examined 7 very closely at the Market hall show when they first hit the market. I'm not a Colt armorer, but I am a S&W armorer, so I have a little experience with revolvers in general.
Every one of the revolvers I examined had dangerous timing issues. All of the cylinders would fail to rotate sufficiently to lock up when the trigger was slowly pulled back to hammer fall.
I've repaired similar shortcomings in the past, but the fixes all required parts and expertise.
Personally I wouldn't trust them. Worth 200 bucks? Not even close.

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I don't have Alzheimer's- My wife had me tested.

I have a 4 inch that I'm very pleased with. At least 1,000 rounds through it, no problems. Pretty decent trigger.

If I needed one, I'd buy it for $200.

$200 doesn't buy much in a gun shop these days. So it's a new gun competing at the price of top break H&Rs and Iver Johnsons. If that was my price limit, I would buy the new gun.

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Made it, Ma! Top of the world!

I have the RI 200 in 4" barrel. For the money, the gun mimics a Colt with the internal parts. I have completely taken the gun apart and reassembled paying close attention to the timing and cylinder lock up. All of the checks appear to be in order and I have had no problems at the range. I would try various brands of good ammo for best performance with the minimum of 100-150 rounds. The RI is a great gun for auto, home and tossing in the pack pack or fishing box for need be protection.

Nick

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NRA Instructor\GCA Gunsmith

DANG! Sounds like that vendor got a really bad batch of them! Almost sounds like maybe he picked up a bunch of factory rejects...

I don't own one, but have to admit the reviews for them are over the top. Amazing that all the bad ones found to be in one place.

Hmmmmmm

I'm very happy with mine.



Purchased in 2015. 152 error free rounds through it. Sights well, feels substantial and has always gone bang when asked.

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Mike
S&WCA #3065

I examined a half dozen of them at a nearby gun shop last week. If he'd had 'em at $200, I certainly would have bought at least one.

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Pisgah

I kick myself for not buying a couple when they were under $200.

I would not hesitate to buy a Rock Island.

It's been several years since my checkout, but these 7 were from 4 different dealers. Maybe a distributor got a "deal". Maybe I should do another series of checkouts. There seems to be a consensus of posters that quality has come up.

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I don't have Alzheimer's- My wife had me tested.

Think i'll buy a M 206 just because of the price,I have a friend that edc one.He never say anything bad a bout it.

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Life is short,live it fully.

I really considered ordering one at one point, but kind of lost interest. That said, I've only seen one in the flesh and wasn't in the market at the time, so perhaps shortsightedly I didn't check it out.

I'd really like to fondle one a bit to see for myself what I think.

I looked at a 4" one maybe a year ago, and thought it looked pretty decent. The only reason I didn't buy one was the fact that if there is anything I'm not short on, it's 4" 38's.

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John 3:16 .

I've been tempted a few times to pull the trigger on these things, but with the market flooded with used S&W revolvers (at least it was flooded for a time) at great prices, I never bothered.

If they ever came out with one in .327 mag, I'd jump at it. I'm not holding my breath though.

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-Mike-

It's from Armscor in the Philippines. Basically a knockoff of the Colt Detective Special. I have only fooled with a few at gun shows, but they seemed pretty solid to me. Several years ago they were selling for somewhat below $200. If I wanted a handgun of that nature, I'd buy one. But I already have a surplus of S&W and Colt snubbies. Some of the Gunmags have written pretty good reviews about them (and I suppose there may have been some which were not so good also, but I haven't seen those). In any event, better than a SNS for someone on a budget.

I wouldn't even THINK about buying something like this in a country where Smith and Ruger DA revolvers abound... You can have mine. My opinion, and it ain't humble. Good shooting, all!

Kaaskop49
Shield #5103