Epicuren
Member
Long time lurker; first time poster here. I picked up my first "Hillary Hole" Smith week before last; promptly cleaned it and headed to my range.
First the good news: The sights are awesome!. It shot very tight groups with POI about 2" below POA at 10 yards, not quite as good as my 6" Model 14 but still impressive for a 2.5" barrel. Recoil was very manageable for a light weight gun (much better than my 640) and follow up shots were very fast with aid of the magnificent sights. For me, balance was not a issue due to it's weight. The stocks will be replaced with Ahrends Boot Grips, but were pleasant enough, though too aggressive and massive for my tastes.
Now the bad news: I ran 300 rounds of my favorite reloads (158 gr. LSWC over 3.3 gr Bullseye in mixed cases with CCI primers) and had 4 FTFs. Since my plan was to use this gun for winter CC, I was very disappointed. Research here and at other forums lead me to conclude that the problem was either the shorter (0.485") firing pin Smith now uses; or the very hard CCI primers; or both. I loaded another 100 rounds using CCI, 100 using PMC (from the Great Primer Shortage of 2009) and bought 2 boxes of American Eagle to compare the "softer" Federal primers. I returned to the range yesterday and all 300 rounds fired without failure. Upon further inspection of the dud rounds I discovered that the primers were 0.001" to 0.002" above flush while all of the second test rounds were flush to 0.002" below. My original rounds were primed on press and my second batch I hand primed to assure consistency. So the problem was not the gun or the primers; but my loading. Now, I've never had this problem with my 3 J frames nor my model 14, 15, 586 or Colt Trooper; so I suppose we could conclude that this gun is ammo picky and I'll not carry it until I replace the firing pin with an Apex 0.495" pin, do a hysterectomy to remove the lock and have 1000 rounds without a FTF. I'll keep y'all posted.
First the good news: The sights are awesome!. It shot very tight groups with POI about 2" below POA at 10 yards, not quite as good as my 6" Model 14 but still impressive for a 2.5" barrel. Recoil was very manageable for a light weight gun (much better than my 640) and follow up shots were very fast with aid of the magnificent sights. For me, balance was not a issue due to it's weight. The stocks will be replaced with Ahrends Boot Grips, but were pleasant enough, though too aggressive and massive for my tastes.
Now the bad news: I ran 300 rounds of my favorite reloads (158 gr. LSWC over 3.3 gr Bullseye in mixed cases with CCI primers) and had 4 FTFs. Since my plan was to use this gun for winter CC, I was very disappointed. Research here and at other forums lead me to conclude that the problem was either the shorter (0.485") firing pin Smith now uses; or the very hard CCI primers; or both. I loaded another 100 rounds using CCI, 100 using PMC (from the Great Primer Shortage of 2009) and bought 2 boxes of American Eagle to compare the "softer" Federal primers. I returned to the range yesterday and all 300 rounds fired without failure. Upon further inspection of the dud rounds I discovered that the primers were 0.001" to 0.002" above flush while all of the second test rounds were flush to 0.002" below. My original rounds were primed on press and my second batch I hand primed to assure consistency. So the problem was not the gun or the primers; but my loading. Now, I've never had this problem with my 3 J frames nor my model 14, 15, 586 or Colt Trooper; so I suppose we could conclude that this gun is ammo picky and I'll not carry it until I replace the firing pin with an Apex 0.495" pin, do a hysterectomy to remove the lock and have 1000 rounds without a FTF. I'll keep y'all posted.
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