ACCURACY AFTER REAMING A S&W 22 REVOLVER - PICS

[chief38]

There have been a few discussions as of late regarding accuracy loss of S&W rimfire M17, M18 & similar revolvers. This particular M18 pictured below is the first one I ever reamed many years ago and although I have not shot it in a while I promised I would shoot it this week to record the accuracy.

The "flyers" are just me - I was up all night with a bad stomach, got next to no sleep and these targets do not represent what the real accuracy of this revolver truly is. It was probably the worst shooting I've done with this particular revolver in a very long time. I was just not having a good day at the range today. That said, you can see that despite the flyers, the groups are relatively descent. These were shot using CCI 40 grain Hi-Vel. ammo and at 50 feet indoors with factory iron sights. The left target has 10 shots in it and the right has 6.

I've owned this particular revolver for many years and reaming with the Manson Reamer has had no ill affect on accuracy at all - as far as I can tell. I still own a few S&W rimfire revolver's that have still not been reamed yet and for some reason I do not shoot them as well as I can this one. I just might get to reaming them soon as well.

Not only has the revolver retained its accuracy, ejecting the spent cases is now a pleasure and I there is no reason to smack the ejector rod hard.

While certainly not my best target work this morning, at least it does show the group size and consistency. I would not hesitate reaming a cylinder if you are struggling to eject spent cases.

 

[steelslaver]

Excellent, I did a similar test using a machine rest and my most accurate K22 had been reamed.

I have reamed 6 or so K22 cylinders and in every case the amount of material removed was very small and the cutting extremely small. More like powdered metal. Plus the reamer usually does not even start to cut until it is over 1/3 or more inside the chamber.

I can see how it might cause some small changes, either plus or minus, in a high precision rifle with a single fixed chamber. But, in a revolver with multiple chambers, the slack necessary for the cylinder to rotate on the yoke and the cylinder stop to move and engage, the jump from cylinder to forcing cone etc, the idea that a few 10 thousands in the chamber dimensions will be a deciding factor that effects the accuracy is ridiculous.

Besides that as far as 22lr chamber dimensions
here are all the PGT variations,

Notice how tiny some of the variations are
Which is best? Lots of precision 22 rimfire rifle shooters are debating this and their 50 yard groups are well under 0.40