"Collector value is reduced" is a false argument against altering just about any production, post-WWII S&W handgun. If they were made in any significant number, they lost "collector" interest as soon as they were shot, or carried a bit in a holster, or the box and documents got lost, or the grips were switched, or the sights were changed to something the shooter liked better.
"Collectors" seem to want pristine, unfired guns with the original packaging and contents. The exceptions to this are factory variations that are really old or models that are rare, i.e. manufactured in very limited quantities. Offer an original finish, unaltered example of, say, a Model 19-3 with no box or papers and some blue wear to a "collector" and he will "sniff-sniff" with contempt. "It's not collector quality..."
I think that the full-lug barrels are great for shooting magnum rounds, but the weight is excessive for just carrying the gun around, and the problem gets worse as the barrel gets longer. When the L frame, full lug barrel M-686 first came out, I bought the first one I saw, a six incher. I had been carrying a 6 inch Model 66 at work, so the extra barrel length wasn't a problem, but the extra weight kept trying to pull my pants down! And this was on a Sam Browne rig! With a Combat Magnum or 1950 Target style barrel, this would have been the perfect uniform.357 Mag for me.
A 4 inch Combat Magnum or Model 29/629 full lug would make some sense to me, because the extra weight helps tame recoil in guns that actually produce recoil, but the 6 inch barrel supplies the extra weight without a lug. But S&W never made a 4 inch Combat Mag or M-29/629 with a full lug barrel. 3 inchers, but no 4 inchers! 'Splain me that!
I bought a Model 686 Mountain Gun and a Model 686 5 inch, non lug barrel. The slender tubes make them much faster handling and they are big and heavy enough already that recoil is manageable.
The full lug barrels on S&W handguns in .45 Colt and .45 ACP are really over-kill in the weight department. Neither round kicks hard enough to need extra weight.
I once had a M-686 with the 8-3/8 inch barrel with the scope ring cuts. It hardly recoiled at all, but it was so heavy, and particularly muzzle-heavy, that I couldn't hold it steady without a rest. Add a scope, and it waggled so much off-hand that it was hard to get it held on target long enough to trigger the shot. Perhaps lugged to the extreme!
The 5 and 5-1/2 inch M-627's are other good examples of full lug barrels in which the extra weight isn't needed.
For range use, it really doesn't matter. You aren't carrying the gun around all day. But for a gun that will be worn on a belt for 8, 10 or 12 hours at a time, while you are on foot a lot of it, the option of a standard weight barrel would be tremendous, and a custom job well worth the cost if you want it bad enough.
Like any collector is going to salivate over a 25 year old, holster-worn, standard, 4 inch Model 586 just because you haven't cut the lug off anyways!
Guys, these are tools, not religious artifacts; Moses didn't carry them around in the Ark of the Covenant for 40 years. They are just tools, and the common ones are just calling to be made more user-friendly, handy or personalized by modification. I'm not going to sweat the loss of $100-$200 resale value when I have gotten so much more pleasure from the gun after I personalized it.
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