tulsamal
Member
I buy guns online all the time. New ones from Bud's or gun broker. And lots of used guns from this forum and the Ruger forum. Lots of good guys out there that need to sell a gun every now and then and I'm happy to snap up the ones I never see locally. Now I've got a problem/issue. I guess it's about time. You keep buying guns and having them shipped to you, sooner or later a gun is going to get damaged.
I want to say right up front that I don't blame the seller at all. I've got lots of photos of the gun pre-shipment and it looks normal. So I think the gun suffered a really sharp impact somewhere along the line. Now whether the gun was 100% before the impact or had an issue that had never caused a problem, guess we will never know that. So here's the story:
I saw an online ad for a S&W M57 no dash, four inch, nickel. I already had an M57-1, four inch, blue. But I had wanted the four inch nickel version since 1983 or so. Pre-US Army days. Just couldn't afford to buy one back then. So when I saw the ad, I was interested. Looked at the photos and it is a 97% kind of gun. No box or anything but really sharp gun, nickel in perfect condition, no yellowing, etc. He wanted more money than I really wanted to pay but every seller always wants more money than a cheapskate like me wants to pay! IMO, his price included shipping and it was right in line with the market and fair.
So we made the deal, I sent off the MO and my dealer sent a copy of his FFL. The gun finally came in and I went to get it. Already had visions of shooting it in my home pasture that night. But that hasn't happened. When my dealer handed me the gun, he had a look on his face like, "Let's see what you think." I saw the look and looked at the exterior carefully. It looked nice at first glance. Then I tried to open the cylinder and realized we had a problem.
(Disclaimer!!!! The US Army trained me as an armorer years ago. And I've taken apart a few S&W's for basic parts replacement on occasion. I've got the Jerry Kuhnhausen Shop Manual. But I KNOW I'm going to use the wrong term or totally mis-diagnose a problem. So bear with me if I describe a part and you realize I'm calling it by the wrong name!)
The cylinder release wouldn't move forward whatsoever. Gently tried to move the hammer or trigger a bit. Nothing would move. OK, we've all seen a S&W where the ejector rod has unscrewed and I've fixed that before. But I needed to get the cylinder to turn. My FFL transfer dealer is an older guy. (Like me.) And he had an assistant there even older than either one of us. So we ended up with three old guys with lots of S&W experience checking it out. The oldest guy moved the cylinder release rearward and got the hammer to release and then the cylinder would turn. (I knew that. D'oh!)
So we found a pencil with an eraser to push on the knurled end of the ejector rod and half a business card to keep the cylinder unlocked. My experience has been that the rod will be loose and easy to turn. Well, it wasn't. We wore the eraser right off the pencil and it never budged. I decided to go ahead and take the gun home and figure it out myself.
I sent the seller an email and told him what was happening. He has been supportive and concerned. He told me the cylinder had opened easily before he shipped the gun. He sent me a photo with the cylinder open. So it seems like something happened in shipping.
At home, I tried the usual methods of tightening an ejector rod. Figured I would get it with a tapered wooden stick. Finally it started moving. After a few turns, I realized the darn thing was getting longer. Wrong way. So I went the other way until it wouldn't get any shorter. Which looked suspiciously like where it started. And the cylinder latch was still frozen solid.
I really didn't want to take off the sideplate. It's a practically new appearing nickel gun and I would cry if I somehow caused it to flake. But it looked like it was take it apart or send it back. So I took off the grips, then all three sideplate screws. (Full set of Brownell's screwdrivers.) Tapped the grip frame a couple of times and the sideplate came right off. Just about pristine inside. Seeing how the sideplate screws weren't buggered up and the inside looked perfect, that pretty much took away my last doubts about condition. This gun needed to be fixed rather than returned.
Here's my first place where I don't know the right term.... when you push the cylinder release backwards that moves the internal bar rearward which allows the hammer to be pulled back. (Otherwise it is blocked at the rear.) I moved that bar back and forth and compared it to another vintage N frame I had on hand. It appeared to me that it wasn't going all the way forward. Forward of the hammer is a rectangular block that is supposed to move forward until it is flush. It was stopped before that and you could see the gap. So I took a small piece of wood and a small hammer and tapped it forward a couple of times. On the second or third tap, it moved forward and the cylinder rolled out of the gun into my hand.
I noticed a couple of things right away. The rear of the cylinder face is supposed to have two alignment pins sticking up. It only had one. I looked down and noticed the other one had fallen out when the cylinder opened. That pin was shiny on one end so it was obvious which way it went. I slipped it back where it went and gave it a couple of light taps. Seems to be seated well but what kind of impact would it take to unseat it in the first place?
The second thing was the relevant problem. Rear of the cylinder, middle of star, the center pin. The rounded pin that protrudes from the star and which locks into the frame. It was flush rather than sticking out. Pushed it with my finger and it wouldn't budge. OK, take the cylinder apart. Eventually I was down to just the long center pin and the star. I tapped the long end of the center pin a couple times and the rounded end popped out. Hmm, there's the problem.
I don't think I can take a successful picture because the part is too small but if you held it in your hand, you could see it easily. The rounded end of the center pin protrudes from the star and it has a definite bend to it. The long part under the star seems fine. Because of the bent part, you can turn the center pin inside of the star but it will only "go inside" it in one position. And it tends to want to stick in the down position once you are there.
1) Does this sound like shipping damage? If the cylinder was closed and the center pen engaged, perhaps a really hard shock sideways caused the pin to be bent. And even dislodged one of the alignment pins?
2) How the heck does the center pin attach to the star? Is it some permanent thing or does it unscrew or what? If the center pin come out, then it seems like I could put the pin on a flat metal surface and gently and slowly tap it straight again. Maybe!
3) If the center pin needs to be replaced, does somebody like Brownell's sell them? Are there dozens of sizes to be sorted through? And once I have one in hand, do they have to be fitted? I notice the shop manual talks about shortening one.
4) I realize you can't evaluate my gunsmithing skills but does this sound like a repair I can make or is it time to punt and head to a quality gunsmith?
Really nice gun. Not the seller's fault.
Thanks everybody.
Gregg
I want to say right up front that I don't blame the seller at all. I've got lots of photos of the gun pre-shipment and it looks normal. So I think the gun suffered a really sharp impact somewhere along the line. Now whether the gun was 100% before the impact or had an issue that had never caused a problem, guess we will never know that. So here's the story:
I saw an online ad for a S&W M57 no dash, four inch, nickel. I already had an M57-1, four inch, blue. But I had wanted the four inch nickel version since 1983 or so. Pre-US Army days. Just couldn't afford to buy one back then. So when I saw the ad, I was interested. Looked at the photos and it is a 97% kind of gun. No box or anything but really sharp gun, nickel in perfect condition, no yellowing, etc. He wanted more money than I really wanted to pay but every seller always wants more money than a cheapskate like me wants to pay! IMO, his price included shipping and it was right in line with the market and fair.
So we made the deal, I sent off the MO and my dealer sent a copy of his FFL. The gun finally came in and I went to get it. Already had visions of shooting it in my home pasture that night. But that hasn't happened. When my dealer handed me the gun, he had a look on his face like, "Let's see what you think." I saw the look and looked at the exterior carefully. It looked nice at first glance. Then I tried to open the cylinder and realized we had a problem.
(Disclaimer!!!! The US Army trained me as an armorer years ago. And I've taken apart a few S&W's for basic parts replacement on occasion. I've got the Jerry Kuhnhausen Shop Manual. But I KNOW I'm going to use the wrong term or totally mis-diagnose a problem. So bear with me if I describe a part and you realize I'm calling it by the wrong name!)
The cylinder release wouldn't move forward whatsoever. Gently tried to move the hammer or trigger a bit. Nothing would move. OK, we've all seen a S&W where the ejector rod has unscrewed and I've fixed that before. But I needed to get the cylinder to turn. My FFL transfer dealer is an older guy. (Like me.) And he had an assistant there even older than either one of us. So we ended up with three old guys with lots of S&W experience checking it out. The oldest guy moved the cylinder release rearward and got the hammer to release and then the cylinder would turn. (I knew that. D'oh!)
So we found a pencil with an eraser to push on the knurled end of the ejector rod and half a business card to keep the cylinder unlocked. My experience has been that the rod will be loose and easy to turn. Well, it wasn't. We wore the eraser right off the pencil and it never budged. I decided to go ahead and take the gun home and figure it out myself.
I sent the seller an email and told him what was happening. He has been supportive and concerned. He told me the cylinder had opened easily before he shipped the gun. He sent me a photo with the cylinder open. So it seems like something happened in shipping.
At home, I tried the usual methods of tightening an ejector rod. Figured I would get it with a tapered wooden stick. Finally it started moving. After a few turns, I realized the darn thing was getting longer. Wrong way. So I went the other way until it wouldn't get any shorter. Which looked suspiciously like where it started. And the cylinder latch was still frozen solid.
I really didn't want to take off the sideplate. It's a practically new appearing nickel gun and I would cry if I somehow caused it to flake. But it looked like it was take it apart or send it back. So I took off the grips, then all three sideplate screws. (Full set of Brownell's screwdrivers.) Tapped the grip frame a couple of times and the sideplate came right off. Just about pristine inside. Seeing how the sideplate screws weren't buggered up and the inside looked perfect, that pretty much took away my last doubts about condition. This gun needed to be fixed rather than returned.
Here's my first place where I don't know the right term.... when you push the cylinder release backwards that moves the internal bar rearward which allows the hammer to be pulled back. (Otherwise it is blocked at the rear.) I moved that bar back and forth and compared it to another vintage N frame I had on hand. It appeared to me that it wasn't going all the way forward. Forward of the hammer is a rectangular block that is supposed to move forward until it is flush. It was stopped before that and you could see the gap. So I took a small piece of wood and a small hammer and tapped it forward a couple of times. On the second or third tap, it moved forward and the cylinder rolled out of the gun into my hand.
I noticed a couple of things right away. The rear of the cylinder face is supposed to have two alignment pins sticking up. It only had one. I looked down and noticed the other one had fallen out when the cylinder opened. That pin was shiny on one end so it was obvious which way it went. I slipped it back where it went and gave it a couple of light taps. Seems to be seated well but what kind of impact would it take to unseat it in the first place?
The second thing was the relevant problem. Rear of the cylinder, middle of star, the center pin. The rounded pin that protrudes from the star and which locks into the frame. It was flush rather than sticking out. Pushed it with my finger and it wouldn't budge. OK, take the cylinder apart. Eventually I was down to just the long center pin and the star. I tapped the long end of the center pin a couple times and the rounded end popped out. Hmm, there's the problem.
I don't think I can take a successful picture because the part is too small but if you held it in your hand, you could see it easily. The rounded end of the center pin protrudes from the star and it has a definite bend to it. The long part under the star seems fine. Because of the bent part, you can turn the center pin inside of the star but it will only "go inside" it in one position. And it tends to want to stick in the down position once you are there.
1) Does this sound like shipping damage? If the cylinder was closed and the center pen engaged, perhaps a really hard shock sideways caused the pin to be bent. And even dislodged one of the alignment pins?
2) How the heck does the center pin attach to the star? Is it some permanent thing or does it unscrew or what? If the center pin come out, then it seems like I could put the pin on a flat metal surface and gently and slowly tap it straight again. Maybe!
3) If the center pin needs to be replaced, does somebody like Brownell's sell them? Are there dozens of sizes to be sorted through? And once I have one in hand, do they have to be fitted? I notice the shop manual talks about shortening one.
4) I realize you can't evaluate my gunsmithing skills but does this sound like a repair I can make or is it time to punt and head to a quality gunsmith?
Really nice gun. Not the seller's fault.
Thanks everybody.
Gregg
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