Time To Start Shooting My 617 In Competition

[AzShooter]

I've been having loads of fun with my Black Mamba, shooting our monthly Steel Challenge Matches and have been improving on each match. In March it's time for me to switch guns and start shooting my S&W 617.

Last year I shot it with iron sights. This year I've mounted my C-More 12 MOA red dot sight on it and went out to experiment with a variety of ammo.

I shot Champions, American Eagle, AutoMatch. Eley and Wolf Match Extra. I only have 3 bricks of Wolf but that gives me 2 matches. It shined as the best grouping ammo this time around. Very light recoil and a pleasure to shoot. Not too dirty, I was able to shoot 10 reloads before having to clean the cylinders. ( I take an electric drill with me for fast clean-up between stages.
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AutoMatch gave me too many failures to fire so it will be relegated as practice ammo while Champion and Target held their own but required cleaning after only 5 cylinders full. Eley had 2 failures to fires but went off on the second strike. Not match ammo.

CCI Mini Mags and Blazers I have a lot of and they work fine. When I'm out of the Wolf ME I'll probably just go with.

 

[ArchAngelCD]

Good luck in the matches, nice gun to shoot. Thanks for the ammo report.

Funny thing about the Eley ammo, for a very long time it was the top of the list for reliability and accuracy. Over the past 6 months I have heard of many FTF using Eley ammo. I was shooting Eley Tenex ammo last summer and had 1 from a fix of 50 fail to fire. That was in one of my very reliable rifles, not a junk gun.

 

[OKFC05]

My S&W 617 thrives on a steady diet of CCI, SV or Mini Mags.
Have observed other people having trouble with Eley also.

 

[SS336]

My 617 likes Wolf Match Target a lot. Shot rimfire silhouette with it for a few years and did surprisingly well. The only 4" revolver in the matches.
The rams at 100 yards were hard, but the turkeys at 75 were even tougher. This is all offhand.
I experimented with .22 ammo a lot trying to get the best, most reliable brand and Wolf won easily, but I shoot just about anything for fun.