Two 625s Fail To Fire. Need Help.

[Bearbait in NM]

OK, dating the change in the requirement for moon clips. In the 2008 article by Brian Pearce in Handloader Magazine he has a sidebar describing this in his 45 Auto Rim article. He states that he bought a 625 mountain gun "about a decade ago" that would misfire without clips. "A number of years later, I obtained a 625-8 .45 acp, and without moon clips it too regularly misfired".

He goes onto describing conversations with S&W producing a variety of responses, with the upshot being that current (2008 article) Model 625's require clips. He goes on to explain that it was a bitterly contested internally at S&W, per some of his contacts at the time. He calls these ""engineering changes"" in his article. I double quoted, as his term was within quotes in his article.

This is about the only information that I have been able to find that I would call somewhat official. It might be related to an official engineering change, or an unofficial engineering change, if such a beast exists.

My 625 PC will fire acp rounds, sans clips. But, if they are excessively crimped, they will not as the firing pin drives the crimped portion into throat. When you plunk your round into the chamber, if you apply a bit of thumb pressure onto the back of the round, you should be able to feel the loaded round go a tad deeper if the case mouth is slipping past the stop shoulder. If the round is solid against the stop shoulder, and still misfires then you have too much working headspace for reliable ignition (sans clips). With that OAL brass length, and firing pin length, assuming the rest of the gun has not been modified.

Craig

 

[Dale53]

I know for a fact that some of the 625's will work fine without moon clips and the later ones will not.

The Rimz clips are the answer for range use. I have a pair of 625's and NEVER try to fire .45 ACP without clips. I commonly use the Rimz clips but also have a pile of Ranch Products full moon clips along with tools to load and unload them.

I have ended up using mostly .45 Auto rim cases (I cast my own bullets and reload) for general use.

The O.P. does not have a problem, IMHO, just needs to use moon clips with ACP cases (and cartridges) or Auto rim cases (and cartridges) if he doesn't wish to fool with the clips.

My two 625's are two of my most favored revolvers. They are superb shooting machines and I have a pile of nice targets to prove it.

FWIW
Dale53

 

[at_liberty]

I need some help with a FTF problem.
I went to the range yesterday with two new to me 625s.
One is a 625-2 5" bbl and the other is a 625-10 2.1" bbl.

Both are chambered for .45 ACP. I know that the chambers in
the cylinder are stepped to allow shooting without moon clips,
however when I tried to shoot both guns, I was getting light
primer strikes. One or two chambers would fire, but on the rest,
the firing pin just dimpled the primer. I tried this with
three different brands or ammo, so I know that that is not the problem.

When I got home I tried the pen test on both guns.
I cocked the gun, inserted a pen into the barrel, and pulled the trigger.
The pen shot up to the ceiling on all 6 chambers of both guns.
I examined the space between the back of the cylinder and the
strike plate (?) and it seems that there is too much space for
the firing pin to hit the primer.
Do you think that using moon clips would take up some of the
space and fix this problem?

Is there any other way to lessen the space behind the cylinder?
I don't shoot these in competition, so I don't need to empty the
cylinder and reload quickly, and I really would prefer to shoot
these guns without moon clips.

Any help or advice would be appreciated.

Thanks,
Stu

You bought the wrong guns, if not up for using moon clips.

 

[ontargetagain]

I have a 625-8 JM and the owners manual states the gun is to be used with moonclips. I have fired it both ways successfully but continue to use it with moonclips.

Are you having FTF in DA only? Can you fire without FTF's in SA? There may be an issue with DA cocking travel of the hammer.

With your side plate off on the dash-10 model check for clearance of the mainspring to rebound spring carrier, are they by chance making contact when you SA cock the hammer and interfering? I have just recently done a full action job following along with the Jerry Miculek DVD and have installed Wolff springs to my gun. The Wolff spring is the standard power mainspring and I noticed it making contact with the rebound slide at full cock, I put a very slight arch in the spring and softend up the nose of the rebound slide.

I reload with CCI primers, I wanted my gun to be able to fire all ammo and I am not experiencing any FTF's and my DA is at about 8lbs with a SA of about 3lbs and a nice smooth DA and clean SA release.

I am not sure that you could tell if someone properly removed your sideplate screws just one time to possibly work on the action or change the springs. The Wolff mainspring will have a rib on it where factory does not. However both Wolff mainsprings, std power and reduced power have the ribs but there will be a significant arch to the reduced power mainspring.

Any idea on your DA and SA trigger pulls? That may tell you the true condition of action and springs in your guns.
Karl

 

[Desert Pete]

Installed a Wolff spring kit in my 625. I only use Federal Match primers. I have never had an FTF with either auto rim or rimless using moon clips.

FWIW, the side plate screws look factory new so they are no indicator bubba was there.