Last year with the rule change allowing 8 shot minor in revolver I got motivated to gear up and shoot some revolver and started almost from scratch, so I can relate to the question. I started with a stock 5” 627PC gun I had bought several years ago and initially figured it would be a piece of cake to get the revolver, gear, ammo running 100% and just focus on the shooting. It didn’t exactly work out that way for me but after some trial and error, and leveraging off what other revolver shooters wrote/told me, things are working pretty well now.
Given the chance to do it over again here is what I would do to avoid some of my dead end detours:
1. Use Starline short colt brass and 147 or 160 grain lead bullets. – I messed with the cut .38 mids for several months and loved the concept of having 38 super length brass and the more forgiving case volume, but I could not get acceptable accuracy…and I tried. Most likely this was due to me using a mix of brass headstamps and messing with the cut length (don’t ask why I did this). After some load development with the starline short colts I ended up with good loads using 147 grain blue bullets and 160 grain Bayou Bullets and either WST, Clay Dot, or American Select powder.
2. My 627 had a rough forcing cone and horrible muzzle crown finishing (probably built on a Monday…really not impressed with the S&W’s PC shop). I ended up cutting the forcing cone to 11 degrees and lapping it using Brownell’s forcing cone chamfer tool, and finishing the muzzle crown. This alone cut my group size almost in half. I think the majority of the benefit came from truing up the forcing cone while the burrs on the muzzle were just annoying to look at.
3. Bought a replacement hammer and bobbed it so it is flush with the frame (I wanted to keep the original hammer stock in case I sell it), and installed a Bang company spring kit (Jerry Miculek’s kit) and did some internal polishing to smooth things up. I tried some other rebound spring weights but ended up using the one that came with the kit as for me it gives a crisp reset and balanced smoothness on the trigger pull. Had to install a couple of Power Custom’s hammer shims as the hammer was rubbing occasionally on the left side ( I hear this is common) and I think that was contributing to an occasional light strike. The trigger pull is about 6 ¼ pounds and is reliable if I use federal primers.
4. Use Federal small pistol primers. See above.
5. Be prepared to be paid a visit by Skip Chambers. I had a couple thousand rounds (and a modest amount of dry firing) through the gun when I got bit by Skip. At first I thought they were light hammer strikes, but then I had a stage where I had 4 or 5 no-fires in the same moon clip and when I took a look at the moon clip I saw the telltale hammer indentations on the case head…and not on the primer. There are some good threads on BE that talk about how to deal with notch peening and put a stop to skipping chambers.
6. In my case adding an aftermarket extended travel firing pin seemed to help in getting reliable ignition. Some folks use the stock one with no issues. I’ve tried the Apex and Cylinder & Slide and they both seem to work about the same for me.
A couple of things that are mainly personal preference:
1. Moonclips - I’ve been using the RevolverSupply .025 moon clips and they hold the starline short colts pretty well.
Another revolver shooter showed me his HearthCo clips and they seemed to be a little tighter with the starline short colt brass.
2. Belt/holster gear – Safariland ELS belt, an old Safariland 002 holster, and a North Mountain 4 post moon clip holder (it is simple and works). I like the 002 holster, however a rig similar to what the winner of the Revo nationals (TGO) used looks interesting which I believe is a Safariland 014 attach kit with a bladetech type holster mounted to it.
3. Grip – Installed a Hogue big butt with the fingerless rubber and I don’t have real small hands. I really like this grip.
At this point it now runs reliably, is accurate enough (about 2” at 20 yards), the trigger is nice, and it is a lot of fun to shoot.
Anyway, this summarizes my dabbling into Revolver.
Hopefully you get to where you want to be with minimal hassles!
