I just went through the process of installing the Apex Tactical J-frame spring kit in my 442-1 yesterday. I haven’t had a chance to get it to the range yet, but man is this a much improved DA press. What else can one do to smooth up the DA press on a S&W J-frame? Better to or worth it to send it off for a trigger job?
In my experience, the rebound slide bearing surface can occasionally have tiny burrs and chattermarks that come through in the trigger press as "hitches."
You can polish manually, or you can dry-fire (with snap caps)/shoot a bunch. Honestly, I think the best trigger job for starters (before any spring swaps) is about 1000 dry pulls on snap caps while watching some TV. That will smooth our the high spots and give your internals a bit of a stress test.
Like everything else revolver-related, your trigger will get sweeter with time... until it gets a bit too worn (which takes years and years).
I hope your 642 will still detonate primers. I de-Apexed my 642-2 because that revolver became "Federal ammo only, and only while clean" with the Apex kit.
So the rebound slide bar is the only piece that needs some care? That seems simple enough. I’ve probably got around 400 rounds through it so far and at least double that if not triple that in dry presses. I’ve pretty much only fed it Federal ammo so far as I carry the GMMWCs and practice with either the LSWCs or LRNs.
I’ll see if I can run some other brands through it for testing soon.
I won't say the rebound slide is the "only" piece that benefits from love, but it directly interfaces with the trigger.
Good luck with your Apex kit! Mine had a 50% ignition rate with Fiocchi and about a 90% ignition rate with CCI and S&B. It detonated Federal 100%.
It eats anything with the stock springs installed, though the trigger is around 12 pounds.
Well, you may be a man. You may be a leprechaun. Only one thing’s for sure… you’re in the wrong basement.
I know the word dry fire refers to firing without ammunition. I am wondering about actual dry firing without any lube. Would it speed up the honing and break in?
In general or in J-Frames?Originally Posted by camsdaddy
In general, I would not operate any gun without adequate lubrication. In the context of dry-firing and dry action-cycling as a means of removing burrs, chattermarks, and high spots, a lightweight oil is an ideal medium for ensuring that any microscopic pieces of metal removed by dry-operating the action are carried out of the mechanism to a place where they can be wiped away.
With revolvers, there should be very little lubrication in a revolver's internals. They are meant to operate as an almost-sealed system, so there are no great places where for lubricant to flow out (e.g. it would flow down into the grip or down the trigger shoe).
I coat internal friction points with the thinnest layer of lithium grease after a detail cleaning every few thousand rounds. Revolvers can get filthy inside over time (full-on dustbunnies), so you don't want anything inside that would give particulates a sticking point.
Because the various internal components have differing degrees of smoothness to their surfaces, potentially different hardnesses, and potentially different treatments/coatings, I would not artificially run those internals dry. Instead of smoothing out a burr or toolmark through dry-fire (slowly flattening that burr down), for example, that burr might end up marring the finish on a mating surface with another component... making the problem worse.
Someone else with a lot more experience cracking apart revolvers might have a different take, but that's been my experience.
Well, you may be a man. You may be a leprechaun. Only one thing’s for sure… you’re in the wrong basement.
Did you put the extended firing pin in the gun? I know a few people who've had the light primer strike issue with the Apex kit who have solved it with the extended pin.
Yes, I installed the Apex extended FP that came with the kit, their FP spring, the rebound slide spring, and their hammer spring. Everything was installed correctly (it's hard to screw up that kit).
Still had a lot of clicks that needed to be bangs. Felt real nice on those clicks, though.
Well, you may be a man. You may be a leprechaun. Only one thing’s for sure… you’re in the wrong basement.
That sucks. I often forget that people buy ammo for their revolvers that isn't Federal, because if I'm perfectly frank that's all I ever shoot these days.
It's all I buy.
AE 130 FMJ for competing with anything that has adjustable sights, AE 158 LRN for shooting IDPA with a snub (also known as giving everyone a break to get food, water, and get a new roll of pasters at the clubhouse), and Federal 158gr SWC for carry.
However, I shoot with a lot of people that, for some reason (i.e. not poor), buy weird crap (PPU/Magtech/Fiocchi) to shoot in their revolvers. So, every once in a while, I end up putting that crap through the 642.
It's hard to snub-flex on the homies when half the rounds don't go bang.
Well, you may be a man. You may be a leprechaun. Only one thing’s for sure… you’re in the wrong basement.
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