686 trouble

[Sld1959]

Wow. I wonder how that got messed up. I only used a couple hot Buffalo Bore rounds and never dropped it once.

Anything mechanical, can break, sometimes without a visible cause. I have seen 686s taken thousands of rounds of heavy loads without hiccup. Should last you for many more years.

 

[Recusant]

Yea, doesn't matter if you used lock or not, they have a tendency to engaged or try to engaged themselves under recoil, my S&W 629 has done this in the past.....just trying to give you some info, just engage it then take it off and see if this helps.

Here are 2 decent articles with more information on the internal lock:

Smith and Wesson Internal Lock: Is it a Deal Breaker?

Revolver owners don't hide their hatred for the Smith and Wesson internal lock but is that one feature enough to make the firearms unusable?

www.luckygunner.com

INTERNAL GUN LOCKS |

 

[wmg1299]

I’m sure there better now then it was few years ago, keep us informed

Did your barrel issue occur in the 2008-2009 time frame? I ask because I was working as a patrol officer with a mid-size department (about 400 officers) at the time. The S&W J-Frame had been a the go-to backup gun for decades. Out of nowhere, the Rangemasters started seeing slightly crooked barrels on newer J-Frames that had been purchased by officers.

S&W customer service was less than helpful, and frequently sent the guns back without correcting the problem. The younger officers were already carrying compact semi-auto's by this time, but the problems with the S&W's pretty much ended the idea of a revolver in an ankle holster as a backup.

Years later, S&W was trying to get departments to adopt M&P's as their duty sidearms. One Rangemaster told the sales rep about the crooked barrels making officers hesitant to buy S&W products. The rep apologized profusely, and stated that quality control had slipped during the rush to purchase guns following the 2008 election. The rep swore that the problems had been fixed. I haven't heard of any issues since, but the department still chose to stick with Glocks.

 

[Annihilator]

Did your barrel issue occur in the 2008-2009 time frame? I ask because I was working as a patrol officer with a mid-size department (about 400 officers) at the time. The S&W J-Frame had been a the go-to backup gun for decades. Out of nowhere, the Rangemasters started seeing slightly crooked barrels on newer J-Frames that had been purchased by officers.

S&W customer service was less than helpful, and frequently sent the guns back without correcting the problem. The younger officers were already carrying compact semi-auto's by this time, but the problems with the S&W's pretty much ended the idea of a revolver in an ankle holster as a backup.

Years later, S&W was trying to get departments to adopt M&P's as their duty sidearms. One Rangemaster told the sales rep about the crooked barrels making officers hesitant to buy S&W products. The rep apologized profusely, and stated that quality control had slipped during the rush to purchase guns following the 2008 election. The rep swore that the problems had been fixed. I haven't heard of any issues since, but the department still chose to stick with Glocks.

Mine was right about 2010, just before I retired. And yes, there CS was less then helpful, especially when I had to send the gun back twice.