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My 929 experience


jcoers

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My new 929 arrived Friday. The label on the box states it was manufactured on 2/15/16. From what I'm seeing, S&W has managed to get their act together. 

First impressions:

1. The barrel is NOT canted. It appears to be on straight, not clocked and bullet impact is dead-on with the sights set right in the middle.

2. The trigger pull was smooth as glass right out of the box. Yes, it's too heavy, but VERY smooth.

3. The forcing cone looks to be cut straight. I've not run feeler gauges into it yet, but it looks fine. I didn't get any kind of weird blow-back when firing.

4. The cylinder spins freely. No rough spots or a grinding. 

5. Hammer and trigger are not rubbing the frame. There is a little wear on the hammer where it contacts the lock mechanism, but that's normal. 

6. Cylinder lock-up is good and tight. No complaints. Timing is fine.

7. The rebound slide and the surrounding frame were nicely polished. Trigger surface to sear, and all other surfaces, had been polished. Someone in the Performance Center did some nice fine tuning!

8. Completely reliable ignition. (Until I started playing with the strain screw....)

9. I haven't slugged the barrel or sandbagged, but accuracy with white box Winchester was just fine shooting off-hand. My steel targets trembled in fear as I reloaded. :-)

There were a couple of oddities:

1. Someone at the Performance Center lubed the crap out of this thing. It almost looked like graphite mixed with heavy Wilson Combat oil. Very thick and plenty of it. 

2. Someones bore brush must have exploded at the factory. I found some bristles in the box and found one bristle inside the side plate. (That's a bit of a mystery to me).

3. Just like my 627, the compensator bolt was loose and had no lock-tite. Glad I checked that before I went to the range....... ;-)

For anyone who, like me, has been reading bad reviews and felt nervous about committing to purchasing this revolver, it would seem that S&W's quality control woes have been addressed. This appears to be a fine pistol and I'm very happy with it.

John

 

 

 

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It's nice to hear something positive for a change.  Good news travels slow. 

I had some concerns about the 929 before my purchase 2 months ago but I don't have any now.   I've played with different powders, bullet weights and bullet sizes and have found it to shoot better than I can hold it although there are some combinations that shoot extremely well and I will stick with those,

I shot it today in our local USPSA match.  I was the only revolver shooter and placed 7th over all out of 27 shooters. I have to admit I had the action worked over and a optic front sight installed.  It now runs like butter and I couldn't be happier.  So I guess there are at least two satisfied S&W 929 customers.

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4 hours ago, jcoers said:

My new 929 arrived Friday. The label on the box states it was manufactured on 2/15/16. From what I'm seeing, S&W has managed to get their act together. For anyone who, like me, has been reading bad reviews and felt nervous about committing to purchasing this revolver, it would seem that S&W's quality control woes have been addressed.

 

 

Maybe they have QC where we all expected it would be from the start. Assuming that is the case and that getting a good one it is still not just a matter of luck and knowing what problems to look for, it would seem appropriate for them to have some sort of a recall program for those of us who got the lemons. At the very least it seems like they should publish blueprint specs for critical dimensions.

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glad to hear another happy 929 owner.  I'm having a lot of fun with mine, developing all sorts of loads for it from light recoiling steel shoots, IPSC minor PF, and even some wad cutter loads just because I like the nice clean holes they make :)

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Yep, I'll be working up some loads down the road. For now, I'm shooting Winchester white box to build up my brass supply.

I have about 3000 JHP bullets that were my fathers (He was loading, quite a bit, for his Sig). They are all .355, so that was a concern for me - but she seems to shoot straight on with the .355 commercial stuff. 

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I've had mine for awhile and it's been a very good pistol, but I expected more from the performance center.

Never had barrel or any other issues, except the strain screw backing out in the middle of a comp !!!!!

With a few "enhancements" it's been a fun shooting gun and I'm also keeping up with the bottom feeders.

I'll be doing some more work to it this winter(Trigger job, Ext firing Pin, .040" moon clips) and have it ready to rock & roll for the 2017 steel season.

I got both the 929 and CZ production gun to run with the same ammo, so I'm a very happy camper.

I highly recommend it and everyone who's shot mine has been very impressed with it too.

Good luck with yours.

 

Edited by shoots100
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33 minutes ago, shoots100 said:

I've had mine for awhile and it's been a very good pistol, but I expected more from the performance center.

Never had barrel or any other issues, except the strain screw backing out in the middle of a comp !!!!!

With a few "enhancements" it's been a fun shooting gun and I'm also keeping up with the bottom feeders.

I'll be doing some more work to it this winter(Trigger job, Ext firing Pin, .040" moon clips) and have it ready to rock & roll for the 2017 steel season.

I got both the 929 and CZ production gun to run with the same ammo, so I'm a very happy camper.

I highly recommend it and everyone who's shot mine has been very impressed with it too.

Good luck with yours.

 

 

I did some testing with the C&S Extended firing pin, but found the stock Performance Center firing pin worked better.  I think it has more to do with the pointy profile of the stock PC firing pin (left) rather than the extended length of the C&S firing pin (right).  Go for the Apex hammer though, that let's me run ~1lb lower with reliable performance.

P1160441.JPG

Test 2016-01-16.JPG

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Icchhh.  Those are the two worst FP choices, in my experience.  The C&S pins break, and the pointy-tipped factory pins provide poor ignition with competition action work.  Find an older round-tipped Ti factory pin that measures .495" and you are good to go.  The Apex aftermarket pin is good also.  

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23 hours ago, Carmoney said:

Icchhh.  Those are the two worst FP choices, in my experience.  The C&S pins break, and the pointy-tipped factory pins provide poor ignition with competition action work.  Find an older round-tipped Ti factory pin that measures .495" and you are good to go.  The Apex aftermarket pin is good also.  

good to know.  I may have to get an Apex firing pin to play with now too :)

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Trying to see if there is anything to do/check before sending mine back for repair.

The first couple range trips with the gun, groups were excellent and I was able to zero the gun. Sight blade was to the left of center with gun zeroed, but not a problem, just an anomaly. 

Had severe leading problems with 9mm coated. So I have tried various loads.

Now with the barrel well cleaned, all loads group poorly and I can not move the sight blade far enough left to zero the gun.

No sign of any looseness in sights. Can you folks think of anything else to check before returning the gun?

 

 

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1 hour ago, IHAVEGAS said:

Trying to see if there is anything to do/check before sending mine back for repair.

The first couple range trips with the gun, groups were excellent and I was able to zero the gun. Sight blade was to the left of center with gun zeroed, but not a problem, just an anomaly. 

Had severe leading problems with 9mm coated. So I have tried various loads.

Now with the barrel well cleaned, all loads group poorly and I can not move the sight blade far enough left to zero the gun.

No sign of any looseness in sights. Can you folks think of anything else to check before returning the gun?

 

 

Take the end cap off and try again.

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1 hour ago, MWP said:

Take the end cap off and try again.

Thanks. It did not feel loose, but if there is a chance that may help I will give it another try at the range before throwing in the cards. After this cold front gets past. 

 

1 hour ago, alecmc said:

a sturdy vice and a pipe wrench will get the barrel indexed up properly.

 

 

just kidding. dont do this.

At this point I think I might really enjoy the process. 

 

Is their a fairly easy way for a lay person to tell if the barrel is indexed within reasonable tolerance? 

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Usually the cap is tight, enough, sometimes. But rarely is the hole at the end large enough, and even more rarely is it centered. 

 

I make the hole large, and keep an eye on it over the season to make sure there isn't excessive buildup.

Clean it the same way a suppressor is cleaned, small glass that's half water half kroil. 

Edited by MWP
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35 minutes ago, MWP said:

Usually the cap is tight, enough, sometimes. But rarely is the hole at the end large enough, and even more rarely is it centered. 

 

I make the hole large, and keep an eye on it over the season to make sure there isn't excessive buildup.

Clean it the same way a suppressor is cleaned, small glass that's half water half kroil. 

If this works I am guessing there is a good reason not to just leave the cap off (looks aside) ?

Thanks, by the way. 

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From what I've seen, some people take it off, some people open the hole up, some take it off and mill off the nipple. But the ones who leave it on unmodified eventually wonder why they miss by a foot at 5 yards.  

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