At the range today...

[socom58]

So, I'm out at the range today with my dad and we're shooting various pistols. In the stall next to us, a guy and his son (probably 10 or 12 years old) are setting up to shoot an S&W .357 Magnum revolver with a 4" barrel. The kid takes the gun, fires of one shot fine, fires another one, and the barrel goes downrange. The barrel separated from the gun right where it meets the frame. Nobody at the range had ever seen a failure quite like that before, and the gun was apparently brand new. He was firing factory ammo as well, not reloads. The best the rangemaster could come up with was some sort of metallurgical problem or a manufacturing defect. Anybody ever heard of this happening?

 

[bigghoss]

saw a video on youtube where a guy was shooting a taurus off a rest and the barrel came off. hand his hand resting on the bag too. could have cost him his hand.

 

[armoredman]

Saw a Ruger Redhawk, I thing it was, same issue. Metallurgy.

 

[Lost Sheep]

Reportedly, the cause was...

Saw a Ruger Redhawk, I thing it was, same issue. Metallurgy.

I am told (but have not done the research to verify or debunk) some of the early Redhawks had barrels come apart right where the barrel meets the frame, leaving the threaded portion of the barrel in the frame and breaking neatly off right there, almost like you took a hacksaw to it.

After a bit of head-scratching (what I call research), it was determined that the lubrication they put on the threads was the culprit. Too much torque required to screw the barrel into the frame or something.

Metallurgy is a bit too broad a subject to describe the failures (in the Redhawks), though I confess my explanation isn't much better (if at all).

About Smiths, my guess is as good as yours, but I hope S&W stands 4-square behind their product.

Good luck.

Lost Sheep

 

[tekarra]

I doubt very much that it is a metallurgical problem. It sounds more like a mechanical problem at the barrel/frame interface. It there was a problem with the metallurgy of the barrel, it would fail in the longitudinal direction rather than in the circumfirential direction. Possibly a defect from the machining of the barrel.