Bad Experience with Mod 48 S&W

[Dave in NGA]

I took this pistol to the range yesterday for the first time. All I took for ammunition was a box of Armscor Precision 22 magnum. Boy, what a sad experience. This was my first experience with the model 48 Smith so I'm hoping it was just the ammo. Every other shot was a dud. Most all the cartridges were very hard to seat into the cylinder. Most of the 'dud' that failed to fire the first time round went off on a second pass. Some required re-seating the cartridge to bring a fresh portion of the rim under the hammer to make them fire.

This being a brand new gun, although an early 80's vintage, I hope there isn't some inherent problem with the gun. Has anyone else had a bad experience with this ammo or model Smith?

[randy langford]

This may be a dumb question but lets start with this are the chambers clean [sometimes there is buildup] and without any damage and do the cases eject ok. If so I would try a different brand of ammo. Forgive if you have checked the chambers already.

[Johnny P]

The easiest thing is to check is another brand of ammo.

[Art]

I agree with Johnny P. I have a Brno .22 Mag. autoloading rifle, sweet, sweet little gun but even though the paperwork that came with it recommends Winchester ammo the rifle hates the stuff. Every other brand I've shot works like a champ. Rimfires do tend to be picky about ammo.

[Major Tom]

My M48 had similar syptoms. A gunsmith relieved 3 chambers to gain proper dimensions. He marked each chamber with a *.