Fire Red Extended Exp Share

[Mckenzie Witting]

Thestock firing pin in my 686 SSR finally broke today so I've ordered a couple replacements from Apex Tactical. I've read that extended firing pins shouldn't be dry fired without snap caps and I've also seen a video where Jerry Miculek broke a firing pin in a match and blamed himself for dry firing the gun beforehand. Is this true of all extended firing pins or just a certain make/model? I don't see how the extended pin would behave differently from a stock one in regards to dry fire but maybe I'm missing something.

I just got my new Apex firing pin in and replaced it last night. First thing I noticed is that the stock firing pin didn't actually break in half like I had thought but it had a couple chips in the face which I thought was odd. That also explains why I had intermittent light strikes instead of a totally non-functioning gun. Also, I was surprised by how much longer the extended pin is as compared to a stock firing pin. The extended pin basically looks like it goes right to the edge of the chamber during dry fire. I've switched to snap caps for dry fire with this new setup.

I've never had an issue with an Apex pin, and dry fire several hundred clicks a day between my 625, 610 and 627. The 625 for IDPA/carry, 627 for USPSA and 610 for predator/pig control 2 and 4 legged. I make enough racket clicking, drawing etc, I've been banished to outside when my wife is home. I've never used snap caps. Maybe I should.

Any dry fire with a frame mounted firing pin is best with snap caps to prevent an issue. But if you dry fire alot in a single session chances are the caps wore to a point where they no longer absorb the hit anyway (excepting maybe the spring loaded type). How many hits?, I dont know. So considering that I dry fired without caps with my Apex Pin. Im on the same pin for dry fire and all my matches for the last two years and no breakage. So whether its a standard length or extended it wont make a difference on probability of breakage if you dry fire. The main pin body is bottoming out on the shoulder in the bushing regardless of how long the nose is. How heavy your mainspring slapping it will certainly raise the chances and of course if its a bad/wrong material pin to begin with (C&S comes to mind). Keep a spare pin, Dry fire and practice with the one in your gun, change the pin before an important match, and run a few cylinders of live fire after the pin change to confirm ignition and no worries... life will be good!

The only time dry firing a revolver with an extended pin can be "more damaging" than the factory standard length is in the .22 rimfire models. Youll start slapping the chamber edges and ding the hell out of it whereas S&W engineered the factory pin to be stupid proof and bottom out just before cylinder impact. (Extended pins in Rimfires dont help anyway).

Having worked on many 617s, I have found that the extended pins DO in fact help improve ignition reliability. They will ding the chamber edges during dryfire, though, unless you cut relief notches (which isn't hard to do).

I don't use extended pins in centerfire revos, but I do replace the new pointy stock pins with the older dome-tip pins that measure +/- .495" (or as close to that as I can find in my diminishing stash).

Ive worked on several 617's as well and just finished one yesterday as a matter of fact. So let me elaborate; when I say an extended pin does not help I specifically mean if the OEM pin is of the .490" spec I've found a longer .495" pin performs the same (no added advantage) with the disadvantage it will hit the chamber edge whereas the .490" spec does not. Honestly with the mainspring set to a given pull, and only swapping pins from an in spec factory .490" pin to a .495" pin I found no change better or worse. If it shoots 100% with a .490 it shot 100% with a .495, if it had a 10% fail rate with one it matched the fail rate to the other. However, of which does fall in line indirectly of what you say (and Smith & Wessons QC), Ive found a few factory pins at .486". In the case of a shorter .486" yes the ignition does improve with .490".

Ive experimented with pin length on these testy revolvers along with pin tip profiles by modifying others pins and machining some of my own. Tried pointy, extreme blunt, narrowed rectangle (like a rifle flat pin), and a few different round profiles all at .490 and .495". I found the factory .490" with a slight ojived curve profile (a little more aggressively angled than a concentrically domed curve) worked best. The flat rectangle (rifle like pin) and pointy were worst.

The first TK firing pin I dry fired a lot without snap caps so that's a lick on me. The second one I dry fired exclusively with those snap caps with the spring in them and it went faster than the first one. I bought an Apex and it has held up but with far less use.

The Power Custom firing pin I just replaced sheared after about a year's worth of dry firing using snap caps and live fire. I would say I dry fire three times for every live round so we are looking at about 15K to 20K trigger pulls. I replaced it with another Power Custom firing pin because I believe that of the three, it was more reliable in terms of ignition.

Guess I will just replace the firing pin every four to six months and be done with it but got to admit my amazement that guys here have not sheared one yet because they shoot and dry fire twice what I do with stouter loads than I normally shoot.

Any firing pin can break. These are very small and take a tremendous beating. On a part that small, any tiny imperfections in that particular piece of metal will cause it to fail. Heat treating parts that small is finicky. It's amazing that some of them last as long as they do. Keep extras of any kind on hand. A firing pin can break for any reason or no reason. I have seen many factory hammer nose firing pins break as well. All the same things apply to them.

An interesting thing about them is that they all broke during a Steel Challenge event. All three of them held up for the individual stage and I didn't know they were broken until I started the next stage or got home and cleaned the revolver followed by a function check -- where it became apparent the firing pin was broken. None of them quit on me during a stage. I find that really strange.

I found myself at the local mall yesterday, at the book shop, to look at magazines. I live in the countryside where not much ever happens. A tornado might come through, or a strip club might explode, but those are very rare events. And regardless, they tend to happen further down south. I certainly did not expect to look up from some magazine to see a car on fire right outside of the building I was in. (more)

Usually, I take photographs for fairly specific purposes, either for my own photography projects, or as illustrations for articles on this website (plus the occasional silly stuff I either post on Twitter or share with friends). Having looked at and thought and written about photographs for a long time I found myself wondering why I was taking photographs. Mind you, I was not the only person photographing, many people had their cell phones out and did the exact same thing. There was one other person who used a digital (non-cell phone) camera as well.

But, and this is the big but here, the photograph itself is not what matters. What matters is the fact that you photographed and shared - even if you will never look at that photo again, and even if your friends might at best briefly glance at it.

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