I recently sent my S&W 4" model 25-5(non-pinned/1980s) back to Smith for some repairs(I had bulged the cylinder with some bad handloads). Last week I was contacted ty a gentleman calling himself "Vito". He was worried about removing my barrel and suggested I go to a 5" barrel. I wasn't for this, I bought this gun because it was a very good length for packing and stated so. He wanted to cut my barrel off and use an easy out to remove the stub, he told me that older S&Ws were always possible to split the frames while removing the barrels? He also stated the cylinder he tried in my gun(not the cylinder that would be installed in my gun) would have a B/C gap out of spec .009"(his reason for wanting to remove the barrel)? I now own S&Ws with more cylinder gap than this, straight from the factory?
I also sent with this gun a standard combat trigger and hammer to be installed with repair(at the same time). He informed me that the cocking notch looked to be out of spec and would probably push off if installed?
This isn't my first experience with S&Ws and not my first experience with haviong one repaired by the factory and I pretty sure this man was the repairman other times?
Sounds to me like he's trying to sell me a new barrel and not install the hammer?
What would the difference be between using an easy out and using a proper fitting jig to remove the barrel(if it even needs to be removed)? Couldn't he use a hard stone to deepen the cocking notch in the hammer?
Puzzled with S&W repair center, Steve
