The new S&W Model 19 Classic ~ A S&W Armorer's Review

welcome back I've been away a little while for about six weeks or so because I've been just very busy around here we can get battened down for winter and I just recently got done spending about two and a half weeks putting down hardwood floors in my friend's house so I'm back now and what I want to talk about was the topic of Smith & Wesson wheel guns the Smith & Wesson revolvers family now for those of you who are not familiar I'm a Smith & Wesson I'm more factory trained at Springfield Maslin roosevelt out back in the early 70s and down there i spent two weeks in school with master craftsman and gun builder john cantos he was our teacher and it was a fabulous time we learned an awful lot in those two weeks we worked on we learned how to build the Smith & Wesson revolver from ground up and we learned how to service it and to maintain all the different things and I'll talk about that in a little bit but I worked on hundreds and hundreds of Smith & Wesson revolvers over the years and I was also a competitive shooter besides being a police a city police officer you know the the model 10 heavy barrel was 38 Spector was the gun that I was first issued and I competed with that and despite the fact that it had fixed sights it was a very accurate gun handled very nicely it was easy in the hand - it was very Swift from the holster easy to get on target and then I later on in competition I wanted to upgrade so I got myself a Smith & Wesson model 19 these days you might know probably more about the model 66 which is the stainless steel rendition of it that came out later but the the model 19 was a gorgeous gun I actually had to I had a I had a forage combat Magnum and I also had a six-inch barrel a six-inch barrel version of that gun that I sometimes preferred when I was competing on a 50-yard course because the laundress site radius was able to really grill the groups and nice and tight so my fondness for that model 19 remains and I was sorry that I let them go you know time to a tough you know early the early in my life you know a young cop you didn't get you didn't get the kind of salary that allows you to have too many toys so I let it go for something else at the time both of them eventually went so I've had a yearning to get another model 19 I've probably spent the last several years every time I go into a gun shop you know picking up various model 19 from years past they would they were dropped from production about 1999 let me kind of you know elaborate on that in in the late 90s no you couldn't you couldn't give away a revolver nobody throughout the 90s nobody really wanted anything to do with revolvers by then people had really become involved with semi-automatic pistols and revolvers really they were littering the shelves of every gun dealer and they had very drastically reduced prices on them and but at the you know the interest has been resurging in those fine firearms for quite a long time now probably for the last 10 to 15 years they've been a gradual increase in interest in revolvers not not much different than you know people I see these ads on TV now and they're the future you know people dancing to a phonograph you know with a with a turntable with the spinning platter you know so that they can hear music and see that you know see this piece of plastic spin vinyl plastic spin around and music comes out that's what I grew up with I mean it's nothing new to me and I just recently was able to sell one of those phonograph turntable and I got a I got a very very hefty check for that and I've got another one to let go one of these days but you know it's the same thing with revolvers the interest in revolvers is kind of a nostalgic thing it's coming back people like to see that cylinder spin around is a little bit of activity there when they pull the trigger so it's just a different sort of gun and it's also very field friendly you know for anybody who goes out in the woods if when I'm taking a walk with you know Benny and we go out in the woods you know semi-automatic pistols a pain in the neck because every time you fire it you lose or you lose a piece of precious brass that you that you can't recover once in a while you know maybe out of maybe out of ten shots you might find two or three pieces of brass or something laying on the leaves but you know it's really not the gun firm for going out blinking in the woods or out in the field so you know a revolver is just very handy for that is beautiful and they you know they're they're very very reliable in all conditions so I I wanted to get another model 19 and as I say I looked around and for years I've been examining them I couldn't find one that was in what I would call good condition I I see some I see some banter about on the internet about the old the real classic old model nine teams and another another fine Smith & Wesson revolvers and to hear the story line you know I'm speaking as an arm room now somebody who spent so much time servicing and maintaining them to hear the story line that goes on you'd think that you'd think that these things were just you know impeccable gems that that's never any issues with them and that they were a far better gun back then than the currently made Smith & Wesson hahaha I gotta tell you something those people perhaps do not know about this is my this is my old arm where's Manuel that I got from Smith & Wesson and they probably don't know about you read that the 51 problems there's 51 problems with the Smith & Wesson that we learn to to fix and how do how to avoid them I can almost guarantee that every time I picked up a Smith & Wesson revolver from a dealer and examined it then I was coming across anywheres from three or more sometimes five or six of these 51 problems some of them that had been developed over the years of sustained views they've been around a long time they haven't they haven't been they haven't been in production for a long time and and so some of them well over 50 years old and even the newest ones hadn't been made since 20 over 20 years ago so and a lot of the problems or something which there someone who owned them created in other words trying to manipulate doing a little bit of you know kitchen-table gunsmithing and improving all sorts of things you know things like doesn't carry up stop catches overhaul push off creeps camera block doesn't open a closed good stubs roughed up blacks and click starting stop sticks stop low stop doesn't recover a plate of stock lon loose rod rod runs out extract the rough cylinder close on lug cylinder on luck center pin rough and shake on yoke cylinder his closing hammer rough hammer hits bolt him loose amra bind and we gets rebound hammer hits trigger hammering those hits knuckles that's a big one had a lot of laden with knuckles there people back out that strange crew or they they they file it off and the gun ends up with knuckles doesn't recover good bolt locks hammer pit locking yoke stud loose Stillman de luchon stop stop doesn't hold hand sticks hand lon cramps blood it's another Bittman stop comes up too fast hand skips a lot of those throw by I mean it goes on and on and there's actually believe it or not some of those things when you have one yeah you have a handful of them because they one problem creates the other I don't like you know I don't like to bash I don't like to bash any gun manufacturer and I don't like to lavish unnecessary praise on any gun manufacturer I like to tell it like it is I'd like to tell it the way our instructor John cantos explained it to us in the real life they were mechanical instruments that had a plethora of problems that could crop up or occur you know either because somebody mishandled them maybe they dropped them you know police officers live in a rough-and-tumble environment and it's not it you know it's not unusual for police officer to to bang his gun in such a such a way where there might be might be dropped in a fight or something like that you know gun popped out in those days you know the gun holsters were not all that secure it wasn't very uncommon for a revival to hit the deck and that created all sorts of problems with those guns once you once you drop the gun invariably you either you either bent the hammer so it couldn't be caught back all the way sometimes that wasn't readily apparent you know we used to tell our guys make sure if you ever drop the gun bring it right in to me immediately to check it out because there's any number of problems that could occur another significant problem was this the ejector rod the center pin and this dissent of caen in that huge Ector rod could get easily bent and then you'd have run out whether where the center rod the ejector rod was not running the straight that can create a horrific problems with Western or especially because it relied on the locking bolt that's the little silver that's the little silver pin that you see inside the shroud or on a uncrowded barrel like a model ten the the barrel lug is a there's a little silver tapered silver plug here that's called the locking bolt when you have run out on that locking bolt you have tremendously rough double-action if you have it at all yad main many times you would have an officer come in and complain that he was having problems and i noted that his ejector rod was loose loose loosening ejector rods cause no end of problems I would have officers come in and you know they're the gun the gun was spitting lead terribly or maybe it wasn't it was a cycling smoothly because the hand was was not engaging correctly on the ratchets on the ejector very frequently the ejector somebody would attempt to tighten up their own ejector rod and in so doing did Bend the two little pins in the back of that ejector that held it indexed in place and would also permanently damaged there the cylinder because there was a little there was a little keyway on that ejector that that went into a their way into a slot on the that when it was I should say a slot on the ejector rod the ejector itself and then that keyed to a small it was a very very small key on the cylinder when that got wiped out it was it's time to order a new cylinder and new yolk he had to go back to the factory actually to be fitted up with a new yolk so they were in a yolk for those of you who were you know the cult and fans of other rulers you call it a crane but it's not a crane and the Smith & Wesson vernacular well suffice to say I could not find in all those years probably looking for the last seven or eight years trying to find a model nineteen that was in any kind of condition that I wanted to take home and certainly it wasn't worth the money that the dealers were asking you know they've gotten they've gotten kind of a collectible price tag now you know the prices are running upwards of 700 800 900 thousand dollars some fantastically ridiculous prices for pieces of junk so I gave up looking well I just I discovered you know just in reading and in passing and I had missed I had missed the fact that the model 19 has been reintroduced by Smith & Wesson well to listen to all the the junk that I see on YouTube you'd think you'd think the Smith & Wesson just reintroduced you know a piece of junk well I'm gonna tell you I've got one here I'm gonna take you through that that that fine weapon and I'm gonna show you how Smith & Wesson has vastly improved a very fine product that will be much better and is much better than it ever was so let's step over to the vent you will take a look well the old Smith & Wesson craft paper is still being used this is not exactly a presentation case but it's better than a better than sometimes in the cardboard box look at that now this is one handsome gun I was actually very pleased that this so-called classic now and it doesn't say classic on the actual gun it says just as the old one did it says combat Magnum 357 Magnum combat Magnum and on the behind the yoke it says 19-9 rather and you'll see also this there's a difference here there's a clasp there's a detent right here rather than being a plain flat surface and right here you no longer have that pesky issue with a 2-piece center pin surrounded by an ejector rod yes it simply is simply an ejector now and we also no longer have two pins that can get wiped out underneath this underneath the ejector there used to be two pins underneath here that engaged two holes on the ejector those are no longer present and there's no longer a fragile little track that ran up and down this ejector that could get wiped out that could spin off and ruin the small keyway that was on the cylinder instead it's a very very rugged flat surface it creates it creates a d-shaped D shaped hole and ejector very very rugged this is not something that's prone to go out of whack but let me grab my this is over 40 years old this is my personally crafted screwdriver that I use only on Smith & Wesson revolvers on nothing else in the world it's hardened polished and it fits exactly into the screws so we're going to take this apart very quickly off camera if you're interested in how these guns are taken down visit my earlier video on how to disassemble and maintain a Smith & Wesson revolver but I'm going to take it apart and get it open for you so you can see inside and we'll examine all the parts well let's start with the back end of the gun first thing you're going to notice is that it's got a round but very similar it's the same style round but there was used in there detective version of the model 10 the headed to believe it had a two and a half inch barrel we had those for our for our detective unit that brown button is now incorporated into the standard stocks and as I said in that other video in Smith in western country you don't call these grips they're not grip panels they're stocks and these happen to be rather than the Goncalves that I had yet back these a beautiful American black walnut I really like that the gun Caldwell's was nice but I still prefer I still prefer the warmth and look of real genuine American black walnut it's just gorgeous and you notice here also it's got this scalloped out edge that is there intentionally for a very very good reason when when competitors began to use speed loaders speed loaders would not go by the old heavy grips and the old heavy stalks didn't permit them to go by so guys had two guys had to manufacture their own carved out thing and oftentimes it came out looking kind of crummy they didn't do a nice job this here is purposely built for that for that game and does a really nice job so another thing is - I've noticed that the the mainspring has got a straighter configuration I think that is going to improve double action double action trigger pull it's just the arched the very heavily arched mainspring that used to be in them had a tendency to feel crampy if things weren't just right now very important thing that you'll probably notice right off the bat is that you've got this skeletonized hammer now people would look at that and say well that looks cheap well let me tell you something that happens to be a very precise tammer I just I have I have gone over that Hamel with a fine-tooth comb everything about it is far more precise then they used to be it's nicely engineered the fact that it happens to be skeletonized if anything just reduces the weight of the gun a little bit probably by a half an ounce all together another thing that you'll notice is right here this is called the the sear this is this is the double action sear this black part right here that's what that's what pulls the hammer back on this pride of the trigger this is called the this is called the real hook of the trigger and that pulls back that's the camo of the trigger and that pulled back on that sear that's sear now is basically just an inserted product and it does not have to be cut at the factory you know I had to learn many many after many many unsuccessful tries I had to learn how to properly cut the seat and let me see if I have I should have some of those in my prize here maybe leave this is a this is a Smith & Wesson Kay framed sear and we had to learn how to cut the seat of this sear on this side and we had to learn how to cut just a long cut and the short cut and the reason we had to adjust that and we used we used what was called a Barrett file that was this that was this puppy right here we use that for a number of things we used that to just the ratchets on the ejector and we also used it to to cut these to fit the gun the reason we had to cut them to fit the gun was because in those days you didn't have CNC machining you didn't have you didn't have the ability to perfectly machine parts you also didn't have molded parts no you know that takes on a very very for some stupid reason that takes on a bad connotation a molded pride as to some people some sort of problem you know this we have metal metallurgy and technology these days that is vastly superior to some of the crude antiquated things that we had to do years back molding a pot does not mean that it's weak it does not mean that it's going to fall apart quite a number of high-grade gun manufacturers have invested thousands and thousands countless thousands of dollars millions of dollars in this sort of process to either mi M apart or to investment casting investment casting is some of the hardest metal known to man because they use it on they use it on the fans of jet engines so you know those rotate those rotate unceasingly at high rpm that would shatter a lesser metal so don't don't immediately think that just because it says mi m or if it's an investment cast product that it means it's inferior not by any means when when Prats were when patch was grossed out started he has an old hammer that well it's unfortunate some some guy who previously owned a n frame model twenty-nine decided he was going to do his own gunsmithing and he he wrecked he wrecked the crock ignites the cracking notch is only six to seven thousandths of an inch deep and he thought by stoning it he can improve his single action pull well he just in those days this I think this this hammer was I think it was about eight or ten dollars or something was very expensive in those days these days would probably be closer to it probably closer to forty or fifty dollars I imagine and it was a nice target hammer with a target spur and everything but all these cuts in those days had to be after this part was hammer forged it had to be all these cuts had to be made with what was called a tower brooch the tower brooch was a thing that a guy climbed up one about a story and a half high and there was a long there was a long traveling like a file that was tapered it would gradually gradually come into these surfaces and cut them away not the most precise process in the world you're talking about monstrous machinery that's trying to make tiny little cuts on these parts and as a result you didn't have you didn't have what you call very close tolerances tolerances were wide enough so that when you combine them together when you had the trigger and the sear and the hammer and all these other Prime's went in the rebound block and all these other parts interacting with one another nothing worked unless somebody was skilled hands knew how to use a Barrett file and other files and and how to make everything come together it was an arduous process it was an unnecessary process and it's not some it it does not mean the guns were made better in those days that is the biggest bunch of baloney I've ever heard it means that they had they had to learn how to do things to basically turn a piece of junk into a fine working instrument they had to they had to learn how to take a gun that would be absolutely an operative would be impossible to pull the trigger impossible to pull the hammer this cylinder wouldn't spin it wouldn't even insert into the gun you had to spend you had to spend a long time putting these guns together that's not necessary anymore one of the first things I'm going to draw your attention to right here on the right here on the cover plate you'll notice that you notice that everything is black and everything is everything has got swirly marks on it that was done that was done by precision machinery that made this and it was ready to go when it was all done you notice right here these bosses this is called this is called the hammer boss and as there's other does there's a also hammer boss on the inside the frame this didn't have to be filed when I was when I was at this when I was at the armor school and when whenever we installed a new hammer or trigger we actually had to take we actually had to take a flat file Nicholson file and and adjust the height of that boss because it may not have it may not have sandwiched correctly with the trigger and or the hammer and caused and cause basically to lock up just like just like disc brakes so that was a very that was a very important change so that this is a precision made piece of steel now it's no longer a something that has to be adjusted on all these different surfaces it's ready to go similarly with with the rest of the gun oh I'll go ahead and I'll take a Pratt some of this and I'll show you what I mean ok here's a close-up look at that hammer one thing that I think is very very intelligent design change was the incorporation of a quick attaching stirrup that's what this that's what this is right here this is the stirrup that connects to your mainspring that drives the hammer in in the old and the old style that stirrup was connected with a pin that had to be driven into place and sometimes it cramped up sometimes it's stuck on the side of the frame or the the side plating had to be made flush and so it was just one of those other little problematic things that could go wrong now we have a stirrup that just simply sits in its sits in a key way it's it's intelligent engineering change I don't see anything I prefer that greatly over the previous design and again here's the here's the seer to see are very very intelligently now it's got a spring loaded it's got a spring loaded back to it the same as the old-style seer but now it's just simply placed raiden raiden in a slot and it doesn't have to be adjusted what a wonderful what a wonderful change that is I wished I had had that when when I was an Armour that's a good design change another thing on the hammer you know sometimes the people will talk about complaining about things I wish that at least learned the proper terminology this is not a this is not a firing pin that's called a Smith & Wesson hammer nose they've eliminated that stinking device that hammer nose was prone to breaking that hammer nose was nothing but problems the reason why they used a hammer nose instead of a firing pin which they used by the way a firing pin is nothing new in a Smith & Wesson revolver was used in their 22 caliber 22 long-rifle combat masterpiece and it requires it requires a hammer a bushing a firing pin bushing it requires a firing pin a firing pin spring and a firing pin retaining pin so those those things were more costly to manufacture than this cheaply riveted in place old hammer knows it was prone to breakage and and bending in all sorts of things so another great innovative change they've gone to something which is more functional by eliminating that by eliminating that pesky hammer nose and now having a good highly intelligent hammer that strikes a spring-loaded firing pin much better here's the close-up of here's the firing pin retaining pin remember that has to also be drilled that's an operation that has to be drilled at the factory that that just sits in there by gravity here's the firing pin here's the firing pin bushing right here that holds the assembly together and inside that there is a coil spring so it's more costly it's not cheaper it's more costly now I've heard a said you know that the people at the Smith & Wesson Factory now wouldn't know what the people at the Smith & Wesson Factory knew back then well you know they're repairing and maintaining these old guns they know they know what they know what they're making and how it was assembled there are still people around there that learn how to disassemble and maintain the old-style guns and how to fix them now again as I showed you on the side plate the the interior of this gun is just as smooth as can be it's no there's no there's no rough machine marks that we used to have in the old guns there's no high bosses that had to be that had to be dealt with everything is very very precise is ready to go so what's this little deal right here well that's that's the one thing probably I I'm never going to use it you put what looks like a handcuff key on the other side and that's the that's the safety and oh the childproof safety to prevent anybody from firing the gun i it's aesthetically it it doesn't it doesn't please me but it doesn't hurt my feelings either I mean I'm not I'm not such an overly worrywart that I'm gonna worry about the fact that it's just got that little that little hole on the side of the gun which I never have to use it's nothing that can go wrong it's not it's not going to accidentally turn and you know cause a malfunction or anything like that it possibly for somebody who does have you know children in the family or something it might possibly save somebody's life so you know it's not a bad thing to have while I'm on the topic of the frame you'll notice that it doesn't have somebody has been complaining that it doesn't have a barrel pin anymore it doesn't need a barrel pin anymore because the barrel is not screwed in that way this barrel is a two-piece barrel that is shrouded the interior of this barrel the pride of working the working pile the barrel is made of stainless steel and it's shrouded with blued steel a beautiful design by doing that they were able to incorporate the best of both worlds the beauty of the blued steel and also the functionality of a very hard tough stainless steel barrel that barrel is now screwed in independent of the shroud that means that rather you know when I when I had to fit when I had to fit a cylinder at the factory Barra just adjusted the cylinder gap if we did it by we did it by hand file that's how we adjusted the cylinder gap on a Smith & Wesson was with a hand file that was a very crude way of doing it you know we used to have a standard saying in the in the class file flat filed flat everything was filing flat because if you filed at an angle you'd might have eight thousands clearance on one side and 2,000 clearance on the other side you're supposed to have four thousandths of an inch clearance I checked this I checked this revolver with my fila gauges it took the four thousands and it would not take the five that's pretty fine to me and that was the same on both sides top and bottom everything is absolutely perfect so Dave by re-engineering the barrel they've also incorporated a beautiful beautifully designed cylinder gap that will not go wrong so another good feature let's step forward to the this is probably one of the more problematic areas in the old Smith & Wesson's of all and I spoke about this at length in the previous video that I did and again I encourage you to watch that video because that will give you a detailed instructions on how to properly disassemble and maintain your own Smith & Wesson within within reason you said this is not an Armorer's course the first thing I want to note is that the what we used to call what we used to call the yoke button up here it was actually it was actually a button that the the cut went all the way around in its full 360 degrees and it left a button on the top and that button was dragged on by a screw which we called a yoke screw and that yoke screw bore against the side the inside of that button and along its along his edge it didn't take very long for that for that yoke button to wear down after repeated openings and closings and and to get battered on in firing so that you ended up with an shake the the whole the whole yoke would slide in and out of its frame well Smith & Wesson has recognized that problem and they've addressed it and now they have a properly fitted screw with a pointed end which engages now instead a perfect perfect slot in the side of this in the side of this yoke which no longer is going to batter it it's it's a precise fitting thing that that bears on both sides of that screw rather than just on one tangent surface that was a real pain in the neck you know we went through we went through yoke screws like they were like they were water I mean we just constantly in this in the police to private we're constantly replacing yoke screws and then after the yoke screws would no longer work I had to start doing physical work with a painting block and you know with a 4-ounce ball peen hammer working on that with with gauges and everything else to restore it to operating condition until it went sour again which it was going to do it was inevitable this is the sort of thing that I find in all these old guns and that's why I won't touch them because probably if they if they've got looseness now it's very severe and it may not be restorable Without Really disfiguring the gun the rebound the rebound block is pretty much as far as I can tell it's the same piece of hardware that it used to be but they've improved it because now they can they can cast these price so that rather than having to install a pin in the side of the rebound block the rebound block now has an integral pin that's a good thing any time we have an integral pin or an integral part rather than a separate practic and that can drift out or get hung up or whatever I get Mis adjusted that's a good thing that's a good design change let's look at the trigger the trigger my friend has got as far as I can tell us about the same geometry as is the is the old trigger right here and here's the new as far as I can tell they're the same the same basic geometry I wouldn't be surprised if the old one would work in the new gun but it would have to be the pivot hole right here is very small diameter on the on the old-style trigger and it was not as rugged and durable that that pin is a smaller pin than what is used now which is much much larger hole much more durable and less likely to bend and that that added benefit means that you're going to have a better mechanical action of the gun the hand now is also a I don't see I don't see an exposed I don't see a see an exposed stud on the other side we tells me that this pin is also integral to the hand a nice little upgrade other than that it seems to be the same basic function and design it has the same the forward portion is called the throat of the throat of the hand the trigger lever that's a great new design change is this old trigger lever here this trigger lever that's this that's this proxy head that pushes back and forth and restores restores the gun to battery the trigger to battery by the by this rebound block the rebound block engages it right here and pushes it back and forth and restores at the battery but that that trigger lever had to be installed with one another one of these pesky little pins and you had to use a special device to get that pin started and you had to get the spring and you had to get the pin rather in in line with the hole inside this thing and it was a problematic thing to deal with now we have a trigger lever that is very intelligently designed with two legs on it on each side which engages and on the side of this it goes into a Raceway here in the bottom of the trigger and it doesn't need to be held in place with any kind of special device it's beautifully it's beautifully some smooth raw made and that slides in just like that without cramping up if you notice this one here now has become has become it's stiff it will not will not move correctly and very frequently that would happen when a gun was became dirty street dirt would get in there and it would cause that to cramp up this one's not going to cramp up my friends this one here will not cramp up because the way it's the way it's installed it's not on a not on a small fragile little pin this is probably one of the best this is probably one of the best things a Smith & Wesson ever did was to get rid of that lousy ejector rod which was a shroud that went around the center the center pin when the center pin became bent and it cramped up on that ejector rod that was the end of the operation of the gun and that happened anytime the cylinder got banged into that meant that if a if an officer accidentally dropped his gun say in a confrontation may be wrestling with somebody his gun came out or it got banged into that that would cramp up the gun and cause it to be inoperative great design change finally if you look underneath here you'll notice there are three there are three holes there's one which is currently being occupied by the strap on the adjustable sight but that once once that's removed it is also two companion holes that serve as mounting points for an optic of some sort so if you wanted to put a scope on it or you know red go out or something like that you've got the provision you don't have to go down to your local gunsmith and have them drill a hole into your antique Smith & Wesson which reduces its value great addition they used to be a couple of gas gas rings right here and those gas rings were intended to deflect gases from the Gessle and the gap deflect them and prevent them from getting inside the barrel of the yoke well they weren't that effective they tried different methods and they slaughter them in different and different things now they've got now they've got a very nicely designed it looks flat but it's somewhat curved and that will that will really deflect gasses better and seals up that port so that they can't just creep in with dirt and crud and get that cylinder all bound up they've done a nice job with this it's a it's it's a fine piece of machinery that I wish if I had if I had that sort of thing to work with when I was in armor it would have cut my workload down significantly and I had to be very honest with you some of the problems that we used to have back then wouldn't even occur because you know six or seven different problems occur would would that would that design the old design of the yoke a number of problems occurred with the hand in those days number of problems occurred with the seers everything was a problem as I showed you there were 51 problems that we learned to correct many of which don't even did not even possible anymore and that's why I think that's a significant reason why Smith & Wesson can now offer a lifetime warranty on these things they certainly didn't before my friends you know when you when you had a Smith & Wesson that would bring new out of the box I took quite a while for that gun to get broken in so that would spin freely they made it with very very tight tolerances so that you know they knew that it would loosen up because of design flaws there was there was flaws in this design that literally loosened up over time and and never stopped loosening and also finally this has got you know this this was an addiction that was not on the original model 19 s it was only available on certain n frame models like the model 29 and the model 25 and things like in the the 41 Magnum they had the they had the red they had the red insert in the Bowman front blade but yet that was not available on the model 19 so it's really it's really cool I like it I'll get this done back together and we'll take another quick look at it so there you have the return of a classic handgun indeed I'm not at all offended by them calling this the classic no it's not it's not the old gun it has the same beauty but it has so many more refinements so many more upgrades that it has a right to its own heritage and I really want you to understand that this is not some sort of a setback in the history of Smith & Wesson this is this is many steps forward incorporating all the new technology that's available not to reduce the quality of the gun but to improve it and they really have improved it they're a lifetime warranty speaks volumes so there's one other little item right here that I want to make note of the model 19 had a trigger stop which was installed behind the trigger here and oftentimes I recommended that could sometimes get out of whack it was held in place by a by a screw under friction and at times that could turn and get out of adjustment and you your trigger really didn't have a correct over-travel in order to disengage in single action and I would tell sometimes if people are having problems with that loosening up to just take it out this gun doesn't need to have an over travel trigger stop because things are so precisely made that it doesn't have any over-travel whatsoever that that trigger lets off in single action just as crisp as can be - exactly this just the book standard that it called for back in the day which was 4 and 1/2 pounds it can be lightened to less than that I don't use single action very much so I'm not going to bother and four and a half pound trigger pull on it on a beautiful Smith & Wesson is nothing no problem to me whatsoever I'm mostly a double action shooter but this gun doesn't have to have that so again just running down you know you've got the same appearance as the old gun with many improvements incorporating many new features and technologies that were not available in those days so truly this is a return of an old friend beautifully made engineering is 21st century now this is this is as fine as it gets used to take a lot of work for me to get a double-action working like that and this is all the box runs this is a wave team while the Box Smith & Wesson didn't come out of the box like that unless you got it from the custom shop this is just as smooth and as slick as could be it's a fine operating piece of machinery that has all the glamour and looks of days gone by a little hole in there I'm not gonna worry about that I'm not gonna lose any sleep about it it's better than ever better than ever friends so don't listen to all the hype and all the baloney that you hear out there take it from when I'm or somebody who has worked with these free for ever since the early 70s this is an improvement to better gun it'll shoot better and I guarantee you'll compete better for me thanks for watching don't forget to subscribe and God bless

Channel: GunBlue490

Views: 106,675

Rating: 4.9266057 out of 5

Keywords:

Id: 4h9l2ipiKf4

Length: 50min 2sec (3002 seconds)

Published: Sat Dec 14 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/werepat]

Dude gets to the point at around 24:30

[u/Torin11B]

Thanks for this video. I was on the fence about the classic series revolvers vs. current line especially about the M36 vs. the newer line of J frames.

[u/HurricaneDitka_1985]

But they still have that stupid Clinton lock

[u/prooveit1701]

If other sources are to be believed these days, one comes away with the impression that newer S&W features such as the shrouded barrel, no pin barrel, internal firing pin vs hammer nose etc are undesirable compared to the old models.

He discusses all the new features from his experience of having worked for years on the originals - and point by point he lays out how pretty much every change constitutes an improvement in design.

I get the nostalgia for the originals - but watching this I think the myth of their superiority is overstated.

[u/TooMuchButtHair]

I can't speak to older S&W revolvers, but I've got a 686+ (only 3 years old) that is absolutely amazing. It is, by far, the handgun I enjoy shooting the most. Sure, my Shield is more concealable, my Glock 19 holds more rounds, but they just aren't the same buttery smooth perfection that is my revolver.

[u/The_Big_Deal]

My 586-8 is a great looking and great shooting gun. I'm glad I bought one new instead of paying the same amount of money or more for the "privelage" of owning an older one that may not be any better. There's a weird myth going around that anybody can walk into any pawn shop or gun store and buy a pre lock version of these guns for half the price of a new one, but that isn't true at all. And people bitch way too much about the lock. Ignore it or disable it and plug the hole, it's not a big deal.

[u/CrypticQuery]

Glad to hear the classic line is being treated well. I just despise the way the lock and the sleeved barrels look (but more so not having the option of ordering the things with an external lock included so I don't have to have that damned internal one).

[u/poapratensis]

Yes...many of us have known this for some time, though 90s production was very good. Some actual improvements have been made. The model 57 classics has the endurance package improvements of the model 29-5 and later, something no early series 57 had. The new model 19 has no cut in the barrel extension and locks on the crane. The finish isn't better though. Polishing must be too labor intensive. Also, thr cylinder gaps are getting too big IMO. 4 thou or less is ideal. And the damn Hillary Hole. I have a 2005 vintage 686+ that I can't quite get a 4 thou feeler into. I've put a feeler to a new model 19 and it was 9 thou. I'm like might as well get a Taurus.