Spanish revolver repair?

[broomhandle]

Hi All,

A pal gave me a old Spanish copy of A S&W in 32-20. (his grand fathers)to clean & reblue.

It has proofmarks from the Elbar proof house that dates it about 1929-1931,
marked FA under the pearl grips.

The revolver has that rear of the cylinder looseness like so many of them.
Is there anything I can do to repair it?

It looks like most of the looseness is from the Dan Wesson style latch ... I think the spring is too soft.
Any one fool with this type of gun?
I have it sitting in a 30 cal ammo box filled with Ed's Red

I know they are not well thought of ,but he wants to shoot it a few times.

Can I/we use 32 Longs or lightly loaded 32 mags in it safely?

Thanks for any help,
broomhandle

[9.3X62AL]

32 Long/32 Mag is a no-go in the 32-20 chambers. There is way too much radial clearance at the head end of the cartridge.

[Bret4207]

Never used one of that vintage, but all the books from that era say they were of questionable quality. No clue of the design and spring, but if I was going to try and shoot it I'd stick with loads in the 6-750 fps range, a fairly slow powder and a failry soft boolit of 90-100 gr. Hornadys swaged 90 gr SWC might be the ticket. Something like the Lyman 311008 would also work.

[Dale53]

I would seriously caution anyone who has an old Spanish revolver to NOT fire it. Hang it up. There have been entirely too many reports of guns blowing up with proper, low velocity factory loads for me and anyone I know to fool with such guns. It is not worth getting hurt. Some of them looked pretty good but were cast junk that would fail at the first opportunity.

Aftrer the revolution (just prior to World War II) the government instituted a program of Proof Testing for all new Spanish firearms and that era thankfully closed, hopefully forever.

Dale53

[broomhandle]

Hi Dale,

The frame is cast! The steel in the barrel & cylinder seen to a good quality.
The proofs seem it indicate it is safe.:roll:
I made a few automatic center punch marks on the revolver and did the same on a old S&W the marks look the same size. (Poor mans hardness tester?):???:

IF I shoot it it will be with the lightest loads I can find for a revolver.

Thanks, :drinks:
broom

[Swagerman]

This is merely a suggestion, don't load smokeless powder. If you just have to load it up, use black powder which is lower pressure stuff...but messey.

Get some black powder suggestions from the experts who burn that stuff.

If it were me, I'd hang it on the wall.

Jim

[broomhandle]

Hi Jim,

I'm sure, your are correct. I should just clean it up and practice "gunsmithing" on it.
I'm retired and do stuff like this just to keep busy!

I fixed a few guns now and really enjoy getting them working.

Be well & safe,
broom

[45nut]

Trail Boss powder might be just the ticket for that.

[johniv]

All good advice given here.. Back in the 70's I worked for a shop that owned a great number of forign/surplus/junk/odd, guns, and got to work on ,and testfire!!
some Spanish copies of the S&W ,chambered for the 44 WCF (shudder). I dont think they had ever been fired before, after checking over the revolvers, we fired current factory loads and the plating (nickel I think) was blown off the cyl. face and thereafter could be peeled off with the fingers like peeling a bannana.
In retrospect I'm glad I was young and indestructable (read dumb) as we werent hurt in the procedure. Dont shoot it, Spanish QC of that era sucks.
John