Ruger Blackhawk Timing?

[danski26]

I'm working on the junker blackhawk I bought for a song and am running into a question I havn't been able to figure out.

I am fitting an over sized cylinder latch to fix the sloppy lock up "and unlocking under recoil" of the old one and am wondering about the timing of the revolver. The fitting went well and along with the oversized base pin I fitted, the blackhawk has tightened up quite a bit. Better than I had hoped for!

The question is, when is the locking latch supposed to go up under the spring tension? In other words, what is the proper timing? Don't worry about the cylinder rotation, that is all good. The oversized latch is moving up against the cylinder fairly early in the cocking of the hammer. I would say about 1/3 cock and it is up. I thought this was too early in the cycle so I put the the old one back in and it is timed the exact same.

Should this latch come up later in the cocking cycle? Other than the latch draging on the cylinder it all works fine. Locks up very tight!

I took two pictures. One shows the point the latch raises and the other shows full cock.

[MtGun44]

Not at all experienced on these, but isn't the latch just retracted to free the
cylinder to rotate and then quickly released with a spring to push it up
when it reaches the bolt cut in the cyl? I think it just rides the cylinder around
for quite a ways until it hits the slot.

I'm afraid that this is just a guess, none of my Rugers has every required any
work!

Bill

[44man]

It is the design of the lockwork. All Rugers have the lock ride the cylinder and I don't think it can be changed. My SBH has been fired 57,665 times and I can only feel the mark with my fingernail going in one direction, not the other.
BFR's are the same lockwork and after many thousand rounds I can't feel the line at all.
Even a Freedom will drop the lock on the side of the cylinder.
Seeing how little wear there is from a spring loaded part rubbing steel against steel, I have to wonder how guys wear end shake into a gun! A drop of STP on the ratchet, pin and front of the cylinder will make them last forever.
Cowboy action shooting will beat the lock and recesses to ruin from fast cocking. Just need a lot of money for gun repair or new guns when shooting that game. If I was shooting that way I would put some STP into the recesses to cushion the impact.

[Ricochet]

Only wear I've seen is a thin silver stripe around the cylinder from the bolt rubbing it as it revolves.

The folks wearing them loose are doing abusive fast-draw stuff, I think.

[Possum]

All the Ruger latches drag the cylinder that I have seen. Mine hits the cylinder about halfway between the notches.

[mousegun]

There's a fix for the "dreaded cylinder ring" problem. Saw this awhile back on the Ruger forum:

http://www.rugerforum.net/showthread.php?t=4163&highlight=cylinder+ring

Hope it kin hep y'all.

[danski26]

Mousegun,

Thanks a million!!! Thats exactly what I was drawing up in my head to try. No trial and error now with the measured drawing. Thanks again!

[Blackhawk Convertable]

The Bible on Rugers is Kuhnhausen's The Ruger Single Action Revolvers: A shop manual