revolver 'locked up' on me

[norsk]

Today at the range I shot about 30 rounds of 38sp though my Taurus 357 revolver, then about another 20 of 357 though it. This was all in about 15 minutes or so, and with cheap, dirty ammo. The gun was hot to the touch. I decided to finish by trying some of the new Hornady Critical Defense 357 rounds. After the second round of this ammo, the cylinder 'locked up' and would rotate, which therefore didn't allow me to pull the trigger. I tried to open the cylinder from the frame, but had a heck of a time releasing it. I literally had to push very hard to get the cylinder to slide out so I could eject the remaining rounds. Once I did this, I let the gun sit for a few minutes (went back to my other gun), then decided to try the 38sp again. I fired five rounds quickly with no problems.
In retrospect I should have done some testing with the 357 ammo, but I didn't. My working theory is that because the gun was so hot perhaps there was just enough expansion of some metal to essentially pinch the 357 round to the gun frame, thus 'locking' the cylinder. After sitting for those few minutes, the metal cooled and contracted and that's why the final five rounds were fine.
Does anyone have any thoughts on this?

 

[WhitleyStu]

Make sure the ejector rod did not come loose and back out a little.

 

[Colt556]

Yep, tighten the ejector rod, make sure breech face is clean too. I had a .44mag lock up on me once and found out the PMC bullets were not seated correctly and were back out under recoil. Had a S&W do it from the ejector rod loosening up.

 

[ELMO]

Seems that you were shooting 38 specials out of the gun and this round is shorter than .357 mag round. It seems that you have powder residue build up in your cylinder and this would make the rounds not seat fully or harder to load .357 rounds. Just use the proper bore brush to clean your cylnder bores and you should be fine. This is what it seems like is going on from what stated... Good luck

 

[IndyGunworks]

Seems that you were shooting 38 specials out of the gun and this round is shorter than .357 mag round. It seems that you have powder residue build up in your cylinder and this would make the rounds not seat fully or harder to load .357 rounds. Just use the proper bore brush to clean your cylnder bores and you should be fine. This is what it seems like is going on from what stated... Good luck

 

[451_Detonics]

Other likely culprit could have been powder flakes under the star, this will lock up a revolver but when you opened it the flakes would have likely fallen out. This is why you should alway point the muzzle as straight up as possible when ejecting empties.

 

[scottka]

Seems that you were shooting 38 specials out of the gun and this round is shorter than .357 mag round. It seems that you have powder residue build up in your cylinder and this would make the rounds not seat fully or harder to load .357 rounds. Just use the proper bore brush to clean your cylnder bores and you should be fine. This is what it seems like is going on from what stated... Good luck

I normally shoot .357 first for this reason.

 

[GlenD65]

Seems that you were shooting 38 specials out of the gun and this round is shorter than .357 mag round. It seems that you have powder residue build up in your cylinder and this would make the rounds not seat fully or harder to load .357 rounds. Just use the proper bore brush to clean your cylnder bores and you should be fine. This is what it seems like is going on from what stated... Good luck

Good advice. I had this happen for the first time a few weeks ago. I was using cheap (dirty) .38 ammo and then switched to .357. A good cleaning fixed the jamb up.

 

[Colt556]

When switching from 38 to 357 I'll run a brush through the cylinder. Works for me.

 

[scottka]

When switching from 38 to 357 I'll run a brush through the cylinder. Works for me.

This works just fine too. I'm just too lazy to run a brush through at the range so I just shoot the .38 last.

 

[Colt556]

This works just fine too. I'm just too lazy to run a brush through at the range so I just shoot the .38 last.

Depending on what I shoot I normally start light and work my way up. Then at the end it's time to relax and just enjoy the pure pleasure of shooting .22s.