Rather than tell you that I built this for church (which I did not) let me tell you about something I built that evolver into my Sunday Go to Meeting Snub. Initially a good friend (who wishes to remain uncredited) offered me his ultra lightweight m342 J-frame. I dislike the ultra (!) light weight snubs and I dislike the frame mounded locks and I dislike the Centennial frame. But the price the gentleman was asking was insane so, following the obligatory paperwork, home it came with me. A few rounds fired on the range and I knew I was right. I hated everything about the gun. First on the list was the punishing recoil. What this gun needed was an intervention. I started with replacing the titanium cylinder with a stainless steel one. A quick trip to the scale and the weight still remained too low for comfort. I though about replacing the barrel with a 2-1/4-inch heavy barrel and enjoying a slightly longer ejector rod, but the 2-1/4-inch short barrel’s additional weight was still going to be to low to produce a useful gun. I did have on hand a stainless steel 3-inch bull barrel begging for a new home. After a notably long hunt, I found a gunsmith willing to remove the old barrel and attach the new one. Every other gunsmith I contacted refused to even try. Out the gun went and back it came with a new barrel. Along with a number of issue including forcing cone problems, ejector rod issues, and a point-of-aim/point-of-impact discrepancy that put rounds YARDS off at targets from 20-FEET from the target. Another score of phone calls and I found a gunsmith willing to try to correct the issues on two conditions. First, I had to accept that there was a near certainty that the frame would crack if he tried to straighten it out. And second, that I would tell no one who did the work as he never wanted to be approached with attempting this work again. Done deal, and off the gun went. When it was returned everything worked and the POA/POI was only fractions of an inch off at multiple yards. Next I need to replace the sight with a set of Cylinder & Slide’s Extreme Duty high visibility fixed sights. If the gun wanted to shoot straight I wanted to do my part and find the sights. All put together and the gun was shooting above my skill set. Notable though, with the bull barrel and the stainless steel cylinder, the gun was still lighter than my daily carry m38 Bodyguard, if only be fractions of an ounce. I still needed to have it re-cut for moon clips but still retain the ability to for .38’s without moon clips. It’s on the schedule for that work over at Original Precision. I need only find the perfect set of stocks for it. I have a order in for a pair of VZ Grips wrap-around (overmold style) stocks and a custom set of finger bump-less stocks for Hogue (not shown). The only holster I considered for the gun was a MacDaniel II style holster from Andrews Custom Leather. I’ve used the MacDaniel II in the past and adored it. I did want the additional belt loop option. Even though this would be for an ultra light carry gun, I didn’t plan to carry the gun forward of the centerline with the forward loop, nor carry the gun to the rear on the center line with the rear loop. I had the semester move the pant beltloop directly in line with the strong-side leg-centerline and wanted the loops, one ahead and one to the rear of that belt loop for security. All put together I did note that the upper left ear on the rear sight was just barely contacting the inner edge of the Andrews Custom Leather. Off it would have to go to get both ear edges rounded off. No one wants to chew up a Andrews holster. Only two items remain for the project. The original frame lock had already been removed by the previous owner via a “home remedy” but I will be fitting an Original Precision Lock Delete within the the gun within next few days. Then it is is off the Rick Devoid at Tarnhelm Supply to install one of his Murabito Gun Safeties. This converts the cylinder latch into a 1911 style safety lever. That was one of the concessions I went with in lieu of a safety strap on the holster. Since I planned to carry this exclusively under a cover garment, I wanted to hedge my bets, balancing access with retention. Overall I can not think of any additional features I would or could want. It would be nice if S&W would have offered the base m342 with a 3-inch bull barrel, but if they did, I wouldn’t be left with a one-of-a-kind snub.
