Ruger GP100 vs SP101 trigger

[heavyshooter]

Ruger GP100 vs SP101 trigger pull

Okays guys; its time for a dumb unanswerable question.

I have both a Ruger GP100 4" and a Ruger SP101 3" and they are both .357 Magnum. The GP100 is new and unfired. I have put about 100 rounds through the SP101. In spite of the fact that the GP100 has not had a trip to the range and it has not experienced nearly as much dry firing as the SP101, the GP100 has a significantly better trigger pull.

1) Why is this the case?
2) What Wolff Spring set-up do you SP101 owners recommend?

 

[bub]

heavyshooter,
1) Occasionally, Ruger gets it right in regards to few/no burrs on the internals, little if any crud in it and you get a good trigger. My GP, bought 5-6 years ago, had a good trigger once I got all the floor sweepings out that Ruger had apparently dumped into it to try and lower their garbage bill. My SP, bought about 2 years ago, had a good trigger out of the box, with little if any crud in it and no apparent burrs. As with apparently all Rugers, both are getting even better with use. My GP has a better (smoother if somewhat heavier) trigger than the S&W M66-2 I recently traded for and the SP has a better and lighter trigger than my MIM but pre-lock S&W M649.

2) Can't answer this for you. I left the stock springs in my SP for maximum reliability since it is used at my PD job for backup and off-duty carry.

Bub

 

[Rexster]

(1) This is an individual gun thing. Some Rugers are smoother than others.

(2) I generally believe in stock-weight springs, unless the gun is a just a toy, never to be used for serious purposes. A light mainspring can result in light strikes, with no primer ignition. A light trigger return spring slows the trigger return, and if a burr is present, or a bit of dirt gets in there, it can get really slow, or may not return at all.

 

[Pistol Toter]

There is little or no difference in the design and construction of the SP vs GP gun other than physical size. They are basicaly identical. As the other gents have remarked some are better than others and generaly get better with shooting ad or even dry firing along with just raking out the loose chips. Again, some guns have more of those than others. But a new gun should be properly cleaned and lubed before firing to start with. Over time little fine chip break off and are cleaned away with maintenance; unless you want to have a smith deburr and smooth it up. If you are handy enough you can even do that yourself. I've had my SP for some years now and it is smoooooth with only firing and good maintenance.
Personally, leave the spring alone, changing them out may improve a function but can cause other problems to appear.
Just my two cents.

 

[Beatnik]

I only have a GP100, which was previously a police trainer.
The trigger is really smooth, with just a little grit on the return, which I don't care as much about. I'm pretty sure it's just smoothed out from use.

I did swap out the hammer spring - I'm pretty sure I got the Wilson kit from Brownell's. I think a 14lb was in there, which I swapped for 10. That helped out a LOT and I haven't had any light strikes in about 300 rounds. I don't think I'd go to the 9lb spring.

I've dry-fired SP101's before, and it was like night & day compared to my well-worn GP. I'm the kind of guy who would open it up, clean it, completely disassemble the trigger group, and go over everything that rubs together lightly with 400, then 600, then with damp baking soda. (Of course, I'd get all the baking soda out afterward.)

If you do anything like that, let me say from experience that you should only disassemble the trigger group inside of a large, clear plastic bag. One microscopic spring going p-tooey! across your living room floor means your gun is out of commish until Brownell's can ship the $10 replacement.

 

[PointOneSeven]

I haven't seen the internals on both, but generally, cramming gun parts into a small package results in a tradeoff. An N-frame has a better chance of a buttery trigger pull than a J-frame. Not absolute, but larger frame revolvers are a joy to shoot IMHO.

 

[GP100man]

the ruger trigger systems are a longer pull of the trigger & always will be but you can smooth it out to be as buttery as slick snot!!!

go to rugerforum.net & look for the IBOK it`ll explain what to do better than i ever can type!!!

GP100man

 

[BigBlock]

GP100's generally come with an excellent trigger pull from the factory. People always try to claim they don't, or if they do it was a one time thing, but that is pure bull****. Ruger does a good job of building GP100's, and therefore, when they leave the factory they have a good trigger. My new GP100 was superb right out of the box, there is nothing unusual about that.

 

[don95sml]

GP100man wrote:

the ruger trigger systems are a longer pull of the trigger & always will be but you can smooth it out to be as buttery as slick snot!!!
go to rugerforum.net & look for the IBOK it`ll explain what to do better than i ever can type!!!

+1. IBOK stands for Iowegan's Book of Knowledge. Iowegan is a well-known poster on www.rugerforum.com/phpBB/ . He has available a free file (IBOK) for the GP-100 and another one for the SP-101. The IBOK explains in great, understandable detail (1) how to disassemble the revolver completely, (2) which springs to buy for a lighter but sure-to-fire trigger pull, (3) which parts to modify (with ordinary hand tools) to obtain a smooth trigger pull, and (4) how to reassemble all the parts. I am no gunsmith by any stretch of the imagination, but I was able to give my GP-100 a smooth, light trigger pull in both double and single action that is the equal of any revolver I have handled. If you think the trigger on your out-of-the-box gun is good, you would be amazed at the improvement that is possible using the IBOK.

 

[s4s4u]

The trigger on my GP is noticeably better than on my SP as well. Darned if I know why. Everyone else that I know who has both agrees.

 

[hoptob]

+1 on Iowegan and IBOK. Gary is a retired gunsmith and knows EVERYTHING about Rugers. I learned a lot from his book and from talking to him.

There is a difference in design between SP and GP triggers. It's subtle but it affects the pull. GP hammer notch is cut flat while SP has concave notch (don't ask me why). The result is that no matter how much you polish it, SP pull increases towards the end of the stroke and GP's pull does not change. Some people don't care about it; others find it objectionable. The only way to change that is to have a good gunsmith reconfigure hammer notch; it's an expensive job.

Mike

 

[Rexster]

FWIW, I picked up a snubby SP101 last year that put to shame not only every other SP101 I have tried, but almost every GP100! Perhaps a Ruger employee had some spare time, and to alleviate boredom, spent extra time on it. Perhaps it was just a fluke, with all the planets lining up and me holding my mouth just right. No matter; I tried the action, and fired up the credit card. I was not even looking into buying another snubby-length SP101; I was thinking of buying the 3-1/16" SP101 next to it in the case, but just had to finger-diddle the snubby, too.

 

[Sunray]

"...GP100 was superb right out of the box..." You need to shoot one that has had a proper trigger job done. It's like night and day.
All factory triggers(except Pythons) are excessively heavy due to frivolous law suits. My GP's DA trigger is smooth, but far too heavy. Did the single action long ago. Had no need for a light DA trigger. Just changing the springs will fix that. If I ever find my roundtoit.

 

[Quoheleth]

The trigger on my GP is noticeably better than on my SP as well. Darned if I know why. Everyone else that I know who has both agrees.

It's not that my GP100 is a bad trigger; the SP101, with its shorter trigger pull, is better for me. I can shoot it DA very well and fairly quickly. My GP, I have to concentrate and really work at it to shoot it well DA.

Q

 

[theoldgringo]

I own a GP100 in 357 and a SRH in 44mag. I converted to lighter springs from Wolff some time back because I wanted to be able to fire in double action and not struggle to hold the muzzle on target.

The GP responded beautifully. The SRH, on the other hand, acted like someone threw an extra part into the action. The cylinder wouldn't rotate consistently; It would jam between the same two chambers, almost every rotation of the cylinder.

So, on the advice of my favorite smith, I bought two ceramic polishing rods (one square, one triangular), de-burred and polished all the flat surfaces of the interior parts on both guns, except for inside the trigger group and I polished the indexing grooves on the cylinders.

The difference is remarkable. Both guns are now behaving flawlessly and are a pleasure to shoot.

Take it for what it's worth, but it was really worth the effort in my case..................