My new S&W 617 -6 has noticeable rough machine marks on the forcing cone.Is this acceptable? I fired it 200 times without issues.

Click on the link for better pics
http://imgur.com/a/uI4pU
http://imgur.com/a/eEKRm
My 629-4 5" classic. Smooth forcing cone.

My lady Smith purchased couple years ago is little rough but not as bad.

My Ruger Redhawk 44 mag 5.5" also smooth.

What it looks like is not as near important as what it shoots like! Yes we pay hard earned money for these things and have high ( maybe sometimes too high) expectations on fit and finish. If the gun runs and shoots to an acceptable accuracy standard I would not be at all concerned

It shoots fine..it's still a production line revolver, and as we know, a lot of mistakes can happen on the production line .Just seems someone should be paying more attention. S&W makes great revolvers ,some bad ones will invariably get out the door. To inspect every part on every gun to know whether they're perfect would cost them out of business -- so we become the final step in quality assurance . S&W will fix it if needed.Of that I have no doubt.

Yup, I was gonna say that it might be lead splatter.

Aloha, Mark

It will probably have to be acceptable. That's what you get from S&W these days. The die-hard loyalists contend that as long as it shoots OK we can't complain, after all Smith is just trying to keep costs down. Apparently "keeping costs down" requires a near complete abandonment of quality control.

Since all the current production revolvers of their's I've looked at recently come in around $1000, I'm not seeing a lot of cost savings. And the two used ones I've recently purchased (I have my own cost saving requirements) have unacceptably heavy DA triggers. All the remedies for that have so far produced mis-fires. For $1K I'll buy older S&Ws, without locks and MIM parts from now on. But then I'm an old geezer and getting cranky in my advancing years.

Dave

In general terms I'm at a similar place myself. There are new new and used well below 1K - but I get what you are saying

I've (sort of) gone that route too.   I'll only buy a S&W revolver without the Hillary Hole.

Aloha, Mark

I got a new 627 perf center last year that has the same issue. It kinda sucks especially being a perf center gun. The gun shoots great and I really like having 8 shots. I like S&W, but it aint no python or anaconda.

S&W issued RMA and got it repaired.I will get it back on Mon the 15th. They cut the forcing cone and polished the back of the barrel .That's what I was told over the phone when I spoke to them few days ago.

I couldn't see the forcing cone in any of your pictures.

The very first pic. I received the gun today. Tech notes are "cut forcing cone and repair barrel". I have no idea on why they cut the freaking forcing cone.