Have a picture of Smith & Wesson 686 / 6?, please send it to us.
Picture courtesy of timstsl.
| Value for Money | 8.7/10 |
|---|---|
| Reviewer Rating | 8.4/10 |
| Overall Rating | 8.5/10 |
By SilentScope
on 5th Sep 2005
| Value for money | 9/10 |
|---|---|
| Overall value | 8/10 |
| | |
-High-quality parts (almost entirely metal)
-Above average accuracy for a 6"-barreled CO2 pistol
-Nickel finish with a beautiful lustre
-Intuitive internal design (easy to repair and replace parts should it be necessary to open the gun up)
-Free extras like: a barrel cleaning rod, barrel wrench (to remove shroud and barrel or re-tighten as necessary)
-Made in Germany
-Large grips (not friendly for users with small and medium-sized hands)
-Grip halves sometimes come together unevenly (can be an irritating feeling when held)
-Double Action shooting can be dodgy as the break off point takes practice to predict
-Cocking the hammer for a Single Action shot is a little coarse
-Naff black-coloured magazines (strange contrast when inserted into the body of a silver gun)
-Plastic carrying box has flimsy hinges (at least it comes free)
The Umarex Smith & Wesson 686 is a high-quality physical and mechanical reproduction of the real revolver. It is a pleasure to shoot and well within acceptable accuracy for that of a pistol (it's not fair to compare it to a rifle because it is a pistol; sometimes people will try to use that non sequitur to compare them anyway). The free moulded carrying case is well thought out. It protects the gun with a decent amount of padding and has brilliant cut-outs for a pellet tin and 2 CO2 powerlets.
There are certain things people may not like on this gun like the faux features (an ejector rod that doesn't eject rearward) and most of the cylinder being fake. I don't use these points to detract from the rating as I think they're unfair criticisms. Firstly, the ejector rod needn't spring backwards since you remove the entire cylinder (unlike on the real gun). From a mechanical engineering standpoint, there is no need to rotate a full-size cylinder to fire a pellet that is maybe 1/8th the depth of it (despite the fact that the Gamo R-77 does this, it is superfluous).
Arguably, this is the most accurate and reliable of all the true CO2 revolvers on the market. I've heard of less problems with this gun than the Gamo R-77 or the Crosman 357-6.
The thing I like most about this gun is that it's a true representation of what it is. Most the repeater CO2 guns on the market are revolvers internally, despite being housed in the frame of an automatic pistol. With the Umarex S&W 686, you get just that, a real revolver that's not pretending to be an automatic.

| Helpful | Unhelpful | Agree | Disagree |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Total Respect: +1
Would you like to see a review that's not being listed?
snipersnipersniper
on 7th Dec 2005
michaelingeorgia
on 3rd Jan 2006
michaelingeorgia
on 29th Jan 2006