I have three stainless Mark IIIs, a Target with 5-1/2" bull barel and an Ultradot 30, a Competition with 6--7/8" slab side barrel and a 4X scope, and a Hunter with 6-7/8" fluted barrel and Hi-Viz sights. I bought three Volquartsen Acurizing kits over the pat few months and finally got around to installing them this past weekend.
The first kit I tried was on the Hunter. I started Friday evening with the disassembly and cleaning. The gun was a real bear to disassemble. I beat it with a rubber mallet and finally got it apart and clean just before bedtime. I started installing the kit Saturday morning and gave up just after lunch. I took it to a local gun shop and they told me they did not work on Volquartsen Acurizing Kits because they were too hard to install. I took a break till just after dinner and started in again. I finally got it all together around midnight. It was just as hard to assemble as it was to disassemble. Total time spent was 12 hours and I probably had it fully assembled 4 or 5 times, but something was always wrong. Lots of that time was spent memorizing the part names, locations, and orientations with additional time spent learning how to use scotch tape as a temporary way to hold parts together and developing a way to grip my mini Maglite in my mouth so I could see inside and have both hands free.
I started on the second gun, the Target Sunday morning and had it back together by lunch, total time was 3.5 hours. It was a lot less tight than the Hunter and I was still working out some of the knks in the process.
I started the last gun, the Competition, just after lunch Sunday and had it back together in 1.5 hours.
The steps on the Brownell web site were very helpful:
http://www.brownells.com/aspx/NS/Gun...317&mc_ID=2020
As were the steps shown on Bullseye's GunTak Online:
http://www.guntalk-online.com/fsprocedures.htm
There are several videos online, all of which are too fast and too grainy to help much. I found it took a lot of practice to get good with the diassenbly and reassembly. There are a lot of little tips and tricks that are not shown such as taping over the ends of the sear pin so it doesn't fall out until you get ready to install the grips.
It helped to do three guns in a row because I always had a complete working model to refer to. I took them to the range tonight after work and all three worked great wirh no misfires or failures to eject after 100 rounds through each one. The difference in the before & after trigger pulls is amazing. I guess I need to go back and train the gunsmith how to do it.
Volquartsen Acurizing Kit x 3
Moderators: Bullseye, Moderators
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Georgezilla
- Master contributor
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I would have to agree with the comment about the gunsmith. I don't think you can call him a gunsmith if he can't install a VQ kit.Georgezilla wrote:Glad you got it all installed! I'm sure you will enjoy the modifications.
Must be a pretty incompetent gun-smith if he considers the VQ kit as being "too hard" to install.
The kit consists of adjustable trigger, sear, hammer, and mag release. In my opinion you can save money by just buying the sear and adjustable trigger. The other parts really don't buy you any more performance. The sear and the trigger are definitely worth the money. You will have a light, crisp trigger and will be able to adjust pre-travel and post-travel.shupdude wrote:I also have a Hunter MkIII in the same spec as you. It is all stock right now and I wanted to upgrade it. I have heard of the VQ accurizing kit, but would like to know what this will provide me and is it worth spending the $$ on?
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greener
Sounds like a good way to run the conversions, smokey. I bought the complete upgrade kit (against Bullseye's advice) for my first one. Decided I didn't like the mag release and replaced it with the old one. The next 3 I did were just the trigger and sear. It's difficult for me to tell the difference between the one with the target hammer and the ones without. You will be very pleased with your upgrades.
It's also fun to watch a guy who shoots an unmodified Ruger when he shoots one with the mods.
It's also fun to watch a guy who shoots an unmodified Ruger when he shoots one with the mods.
They all three turned out well. I have been too busy at work to go to the range much, but the lighter trigger pull is definitely an improvement. I still have some adjustments to make to the trigger pre and post travel. I like the larger VQ bolt release. The Ruger stock hammers may go back in later. It works for most brands of ammo I tried, but some do not like the light strike and fail to fire on almost every round. I believe Winchester HP were the rounds I had trouble with. I prefer CCI MiniMags and it woks well with them. I have about 5.000 rounds stockpiled and 3K of those are MiniMags. The others are a mix of whatever was available since the CCI MiniMags are in short supply. Below is an older pre-VQ photo of the same three Mark III's on the right with my other two rimfire handguns, a Ruger Single Six and S&W 617.
