Extractor safety bushing for hand guns

A hand gun has a cylinder, a chamber in the cylinder for holding a shell casing, an extractor rod extending through the cylinder adjacent the chamber, an extractor on an end of the extractor rod normally held in a closed position adjacent the chamber, and a return spring around the extractor rod for normally biasing the extractor into its closed position. The extractor normally can slide the casing entirely out of the chamber in response to travel of the extractor rod. A safety bushing is secured around a portion of the extractor rod, and the return spring is biased against the safety bushing. The safety bushing reduces the travel of the extractor rod which, in turn, limits the distance that the extractor can move the shell casing out of the chamber. The length of the safety bushing is sufficient to prevent the extractor from sliding the casing entirely out of the chamber, but sufficient to still allow the casing to be easily removed from the chamber, so that a casing cannot be jammed in the chamber by the extractor under the bias of the return spring after the extractor rod has been actuated.

BACKGROUND 
This invention relates to a safety bushing for preventing an empty shell 
casing from being jammed in a chamber of a hand gun by an extractor rod 
for removing the casing from the chamber. 
A revolver commonly used by law enforcement officers includes an extractor 
rod for emptying spent shell casings from the chambers in the gun 
cylinder. The extractor rod includes an extractor having fingers which 
project into respective chambers of the gun cylinder. The tip of each 
finger fits under a rim on a corresponding shell casing, and the officer 
empties the chambers by depressing the extractor rod which causes the 
extractor to slide the shell casings out of the chambers. 
In a service revolver manufactured by Smith and Wesson, the extractor 
slides the spent shell casings entirely out of the chamber when the 
extractor rod is actuated. This type of revolver is commonly used by most 
law enforcement officers in this country. To empty the shell casings from 
the chambers, the officer inverts the gun and depresses the extractor rod 
and waits for the casings to fall clear of the weapon before releasing the 
extractor rod. 
When a shell casing is withdrawn entirely from the chamber, the extractor 
is free to pass over the end of the rim on a shell case; and if the 
officer releases the extractor rod too quickly, without waiting long 
enough for the cases to clear the weapon, the extractor can push the case 
back into the chamber and can jam the case in the chamber. The extractor 
is then not in a position to withdraw the case from the chamber, and the 
officer will not be able to reload until the case is removed from the 
chamber. This requires a tedious and time-consuming task of picking the 
case out of the chamber, say by removing the case by hand or by inserting 
a probe into the opposite end of the chamber and pushing the case out of 
the chamber. 
If an officer is in a stress situation, such as being under fire, the 
officer can easily allow the extractor rod to return too quickly and 
therefore jam a spent casing in the chamber. The officer then can be 
defenseless until he can remove the jammed casing and reload. Several 
actual cases have occurred in which an officer jammed a shell casing in 
his service revolver while under fire. 
The present invention provides means for limiting the stroke length of an 
ejector rod in a revolver of the type used by law enforcement officers. By 
limiting the stroke of the ejector rod, the shell casing is not entirely 
withdrawn from the chamber when the extractor rod is pushed its full 
stroke length, although the extractor rod can travel through a stroke 
length long enough to allow the shell casings to easily fall from the 
chambers. In this way the extractor cannot slip over the end of a casing 
and jam the casing in a chamber during the return stroke of the extractor 
rod. 
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
This invention provides a safety bushing which can be installed on the 
extractor rod of a revolver commonly used by law enforcement officers. The 
safety bushing reduces the stroke length of the extractor rod. The 
revolver includes an extractor rod extending through a cylinder of the gun 
for extracting a shell casing from a chamber in the cylinder. The 
extractor rod includes an elongated extractor carrier aligned 
longitudinally with an elongated ejector member, an extractor on an end of 
the extractor carrier opposite the ejector member, and a return spring 
around the extractor carrier for normally biasing the extractor into a 
closed position adjacent the chamber. The ejector member projects from an 
opposite side of the chamber. The ejector can be pushed against the bias 
of the return spring for causing the extractor to move away from the 
chamber and slide the casing out of the chamber. The safety bushing is 
releasably secured between the ejector member and the extractor carrier, 
and the return spring is biased against the safety bushing. The safety 
bushing is of sufficient length to limit the travel of the extractor away 
from the chamber so as to prevent the casing from being withdrawn entirely 
from the chamber. The safety bushing can be releasably secured to the 
extractor rod, say by retrofitting procedures, so that the stroke length 
of the extractor rod in existing service revolvers can be limited. 
These and other aspects of the invention will be more fully understood by 
referring to the following detailed description and the accompanying 
drawings.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION 
FIG. 1 shows a cylinder 10 of a hand gun such as a Smith and Wesson K-frame 
or N-frame revolver for .38 or .357 magnum calibers of the type commonly 
used by law enforcement officers. The cylinder includes chambers 12 
circumferentially spaced apart around the axis of an internal bore 14 
concentric with the cylinder. 
An extractor rod assembly 16 extends concentrically through the bore 14 in 
the cylinder 10. The extractor rod assembly includes an elongated ejector 
member 18 having a free end 20 located outside one end of the cylinder. 
The extractor rod also includes an elongated extractor carrier 22 
extending collinear with respect to the ejector member 18. The extractor 
carrier 22 has an outside end which carries an extractor 24 located 
adjacent an end of the cylinder opposite the end 20 of the ejector 18. The 
extractor 24 has projecting fingers 26, each of which extends into a 
corresponding chamber 12 of the gun cylinder. An inner face 28 of the 
ejector member 18 is spaced from an inner face 30 of the extractor carrier 
22, and a safety bushing 32 is releasably secured between the faces 28, 30 
of the ejector 18 and the extractor carrier 22, respectively. 
A return spring 34, in the form of a coil spring, extends around a portion 
of the extractor carrier 22 which travels in the bore 14. The return 
spring 34 has one end which bears against an internal face 36 in an end of 
the bore 14 adjacent the extractor 24. An opposite end of the return 
spring is urged against an annular face 38 of the safety bushing 32. 
An ejector rod safety collar 40 includes a sleeve 42 located in the bore 14 
of the cylinder. The sleeve 42 surrounds portions of the ejector member 
18, the safety bushing 32, the extractor carrier 22, and the return spring 
34 which travel in the cylinder. The sleeve guides travel of the extractor 
rod assembly back and forth in the cylinder. 
FIG. 1 shows a normal or closed position of the extractor rod assembly 
prior to ejecting spent shell casings 44 from respective chambers 12 of 
the cylinder. Each finger 26 of the extractor 24 fits under a 
corresponding rim 46 projecting from an end of a corresponding casing 44. 
The return spring 34 normally biases the extractor 24 into the closed 
position shown in FIG. 1 so that the cases 44 are held in the chambers 
until the extractor rod assembly is actuated. 
FIG. 2 shows the extractor rod assembly 16 in its actuated or open position 
in which the extractor rod is moved longitudinally relative to the 
cylinder, say by pushing on the free end 20 of the ejector 18. This slides 
the extractor 24 away from the end of the cylinder 10 so that each finger 
26 pushes against the rim 46 of a corresponding shell casing 44 to slide 
the casing out of its corresponding chamber 12. 
The hand gun shown in the drawings is normally manufactured and sold to law 
enforcement officers without the safety bushing 32. In this instance the 
ejector member 18 and the extractor carrier 22 are secured adjacent one 
another on the extractor rod. It is common to include a narrow flange (not 
shown) between the adjacent faces 28, 30 of the ejector and the extractor 
carrier 18, 22, respectively. The return spring is normally biased against 
the face of the narrow flange so that the working end of the return spring 
is very close to the face 28 of the ejector 18. In this instance, when the 
extractor rod is actuated to empty the casings from the chambers, the 
extractor rod travels through a relatively long stroke length to withdraw 
the casing from the chamber so that the inner end of the casing 44 can 
clear the outer end of its respective chamber. Such a long stroke length 
is produced because the face 28 of the ejector member 18 can travel a 
longer distance through the cylinder than is possible in the embodiment 
shown in FIG. 2 in which the safety bushing 32 is present between the 
ejector member 18 and the extractor carrier 22. The safety bushing 32 acts 
as a spacer to lengthen the distance between the face 28 of the ejector 
member 18 and the adjacent end of the return spring 34. Thus, when the 
extractor rod is moved to its open position shown in FIG. 2, the stroke 
length of the ejector rod is shortened when compared with a firearm not 
having the safety bushing 32. 
The length of the safety bushing 32 is sufficient so as to limit the stroke 
length of the extractor rod so that the extractor 24 does not completely 
remove the casings 44 from the chambers 12. The safety bushing 32 shortens 
the effective stroke length of the extractor rod by about 25% of its 
normal travel without the safety bushing. This allows each case 44 to be 
withdrawn sufficiently far from the chamber that the case can fall under 
gravity to clear the weapon when the extractor rod travels its full stroke 
length. Thus, the fingers 26 of the extractor can not extend over the rim 
46 of a case and cause the case to be jammed in the chamber when the 
extractor rod is returned to its normal position under the bias of the 
return spring 34. 
The safety bushing 32 preferably has a length in the range of 0.26 to 0.29 
inch. The length of the safety bushing is illustrated by the dimension a 
in FIG. 4. This length reduces the travel of the extractor 24 from the end 
of the chamber by about 0.23 to 0.26 inch when compared with the normal 
configuration (in absence of the safety bushing) in which the end of the 
return spring 34 is about 0.03 inch from the face 28 of the ejector member 
18. I have found that this stroke length is sufficient to prevent jamming 
of a casing in the chamber and yet withdrawing each shell case 
sufficiently far from the chambers that the cases can be emptied with a 
relatively quick depression and release of the extractor rod. 
Referring to FIGS. 4 and 5, the safety bushing is shaped as a tubular 
open-ended cylinder which includes a stepped bore extending concentrically 
through the bushing. The stepped bore includes a relatively wider circular 
bore 48 which is stepped down to form a narrower circular bore 50. The 
wider bore 48 is formed adjacent the face 38 of the bushing against which 
the return spring 34 is biased. The narrower bore is longer than the wider 
bore, the length of the narrower bore being preferably 0.180 inch and 
being depicted by the dimension b in FIG. 4. The inside diameter of the 
smaller bore 50 is preferably 0.187 inch and is shown as dimension c in 
FIG. 4, and the inside diameter of the wider bore 48 is preferably 0.260 
inch and is shown as dimension d in FIG. 4. 
The safety bushing 32 is secured to the extractor rod assembly by fitting 
the end of the extractor carrier 22 into the wider bore 48 of the bushing 
32, as shown in FIG. 3. The ejector member 18 has an externally threaded 
projecting portion 52 which extends through the narrower bore 50 of the 
safety bushing 32. The threaded projecting portion 52 also extends into a 
corresponding internally threaded bore 54 in the cooperating end of the 
extractor carrier 22. A rod which normally extends through the extractor 
carrier 22 and the ejector member 18, together with a plunger for the rod, 
are not shown in FIG. 3 for simplicity. 
The safety bushing 32 provides an effective means for retrofitting existing 
firearms to prevent the extractor from travelling so far that it 
completely withdraws the shell casings from the chambers.