H. K. Uriah, SASS #74619

I prefer this... Or this...

Everything? Look back up at the scenario I suggested. How would that be impossible if using black powder?

The Cabela's gun library is a strange place. Sometimes you can find great deals there, and at others, their prices are can only be described as unreasonable. And don't get me started how it seems that half the clerks who work in there don't know what they are doing or their at times silly rules about various things.

Start at position 1 with your "rifle caliber" repeating rifle and place 5 shots on the large targets at the back end of the bay that are about 100 yards away. Move forward to position 2, and double tape the the same targets with your main match rifle. Targets are now about 75 yards away. Move to position 3 and double tap the same five targets with your .22 rifle. Targets are now about 50 yards away. Move to position 4 and engage the same 5 targets 5 times with each pistol from 25 yards away. Move to position 5 and engage the 4 shotgun targets with your shotgun from 10 yards away. The shotgun, or the .22 could be optional, or just not included in the first place.

How about a 3 rifle event? A .22, a Main Match Rifle, and "big rifle" such as a Win 94/76/86. Three targets. Still big ones but at 50, 75 an 100 yards. 10-10-5.

Really like the .44 Specials. When I first got into this game, I was sure that'd be my go to caliber. Loaded up a TON of ammo for it. But as you saw above, it's been more of a novelty chambering for me. Partly cuz I never found a rifle for it, and I learned the hard way that 92's chambered for .44 Magnum don't really work quite right with the shorter rounds. Still like the caliber though, and I do have some clones chambered for it.

How many of us would, if given the chance, fire SAA #1? Assuming it's sound, I'd be very likely to do so.

They are .22's The .22 version of the Peacemaker was slightly different. Among other things that that the firing pin is in the frame, for example.

Recently, I made a post about what makes for a "complete" collection of Colt SAA's. There were a few different ideas as to what would be the way to define that, and that was pretty good. Also., someone made a very appropriate observation that the discussion was pretty pointless without pictures. Someone else posted about how SAA #1 was on the cover of the latest issue of The American Rifleman. I got my copy of it yesterday, and while there really wasn't anything in the article I'd not read before, it was still a very good one, and there were a couple of other SAA related articles aside from the cover story that were fun to read as well. One of the highlights of the cover story was at the end where it was announced that Colt would be releasing a special commemorative to mark the Peacemaker's 150th anniversary. No price info yet, but I am curious.... Anyway, with all of that in mind, and some other things as well, let's celebrate the SAA by sharing ours with each other. I'll start the ball rolling. I have separated them by caliber and arranged them in the pics in the order aquirred. The top is actually the first SAA I ever purchased. The bottom is a California Bicentennial model, and was the first gun I got that allowed me to refer to myself as "a man with a golden gun." I have used both in side matches. These are .32-20's. Top left left the factory as a .38-40, but has been changed to a .32 at a time and by persons unknown. The nickel finish letters as original, but who knows? The cylinder and barrel looks fairly modern. It is 1st Generation antique. Below it is a 3rd Generation pistol, and was the first SAA that I bought new. Upper right was my first Bisley, and lower right is a more recent purchase. The lower right is the only one I have not yet used at a shoot, but eventually will. Both are of course, First Generations, and are modern ones. These are my .44 Specials. The first time I took the Buntline to a shoot, someone joked that I should obtain a Sheriff's model to pair with it. Soon after that, the left Sheriff was obtained. Whenever I do pair these two, I always find an excuse to shout, "Sheriff Buntline to the rescue!" I also sometimes put the Sheriff in a holster for a 7.5" barreled gun. People are surprised when they see what I am actually shooting. About a year or so later, I found the blued one, and they became the first, closest thing I have to a "matched pair." Both also came with .44-40 cylinders, and I did obtain a .44-40 one for the Buntline, but forgot to put it in the picture. All three guns are 3rd Generations. As of this posting, the New Frontier is my most recently obtained pistol. I've had it for less that a week, so it's the only one here I've not used at a shoot yet. It's a 2nd Gen. These are .44-40's. The top is a 3rd Generation, and came with regular hard rubber grips. I found these "Ivory laminate" grips at a big guns store in Pennsylvania, and thought they'd look cool in this gun. To me, nickel guns just look "better" with ivory. The grips are mostly wood and have a thin layer of this ivory laminated over the wood. I have no idea if it's real ivory or not. Below is a 1st Generation antique that somebody chromed. It's as ugly as sin, the grips are obviously broken, left the factory in 1881 with a blued finish, but it is mechanically perfect and only cost me $500 bucks just before the pandemic hit. I figured it was a bargain. I've toyed with the idea of restoring it. One local gunsmith who specializes in restorations didn't really wanna try. One cool feature is that the hammer, trigger and ejector have been gold plated. Both have been used at shoots. And finally, here are my .45s. The upper left 3rd Generation is the most special gun in my collection; it was my father's. To its right is an NRA Centennial Commemorative. These were 2nd Generation guns. I bought this one when I found it at a now gone Big Gun Store in New Hampshire, and the following weekend, I used it at a big shoot that was spread over 2 days along with Dad's gun. The next time I went on a business trip that took me that way, I took the pistol back to the factory for an action job. (It was that bad!) First pistol I ever felt needed such to be done to it. They did a great job, and it was less than a hundred bucks. But this was at least 10 years ago, maybe 15. Lower left is a fairly generic 2nd Generation, which was a gift from my parents. Lower right is the "Old Fort Des Moines Restoration" commemorative. It's gold plated, and came from the factory with mother of pearl grips. I still have those grips, but I could not get the words of General Patton out of my head, so I obtained these genuine (wooly mammoth) ivory grips for it. And yes, I have used it in competition, like everything else in this caliber. Well, that's my SAA collection. Or at least, all my COLT SAAs. I have not pictured my clones. Shall I send in the clones? Who else will share? Oh, double checking over my list of what I thought would make up my definition of a "complete" SAA collection, I see that I don't have one! Unless you wanna count one of the Bisley's or let it do double duty, I don't seem to have a "modern" 1st Gen example. Oh well.

I have always thought that the Colt New Frontier was an interesting looking revolver. And for some reason, I've always associated .44 Special with the model. (I have learned that it's actually not that common a caliber.) Anyway, I finally found one! A .44 Special NF, Second Generation, for LESS than $2000! Needless to say, it is now mine. No box, but I don't think it's ever been fired.

.38 S&W was a 146 grain round nose bullet of .361" diameter. .38 Colt New Police, which was what Colt called the round, but it is the same thing, used a 145 grain round nose flat point bullet of the same .361" diameter. I'm not sure what the "official" charge of powder was. Full case of black slightly compressed, I suppose. Early cases were also balloon headed to allow for a smidge more powder. I have found a good bunch of .38 New Colt Police brass over the years, and so far everything I've found with that headstamp is balloon headed cases, even rounds that were in old boxes marked smokeless powder. As such I have no fear in reloading them. I use the NCP brass for black powder loads, regular .38 S&W brass for smokeless so that I can know just by looking what is what. When I first started reloading, FINDING .360" or .361" bullets was difficult. I eventually found a .360" 158 grain RN bullet that I use for my smokeless rounds, and Buffalo Arms has a 150 grain round nose hollow base bullet that is lubed for either black or smokeless powder. I use that round in BP .38 S&W. The hollow base expands to grab the rifling. (I also use it for .38 Short and Long Colt, both smokeless and BP loads) It's a rather expensive bullet, but since I don't shoot the load all that often, it's "affordable" in my estimation. A word now about nickeled Winchester .38 S&W brass. It's oddly sized. If you seat a .360" bullet in said brass, you will see the case being bulged where the bullet is, and it WILL NOT CHAMBER in your ,38 S&W revolvers. So, for this brass, I use the above mentioned .358" diameter bullet, and since it seats not as deeply in the case as the .360" bullet, there is more powder capacity. This brings up something called the .38-200 round. The case is identical to the .38 S&W, but it was loaded to much higher pressures for use in the Webley Mark IV .38 revolvers used by the Brits in WW2. You will also find many S&W Victory Models and Colt revolvers that were lend leased to British and Commonwealth forces that are chambered for this much hotter round. While I have not been able to find any data for the .30-200, (which used a 200 grain bullet) I use the nickel Winchester stuff, with the smaller bullet and a max charge of my smokeless powder of choice. This loading seems to be about the same, or perhaps slightly hotter than modern factory .38 S&W, which is downloaded due to the many old guns out there chambered for it. Anyway, this ammo I use ONLY on my Webley, and WW2 or later made DA S&W and Colt revolvers. You can of course chamber regular ,38 S&W ammo in those guns as well. If ever I I find good data for .38-200 and some properly sized 200 grainers, I will again use the nickel Winchester for those loads for easy of visual identification. And then there's .38-44.. Not the hopped up .38 Special that was the predecessor of the .357 Magnum, but a much older round that is basically a .38 S&W with the case elongated to be the same length as the cylinder of a S&W New Model 3. The bullet would be set entirely in the case, and the theory was that with the case being cylinder length, the gun would be more accurate as their would be less jump for the bullet to overcome. Finding this .38-44 brass is all but impossible, and if and when you do, it is stupid expensive. That being said, any gun chambered for this original .38-44 can safely chamber and fire BP loads of .38 S&W. .38 S&W is a fascinating cartridge. It has a long history with many interesting guns chambered for it over the years. Even more when you consider the variations of the cartridge that exist. With more modernly made guns, a rather potent round can be developed if you are so inclined. It is a VERY addictive cartridge. Colt even chambered the SAA for it, albeit in very limited numbers. I greatly desire to find one of these guns, but am not holding my breath. Good luck with it, and happy shooting.

On the "larger" calibers, say, .32-20 plus, just load 'em up with a full case of the stuff, and you're gonna be fine. On the "smaller" calibers, say, .38 Short Colt, .38 S&W, .32 S&W Long and .32 S&W, and maybe some others, well, they won't meet the standard even with a full case of powder. Perhaps a minor exemption is needed for these little guys? I have no idea what it should be, or even if it SHOULD be. In all fairness, when I do shoot a gun in these little calibers, I'm just shooting my regular 49er category anyway. The .38 S&W seems to make a decent amount of smoke to me, but, yeah, no where near as much as the bigger ones do. Don't know what the answer is. I will say the first time I shot my New Model 3 in .38 S&W, I had recently acquired a vintage partial box of factory black powder ammo. Since the box was labeled non corrosive primers, I decided to shoot the ammo. Only two went boom, the other three did nothing. Did a "reload" to get the other three shots, two went off, one didn't. Reloaded again and the last one did go off. Did not use the gun for the rest of the shoot and broke down the ammo and reloaded it it fresh powder and primers. That was an oddly fun experience.

I find the image of the ROA next to the Remington to be fascinating. I think we've all always know that the Ruger is heavily based on the Remington, but seeing them side by side makes it clear just how similar they really are. In some ways, I think the ROA is more similar to the Remington than the Vaquero is to the SAA. Congrats to you on a good find, sir. I look forward to seeing it at the range sooner or later. If I know you're gonna be bringing it, I'll bring my Walker to do a size and weight comparison!

Interesting thing the 87... My original 87 runs Magtech all brass or AA's cut back to 2-1/2" just fine. My Chiappa reproduction runs 2-3/4" AA's just fine, but if I try running the shorter shells in it, they tend to stovepipe on the way out. Weird.

I am not a BP shooter, but I enjoy watching it. I also sometimes like to experiment shooting that way, just for fun. But I have never shot in a BP category. For one thing, while the pistols and rifles are fun, I find shooting the shotgun with BP unpleasant somehow., so I usually shoot them smokeless. Which means not shooting in a BP category. I am told that while you can't shoot smokeless in a BP category, you can shoot BP in one of the other categories if you want too. The first time I shot BP rounds was at a shoot where were 1 of my pistols was an antique, so no smokeless in that gun. The first time I fired it, and it was not the first gun shot, there was a lot of unexpected laughter. Strike that. I just remembered that the very FIRST time I shot black was at a shoot where I was using my Sheriff's models. On the last stage of the day, the last round out of my second pistol was loaded with black. I got applause. My point is, I have fun. And shooting black or a sub is fun. Yes, the smoke can be confounding if there's no wind, but well, if you don't want to deal with smoke, shoot smokeless. On the other hand, if you are shooting something like .32 S&W and are worried about it generating enough smoke, well, just shoot Traditional or Duelist that day, use your .32's and have fun. And if you wanna shoot a BP category, generate lotsa smoke and have fun that way. For what it's worth, here's me shooting. The pistols are a converted Walker, and a 7.5" SAA clone. The rifle in obviously a 92. and all are .45's. The shotgun had reduced loads that didn't generate all that much smoke, and a couple of rounds were smokeless as I ran out of the other stuff. I shot 49er that day. and had a lot of fun. (Last stage of the day, IIRC)

Larsen brings up a good point. The .22 version of the Lightning is very different from its medium and large frame relatives. I was talking with Lassiter about them once. and he described a large frame as a medium frame "on steroids." Essentially an upscaled version of the medium. although there are some minor differences. But the small frame Lightnings are completely different. They actually have a lot more in common with the Winchester 73 in some ways. And if you look at the three sizes. you can see that this is all so.

Contact Lassiter. He's the go to guy for all things Lightning. TOM’S SINGLE ACTION SHOP: 937-687-1039

That's an interesting question. What calibers would that be? .32-20 .38-40 .44-40 .45 Colt are the "original" ones. But other common calibers are .22 LR .22 WMRF .38 Special .357 Magnum Other calibers would be. .38 Long Colt .41 Long Colt .44 Special Other calibers that it was chambered for would be rather obscure, I think. So, getting common calibers, would that really be less expensive?

What makes for a "complete" collection of Colt SAA revolvers? Limited to just Colts and not including clones, which I think should be considered a different collection. So, what do you need? Well, how's this for a possibility? At least one of each of the following... 1. Antique 1st Gen 2. Modern 1st Gen 3. 2nd Gen 4. 3rd Gen 5. Sheriff's model 6. Buntline. 7. Commemorative. 8 Bisley Model 9 New Frontier. 10. A .22 That covers the "highlights," I think. Things like barrel lengths, nickel or blued, or other finish, caliber, grips, and other variables may or may not be included, but they could easily overlap with the above. Opinions? .

Just get a Lightning.

While I do not shoot .38/.357 for SASS, I can offer something along the same lines. I have two 92's in .44 Magnum, a pre safety Rossi and a real Winchester that started life as a .38-40 that someone rebarreled. But had issues with stovepipping if I tried running .44 Specials in them. Switched to using Magnums, but way downloaded, and they never give me a problem again. My brother did have a safety Rossi in .357 Magnum, and he had occasional feed issues with the .38 Special. Based on all of that, I'd say that if you wanna run .38 Special, get a rifle specifically chambered for it, not one in .357 Magnum. Revolvers on the other hand have no problem with the shorter shells, aside from the "carbon ring problem" with cleanup. But if you are careful, I've not found that it be much of a problem. That being said, since I do have revolvers in .44 Special, I very rarely bother to run them in my .44 Magnums. I do the same thing with my (non-SASS) .38's and .357's. Good luck, and happy shooting.

I've always used Red Dot for Shotgun. It can also be used for many of our SASS calibers with good results, but finding Red Dot has been very difficult, read impossible, for some time now. Same for Trail Boss, which I used for just about every cartridge that I reload. So what have I been using of late? I found a big jug of Win231/HP38, (they are the same) a few months ago. It can be used for things like .44-40, .44 Special, .44 Magnum and .45 Colt. I am not sure, but I think it can be used with the 38s and .32-20, but I have not started doing so yet. Assuming that I can one day get some Trail Boss again, I'll keep using the HP38 for the cartridges that I can till I run out of it. For 12 Gauge, I still have SOME Red Dot, and I'll keep using it till I have no more. Hopefully I'll be able to find some more of it before that happens. For 20 gauge, Red Dot is a no go, it generates to much pressure. I've tried, er... Either Green or Blue Dot, I can't remember off the top of my head. While it worked great in my Stevens pump gun, it was a real shoulder thumper in my Parker, using Magtech all brass. So I need to experiment with either reduced loads or a different powder for the 20.

Man, I'd love to go to that! But it's about as far from Boston as you can possibly get. 72 hour drive, 88 hours via Seattle to minimize time in Canada. And you gotta go through Canada to get there... (9 Day drive.) Flying with all those guns and ammo would be... Difficult...

Year 35 to 45?

Compare an original Winchester 73, or a 92, or even a real Colt Lightning in .32-20 to the modern made replicas in the same caliber. You will notice that the tube on the originals is of noticeably less diameter than the one on the replicas. As far as I know, the above mentioned sleeve kit is the most effective way to deal with the oversized magazine. Given how popular replicas in .38 Special are, I am surprised that the makers don't create a properly sized magazine for the smaller calibers.