Ruff Kut

Like Judgem All said. The brass frames go on sale for $150 all the time, but I have never seen the steel frames come down at all.

Looks like I am the oddball of the group. 160 RNFP in my vaqueros and Marlin 1894.

Thank you!

Find the nearest Harbor Freight store. They sell a power chainsaw sharpener that is basically a 4" chop saw. Buzzes through brass like butter for $25. Clean up and finish with your Lyman. For Ruger pistols? I just use Schofield brass unless you just really want super shorties.

I think that would make a fine looking smoke pole!

What Kajun said! I got some coated bullets from Lead Ringer and love them. So a free plug for Ringers Bullets here! No gumming up the dies in my press, slide slick and easy in bullet feeders, barrel is clean as a whistle after shooting. I am a fan for sure.

Reduced?!?!?! Is it sold?

That is a plainsman's dream right there! Nice work Chili!

Widder, Can't send you a message. I guess your box is full. But you have a rifle headed your way!

The older Bonds, like mine were definitely that way. The newer ones have a MUCH improved trigger pull on them.

It shoots, it runs, it is insanely picky on OAL length. The action still needs to be slicked, bolt bridged, but...I would call her about 90%.

It is a bit more involved than a set screw. You actually have to make it a gate that stops the shorter cartridge, but still allows the bolt to slide through from the back side. Pictures explain it much better than I can. But essentially this is the route I was considering to make the 73 run .45 Schofield. http://www.thesmithshop.com/cbs45.html

I have this mod. It is a shade more in depth than the 45CS conversion due to headspacing off the case and being rimless. Well, it is a hell of a lot more in depth actually. I bit off a lot more than I realized when I got things started. After shaving off the back of the barrel to shorten the chamber you start to get into the dovetails being out of alignment, the inside of the receiver needs machined to bring the ejector further forward to function with the short case, the bolt face is larger to handle the rimmed 45 and needs to be addressed to actually hold on to the smaller acp case etc. Basically it is a pretty involved conversion from my small experience. Is it worth it? Well I will tell you that when all of the kinks are worked out and I trust it to make it through a 10 stage match without hiccups. Oh and did I mention that I am shooting it in Frontier Cartridge? So you have the black fouling to consider on a cartridge that spaces off the case rim. Why do it? I am lazy. I wanted one cartridge I can shoot in my vaqueros, my rifle and my 1911 for wild bunch. Brass is cheap and abundant compared to 45 CS. And the case is the perfect size for the SASS min 1cc of black. I absolutely loved the 45 acp in my revolvers for blackpowder, so gave it a shot in the rifle. All in all it is an ongoing project, and yet to be determined how successful it will be. In hindsight? I think converting a 73 to run Schofields would probably have been far easier, less time consuming and cheaper. Schofields are a great BP cartridge that you can run with zero mods in vaqueros and gives you the smaller case volume. But then I was still staring at the 1911........

I second what Tyrel said about Bowling Green KY. Central KY is nice. Not too hot, no brutal winters. Low taxes, cheap housing, and federal pensions are tax exempt I retired here with good reason after living all over the globe.

I am loading them just long enough that I have to put some pressure to get it to seat fully. The bullet is just starting to engage the rifling. No free bore.