Brutus
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
True.
The Pietta Python?
- Thread starter sailor723
- Start date
True.
highlander
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Newfoundland
While I don't doubt that Pietta could make a good copy of the Python, what made the Python so great was the large amount of hand fitting and hand polishing that went into them, which obviously drove the price all to hell. In order for Pietta to make a true copy, they're going to have to do the same thing; with the same results.
If they don't, it will just be another cheap knock-off.
If they don't, it will just be another cheap knock-off.
highlander
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Newfoundland
For $700 dollars I'd buy all I could get. I paid that for one of my Pythons about 30 years ago.
Pietta needs to go back in time when there were real craftsman and none of this CNC guided laser crap.
If they can't find a team of guys who can't put a gun together the way Colt did, the Python they're trying to replicate will be some generic production line gun that really would only be popular because it's a wannabe of a legendary firearm. I wouldn't hold my breath until someone does a side by side to see if it's anywhere close.
If they can't find a team of guys who can't put a gun together the way Colt did, the Python they're trying to replicate will be some generic production line gun that really would only be popular because it's a wannabe of a legendary firearm. I wouldn't hold my breath until someone does a side by side to see if it's anywhere close.
highlander
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- Newfoundland
Yep, but it's probably my error; I meant the REAL Python.
Ardent
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
They could, for about $5,000 a gun, which is comparable or slightly less than as new in box Pythons sell for today. Mass production wasn't possible with the Python as you well know, at least not to make a product Colt would call a Python, so it died along with many other fine, hand fit things. This Pietta will look like a Colt with poor fit and finish, and smell like one... But it won't feel like one.
As for real Pythons, they've been outperforming the stock market by leaps and bounds for some time now. A Pietta won't do that. Not bad when you can enjoy something and have its value steadily climb while you do, it's a rare and beautiful thing. Unlike the wine aficionados our $3,000 "bottle" isn't worthless soon as it goes "pop". Spend the money and buy the real thing, in the end you actually lose money buying the knock off as it depreciates, the real thing actually climbs- making it look like a bargain.
If that's the case, there would probably be better guns for the money. Pietta would sell well until everyone who wants a Python has their wet dream satisfied. S&W's in the same price bracket would destroy it.
However, I don't think it'll be as bad everyone thinks, it's just that once you actually shoot a real Python and appreciate the amount of work that went into it, nothing can come close. Italian labor is still decent but computer guided milling has made skillful jobs go the way of the dodo.
Afghan's wouldn't have anywhere close the quality of steel or the same tools used for finishing/test as say, the Filipino's do, though they should stick to 1911's, I don't think their other guns get a good wrap.
The prowess of America's gun manufacturing was steeped for generations. Craftsman like what was found in the early 1900's, at the peak of U.S. arms manufacturing and peak America, to me at-least, completely pale in comparison to any of the assembly workers we find today. This was at the era just before the Ford production line started to change quality into quantity, and thus, skilled tradesmen started to dry out as a breed and their sons, who would've picked up the craft, went on to do other things.
CNC's and lasers are all good and dandy if you want to keep "OK" quality consistent and spend the least dime on training your staff. When it comes to replicating or trying to create guns that were created by the best people of their craft and generation, you're going to fall flat no matter what. Guns that were hand made and crafted with passion show in their enormous price tags today.
- Location
- Calgary, AB
If it's anything like the Pietta SAA I have, then I will be getting one for sure.
I agree that currently, the nice older S&W K and N frames are a better value for the dollar, and they seem to be gaining nicely in value too. I got in to the Colt snake guns while they were only stupidly expensive, as opposed to insanely expensive. Net gain on all of them and only going up. I feel like really decent examples of the Smiths are going to do the same, which is why I have 20 or so in the safe now, and looking for more. I think the return on them will be similar to the Snakes in the long term, but you can still afford to get in to them. I'm in buy mode, sell mode will be 5 or 10 years down the road when it is time to retire. But you can bet your Glock that I will be keeping a fine batch for shooting in my golden years.
Ardent
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
While the Smiths should do ok, they'll never follow the Python's course, there are just too many of them and they were never the premium offering the Python was from the get go. Far fewer Pythons were made, and they were priced at double a Smith even when selling beside each other. I like Smiths a lot, they're just not on a level with the Python. If you sold three or four Smiths and bought a Python, you'd have made more on the Python in ten years. Willing to bet on that.
People talk about the Python as if it required some kind of long-lost, semi-mystical knowledge and expertise to manufacture. I think that's an exaggeration. Sure, making a Python is more labour and skill intensive than your average gun, but it can be done for a lot less than $5,000. I bet you could sell a properly made Python for $2,000-$2,500 and still make a nice profit. That's what Sig P210 Legend sells for and it's a finely built gun. Just because Colt can no longer make the Python does not mean that nobody else can. You have to remember that Colt is one of the most poorly run companies in the industry.
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Maybe that's why they're on the verge of bankruptcy.
Ardent
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
Have to disagree. In 1955, hand fitting was normal, and how everything was built. It still continued to exist in Colt's shop, but at every increasing costs... to the point they were being sold at a loss for a long time. Of course that's not sound business, and it didn't last. Now try and assemble, train, and retain a group of hand fitters willing to sit at the bench and fiddle with Pythons day in day out. Times have changed, people are training for much different vocations, and time costs far, far more- the cost to "rewind" to old techniques and retrain skills that barely exist today would be astronomical. I own a Holland & Holland Royal double rifle from the early 20th century, replacement cost today? $210,000 Canadian base. This is one of the few examples of hand fitted guns still available today. The Python always has contained far more machine operations than a H&H, hence why I don't throw out a figure of $20,000. How many Pythons do you own I have to ask, and ever done any firearm finishing? Just the polish and "Royal Blue" bluing job on a Python can run $1,000 at a small hand down shop today. The costs stack up fast, and Colt or others would be turning to small shops with the skills intact to make these hypothetical hand fit Pythons. The P210 is a much simpler design to manufacture well.
The Hawk approves.
Look at the way that goofball is holding his wrist, LOL!
FN still churns out Hi-Powers with bluing jobs as good as Colt's Royal Blue. Have a look at a recent production MKIII if you don't believe me. And "polished stainless", which seems to be the most desirable finish among Python collectors, can easily be applied on an industrial scale. As for P210 being much easier to produce than the Python, I beg to differ. The tolerances on those pistols are very precise and for decades they were 100% hand made. With time, Swiss Arms adapted modern manufacturing methods and now Sauer makes the P210 on CNC machinery in Germany. The quality of these modern Germans P210's is just as good as that of the original Swiss guns.
Of course, Sauer is Sauer and Colt is Colt. And that is the reason why Colt cannot make the Python in the 21st century.
I had a like new colt python with the ultimate stainless finish.I wanted a colt python since I was a kid and finally bought one about 10 years ago.The gun was nice but not the holy grail,some people believe these were made by the hand of god.I did find slight faws in the gun every gun has them if you look hard enough.The gun wasn't what I expected the trigger was very nice but the gun was very front heavy and I enjoyed shooting pistols better.I wonder how many people that buy them now for 4 to 5 thousand and then when they recieve them find out that they are nothing special.
