357/ 38 special handgun
- Thread starter hound2013
- Start date
Ok guys I'm in the same boat here, I'm also looking for a very good quality revolver, and all of you have been pretty saying what i've been considering, a ruger or a smith, but frankly i don't know which ruger or which smith, single action or dual action, id like something in the 4 to 5.5 inch barrel.
I do know that i want a 38, if it can also shoot 357 thats fine but really all ill ever pretty much shoot with it is 38. I do know that ill probably never shoot dual action, so thats not important to me.
I do have small hands and I've heard that the rugers fit the small hands better?
I do know that i want a 38, if it can also shoot 357 thats fine but really all ill ever pretty much shoot with it is 38. I do know that ill probably never shoot dual action, so thats not important to me.
I do have small hands and I've heard that the rugers fit the small hands better?
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Scott Bear
Regular
- Location
- Prince George
Anyone have problems with the internal lock on the 686s?
SP101 only holds 5 rounds?
Black hawk 9mm/357 combo single action?
SP101 only holds 5 rounds?
Black hawk 9mm/357 combo single action?
No. I'm about 12,000 rounds deep, about 2000 of which are some VERY rock-and-roll .357 Magnums with the load I use in my bush rifle. Mine has been banged around quite a bit in action shooting. I'm not worried about the lock but if you are, it's easy to disable. Optionally, you do see used older 5/686s on the EE with some regularity (guys selling those guns must be in really dire straits, so help a brother out, and help yourself!).
In your case I recommend a single-action Ruger Blackhawk. They are super-robust, shoot very well, are priced fairly and worth an insane amount of style points. If you don't plan to shoot SASS the adjustable sights are nothing but a bonus. Their grips are comfortable for people with smaller hands. This will be a gun that will serve you well if double-action shooting is a low priority. There's a 4.6" model that sounds right up your alley, stainless or blued.
If you want the classic cowboy look the Vaquero has fixed sights but I don't see a reason to limit yourself to them unless you're planning to compete.
pisces-guy
CGN frequent flyer
- Location
- West Kelowna, B.C.
I've got smaller hands and I shoot a Ruger GP100, and it feels great and shoots accurately. When you're shooting .38 wadcutters it's as comfortable as shooting a .22, almost...nothing to it. Now .357 Mag with a heavy bullet and powder load does buck a bit, but if you use a good two handed grip it's nothing that will worry you. The Ruger has a 6" barrel, as it isn't anything that one can hide in any SHTF scenario...it's definitely a big ol' sixgun.
Now I've ordered a .38/.357 Ruger SP-101, it's a sweet looking well proportioned 4.2" barreled SS revolver. Slimmer, lighter, and more petite than the GP100, it's a piece of art. The stock grip felt a bit small, and my pinkie barely fit on the very bottom of the grip...but for $20 from Brownells you can buy a Hogue Monogrip that absorbs energy even better than the stock grip, and is a bit bigger so you can get your hand around it comfortably. For $7 I got the spring kit with 9/10/12 lb hammer springs, and 2 lb lighter-than-stock trigger return spring. From what I've heard and read, the 9lb spring will give you the odd light strike, but if it's not being depended on for protection that's not critical...and I've heard Federal ammo uses a primer that's easier to ignite and eliminates that issue. If you want it dead reliable with all ammo use the 10lb spring, it's just a bit heavier of a double action trigger pull. I think I'll try the 9lb in the GP100 and the 10lb in the SP-101. From triggershims.com, for $23, you can get shims to make your hammer and trigger operate perfectly smoothly with no play, and even eliminate the tiny bit of play in the cylinder. A video on the site shows you how to install the springs and shims. So if you're willing to spend some small money and a bit of your time, you can make your Ruger function a bit nicer than a S&W for a lot less money. So, the bottom line is the GP100 is hefty, very accurate, and shoots .38s softly enough for a little girl to shoot...great range gun. The SP-101 has artistically nicer proportions, is more concealable in a SHTF scenario, is still tame with .38s but not quite as tame as the GP100, and is a handful with .357 ammo. In the US a lot of folks load it with .38+P instead of .357 for concealed carry because it's easier to shoot accurately, to give you an idea of what I mean by a "handful". With .38 wadcutters it's also an accurate revolver, but requires more practice than the GP100 to be a tackdriver...then again it's a 4.2" barrel and my GP100 is a 6"...so that explains part of that as well. The extra weight of the GP100 helps accuracy too... Hope this helps!
What is sass? Is hat the cowboy action shooting competition?
The vaquero and the blackhawk are awesome!
Wow thanks, very comprehensive, well I'm only interested in a firearm that i can shoot very well, i.e. Hit what im pointing at! So far I'm shooting heavier pistols a whole lot better than lighter ones. Maybe the 6 inch would be something to try.
just got my gp100, haven't shot it yet. very nice finish, strong. really like the trigger too, very smooth. was kind of surprised since the S&w crowd always calls the ruger trigger garbage. i had a large frame s&w 44 special that was extremely accurate but i actually like the ruger trigger far better, though its single action pull is way too stiff. picked up the gp100 myself due to its reputation for being a great buy for your dollar, being tough as nails and accurate.
To mikethebike, one thing about revolvers is that the grips are easily changed to something else that can suit anyone's hands. So you can buy any revolver and make it work for you. In SOME cases this may require a bit of custom wood working to shape them to suit you. But at least the possibility is there to a higher degree than with a semi auto.
You say you'll never use the DA mode. I wouldn't say "never" if I were you. A lot of us enjoy shooting our revolvers in things like the Speed Steel matches at Mission and other clubs around here. And both IDPA and IPSC have revolver divisions. In all these cases you'd need to use DA to keep the stage times down. And it's really not that hard to learn to get "good enough" accuracy in DA.
DA and SA revolvers are quite a lot different due to the shaping of the grip frames. And the fact that SA's are shaped such that the primary way of holding the gun is to park the pinky under the butt end of the grips. This is so you index your hand on the grips in the correct lower position and it aids in lifting and rotating the gun back into place after a shot that rotates it back and down in your hand. DA revolvers don't work like that and you want a higher hand placement and firm grip to avoid the gun shifting around.
Both S&W and Ruger make a fine product. You won't go wrong with either. I do prefer the S&W trigger but I have examples of both brands. If you can try the triggers on both brands before you leap. Mostly I prefer the S&W for the smoother DA pull.
A classic option for an SA revolver is the fixed sight Ruger New Vaquero or one of the Pietta or Uberti old style Colt action clones. Again all three make a very nice product. It's more what you want in a gun. I went for Pietta because I wanted a gun that was as close to the guns of the old west as possible. The Ruger looks the part but inside it's all modern.
Fair warning, if you go with a fixed sight gun in .357/.38 be aware that the Italian clones come with an overly tall front sight. The intent being that you will pick the bullet weight and powder charge that you like as well as select shooting with one or two hands and then over a course of trial shoots file the front sight down until the point of aim matches the point of impact. But at least they give us too much metal which is reasonably easy to remove instead of too little which is hard to add to...
The Ruger Blackhawk solves all this by giving us adjustable sights. But as a result we lose the lovely smooth upper lines of the fixed sight versions.
DA or SA? They really do feel and shoot totally differently. Especially when you take the leap to using the DA mode more in the way these guns were intended. So really you will want to work towards getting both styles.
A particularly nice combo that covers a lot of ground would be a DA in .357 and a Ruger Super Blackhawk in .44Mag. And since anything that starts with ".4" needs to be reloaded to keep costs under control you can tailor the .44Mag for anything from mild to wild. And as a result they are a HEAP of fun.
So, knowing what I know now and having been through a few of them which way would I go if I had to start over? I'd still go with my choice of the slightly more compact K frame S&W's for DA revolvers in .38Spl with a little .357Mag for giggles now and then. For SA fun I'd mate the S&W's with a pair of Pietta SA's in 5.5 inch length to allow for use in cowboy action shooting. And finally I'd put a Ruger Super Blackhawk in there for big bore wrist wrecking duty for a last few shots at the end of the day. A .44Mag loaded with a full pot of H110 or 2400 makes the most wondrous fireball you will ever see. Particularly when shot in dim lighting....
Since you live here in the lower mainland you may want to check the Mission Rod & Gun's website and check the calendar. There's a monthly cowboy action fun shoot where you can see a lot of various brand SA guns and we'll set you up to try a stage under direction to see what the fun is all about. And starting pretty soon is the monthly Speed Steel meets where there are always at least half a dozen of us using revolvers for clanging the plates. Abby also has Steel Challenge which I suspect has a few folks using wheelguns as well. Any of these spots are a great place to check out how some of the rest of us are using revolvers and really making them sing.
You say you'll never use the DA mode. I wouldn't say "never" if I were you. A lot of us enjoy shooting our revolvers in things like the Speed Steel matches at Mission and other clubs around here. And both IDPA and IPSC have revolver divisions. In all these cases you'd need to use DA to keep the stage times down. And it's really not that hard to learn to get "good enough" accuracy in DA.
DA and SA revolvers are quite a lot different due to the shaping of the grip frames. And the fact that SA's are shaped such that the primary way of holding the gun is to park the pinky under the butt end of the grips. This is so you index your hand on the grips in the correct lower position and it aids in lifting and rotating the gun back into place after a shot that rotates it back and down in your hand. DA revolvers don't work like that and you want a higher hand placement and firm grip to avoid the gun shifting around.
Both S&W and Ruger make a fine product. You won't go wrong with either. I do prefer the S&W trigger but I have examples of both brands. If you can try the triggers on both brands before you leap. Mostly I prefer the S&W for the smoother DA pull.
A classic option for an SA revolver is the fixed sight Ruger New Vaquero or one of the Pietta or Uberti old style Colt action clones. Again all three make a very nice product. It's more what you want in a gun. I went for Pietta because I wanted a gun that was as close to the guns of the old west as possible. The Ruger looks the part but inside it's all modern.
Fair warning, if you go with a fixed sight gun in .357/.38 be aware that the Italian clones come with an overly tall front sight. The intent being that you will pick the bullet weight and powder charge that you like as well as select shooting with one or two hands and then over a course of trial shoots file the front sight down until the point of aim matches the point of impact. But at least they give us too much metal which is reasonably easy to remove instead of too little which is hard to add to...
The Ruger Blackhawk solves all this by giving us adjustable sights. But as a result we lose the lovely smooth upper lines of the fixed sight versions.
DA or SA? They really do feel and shoot totally differently. Especially when you take the leap to using the DA mode more in the way these guns were intended. So really you will want to work towards getting both styles.
A particularly nice combo that covers a lot of ground would be a DA in .357 and a Ruger Super Blackhawk in .44Mag. And since anything that starts with ".4" needs to be reloaded to keep costs under control you can tailor the .44Mag for anything from mild to wild. And as a result they are a HEAP of fun.
So, knowing what I know now and having been through a few of them which way would I go if I had to start over? I'd still go with my choice of the slightly more compact K frame S&W's for DA revolvers in .38Spl with a little .357Mag for giggles now and then. For SA fun I'd mate the S&W's with a pair of Pietta SA's in 5.5 inch length to allow for use in cowboy action shooting. And finally I'd put a Ruger Super Blackhawk in there for big bore wrist wrecking duty for a last few shots at the end of the day. A .44Mag loaded with a full pot of H110 or 2400 makes the most wondrous fireball you will ever see. Particularly when shot in dim lighting....
Since you live here in the lower mainland you may want to check the Mission Rod & Gun's website and check the calendar. There's a monthly cowboy action fun shoot where you can see a lot of various brand SA guns and we'll set you up to try a stage under direction to see what the fun is all about. And starting pretty soon is the monthly Speed Steel meets where there are always at least half a dozen of us using revolvers for clanging the plates. Abby also has Steel Challenge which I suspect has a few folks using wheelguns as well. Any of these spots are a great place to check out how some of the rest of us are using revolvers and really making them sing.
I like the look of a blackened cylinder face on a stainless gun..... it means it's getting used!
It's now more dirty then the blued guns it just shows against the stainless and screams "yes I shoot my guns!"
I clean the face fully only if I'm selling the gun.
It's now more dirty then the blued guns it just shows against the stainless and screams "yes I shoot my guns!"
I clean the face fully only if I'm selling the gun.
- Location
- Burnaby, BC
.357 Mag is derived from .38 Special. All .357 revolvers will shoot .38 but not the other way. IMO, Ruger GP100 is best bang for the buck and has great resale value. Some retailers have stock in blue and SS, 4.2 and 6" versions. I like the Smiths 585/686 but I can't see why they cost more aside from brand recognition. That said, I'm gonna order a 4.2" SS GP100 right now in stock.
Shanks4300
Regular
- Location
- Winnipeg, mb
Just took my gp100 out this morning for the first time, might be my new favourite. Shot it almost exclusively in double action, trigger is a big heavy but smooth. I have a set of lighter springs on the way which should take care of that. With .38's it's easy on the hands, the .357's bucked pretty good.
All of these will shoot .38 special & they are some of the finest guns to ever come from the S&W factory. The short ones are model 65 (.357 Mag chambered), the 4" one is a model 64, & the 6" is the model 14, both chambered in .38 spl.
You can find them in the EE from time to time & you would do well with any one of them.
Basically it comes down to fixed or adjustable sights.
Let me also state, nothing wrong with rugers either....
You can find them in the EE from time to time & you would do well with any one of them.
Basically it comes down to fixed or adjustable sights.
Let me also state, nothing wrong with rugers either....
