why is 38 Colt not an antique?

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bross

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I was reviewing the list of cartridges not acceptable for antique status, when I was struck by the inclusion of the 38 short / long Colt.

I've a H&A rifle in 38 short (center fire). It fires a.375" heel based bullet that is near impossible to find, uses only hand made brass, and requires a custom built crimping tool to assemble.

Given these characteristics, why is it in the same boat as calibers which are still in current production? If there actually is a rational, why ISN'T the 38 Ballard XL also on the poop list? I welcome your thoughts..
 
bross said:
I was reviewing the list of cartridges not acceptable for antique status, when I was struck by the inclusion of the 38 short / long Colt.

I've a H&A rifle in 38 short (center fire). It fires a.375" heel based bullet that is near impossible to find, uses only hand made brass, and requires a custom built crimping tool to assemble.

Given these characteristics, why is it in the same boat as calibers which are still in current production? If there actually is a rational, why ISN'T the 38 Ballard XL also on the poop list? I welcome your thoughts..
Click to expand...

if you read it dose not apply to rifles only pistols in those calibers
 
They wanted to ban anything you could walk into a store and buy ammo for. It didn't really work...
 
Probably because it's damn close to .38spl, meaning you could chamber and fire .38spl in a .38 Colt revolver. The later variants of the Colt DA Army/Navy guns made in 1905 and later, IIRC, were chambered for .38spl. S&W even tried to sue them for using their cartridge name so they stopped marking them but left them chambered as such.

Ironically an antique gun converted to .38spl is antique.
 
My money is on something simpler.

The magazine or books that they had in front of them, listed the cartridges as being used in handguns pre-1898, and beyond, so they decided they should be excluded from being Prescribed as Antiques. I would bet that there was at least one or two catalogs in the pile of 'reference' material, S.I.R., likely, along with the ammo charts from a Guns Annual, but a check through those would have confirmed the availability of some of the old-timey round, thus...Nixxed!

That we have a poorly written law, full of loopholes you can fly an airliner through, we can thank the few knowledgeable folks that were there, that kept their mouths shut, when they saw it all shaping up.

Yep. They started by trying to define an Antique as being anything you could not readily get ammo for. Be funny as heck, trying to keep a Legal list of all the firearms that you could or could not get ammo for, at any given time, and someone, no doubt an actual Lawyer, pointed out the legal lack of clarity and definition, which left that interpretation so wide open as to be useless, and it never went in to the Law. It did, however, get mailed out to thousands of license holders, and a lot of them still believe it to be so. They show up here frequently to dish out inaccurate advice, generally parroting that if it is a modern round, it is not a Prescribed Antique, which is wrong.

Picture some poor bureaucrat in Ottawa trying to keep a rolling score of what cartridges were and were not available, while this latest 'ammo crisis' was going on. :)

Cheers
Trev
 
If it were possible without damaging the gun, I would like to chronograph at 38 special fired from a 38 Colt chamber. With .018" clearance between the bullet and groove diameters I would doubt the ability to achieve any velocity. More likely the bullet would move an inch or so and weld in place from the blow by.

Not that I really expect rational thought from firearms legislators. Their basic premise is that one gun is more dangerous than another; and all guns have animistic spirits within.
 
bross said:
I was reviewing the list of cartridges not acceptable for antique status, when I was struck by the inclusion of the 38 short / long Colt.

I've a H&A rifle in 38 short (center fire). It fires a.375" heel based bullet that is near impossible to find, uses only hand made brass, and requires a custom built crimping tool to assemble.

Given these characteristics, why is it in the same boat as calibers which are still in current production? If there actually is a rational, why ISN'T the 38 Ballard XL also on the poop list? I welcome your thoughts..
Click to expand...

As a single shot rifle with a bore size over 8.3mm it is an antique..... Handguns in 38 Colt are not.....
 
You're trying to find logic where there is none. Like some Webley's being antiques while others are not.
"...pre-1898..." That'd be another thing the Socialist F**ks got from the ATF. It's an arbitrary date just like every other number related thing government decides upon.
 
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