Innehållsförteckning för August 2022 från Gun Digest

Why do you love revolvers so much? Seriously. Why? Sure, you might holster a polymer pistol every day inside your waistband, or shoot your highly customized AR at the range on the weekends or tote your grandfather’s bolt-action Model 70 every November in the deer woods—and I’ll assume you wouldn’t trade a single one of them for anything. But, whether you own 10, one or none … I’d be willing to bet a fresh case of .357 Mag. ammo that you stop and admire a wheelgun each time the opportunity arises. A revolver is kinda like a shiny ’67 Camaro that you see on the road: Regardless of how much you love the wheels you’re driving, you have to admire it for at least a moment as she drives by.…

01 Colt King Cobra Target .22 LR There’s a tingle that comes with Colt’s latest foray into revolvers, knowing the manufacturer might’ve nailed it on the head. Lovingly dubbed the “Baby Snake,” the King Cobra Target .22 LR delivers the aesthetics and performance of the original .357 Magnum, but in a 10-shot rimfire. The all-stainless-steel revolver has some nice twists, whether it’s eventually aimed at a bull’s-eye competition or high-end plinking. It’s available in two barrel lengths (4 and 6 inches), each with a 1:16 twist, is outfitted with Hogue rubber grips, and comes with a bright front fiber-optic sight. As expected with a target model, the King Cobra also boasts a fully adjustable rear sight, so you can dial it in. MSRP: $999 02 Taurus 856 Executive Grade Revolver…

The 20th century saw some of the greatest gains in cartridge design and velocity increases, from the magnum-mania that began with the 1912 release of the .375 Holland & Holland Magnum … to the century closing out with the behemoth .300 Remington Ultra Magnum. But it wasn’t just rifle cartridges that saw the speed and power bumped up; the 3½-inch 12-gauge shotshell became a normal occurrence in the turkey woods and goose blinds, and our handgun cartridges went from mild to wild over the course of the century. Smith & Wesson’s .357 Magnum—designed by Douglas B. Wesson and Philip B. Sharpe in 1934, inspired by the labors of Elmer Keith with his high-pressure .38 Special loads—was at the forefront of magnum handgun cartridges. The “magnum” treatment would extend to the…

With so many firearm parts and accessories available in plastic and polymer nowadays, it’s a great time to be a do-it-yourselfer. Not everyone may have the skills or tools to hand-checker a 1911 metal frame, but most anyone willing to try can shave, stipple, or, in this case, dye polymer. Dyeing polymer furniture and other firearms-related gear is a fun and inexpensive way to give your equipment a durable and unique, custom look. It’s not all for show, either. Dye can be applied as a semipermanent, identification marking on your gear, such as a magazine. There are many methods and variations on how to dye polymers; we will take a look at just one of the ways. Dyeing polymer is not an exact science. It takes trial and error to…

People often toss around some terms without really knowing what they mean, like “complete weapons system.” Complete means just that—everything that’s needed to run, feed, maintain and inspect a weapon. It comes from one source. That’s not easy, but Bill Geissele comes really close on that. Bill is a nice guy and a great engineer. His start in the firearms field was making triggers. Instead of simply making the same triggers as everyone else, he made better triggers. Soon, the top shooters and the guys who go places to deal with nasty people were beating a path to his door, wanting triggers. Then, he made scope mounts—beautifully machined, structurally rigid, essentially unbreakable scope mounts. From there, it was a straight path to complete rifles because, well, if you’re going to…

HISTORICAL NOTES The .38 Long Colt was once the offcial United States Army revolver cartridge (1892 to 1911). The short version was used mainly in the Colt Army & Navy Model revolver with swing-out cylinder, developed in 1887. The .38 Long Colt was introduced in 1875 as one of several chamberings for Colt New Line, New Police and New House revolvers. GENERAL COMMENTS Since it was once a military cartridge, a number of Colt and Smith & Wesson revolvers in this chambering are still around. The .38 Long Colt cartridge can be fired in a .38 Special revolver, but not vice versa. During the Spanish-American War and the Philippine Insurrection, the U.S. Army found that the .38 Long Colt had insuffcient stopping power for combat use. The cartridge was therefore…

I was raised on revolvers. As a habit from his moonshining days, Grandpa kept a Smith & Wesson Model 10 close by most of the time; it was the first handgun I ever fired. My cousin either had a Ruger Single Six or Colt Frontier with us on all our adventures. We used them to shoot pop cans and to kill rats and snakes. Of course, I found autoloaders soon enough, and my hands found a 1911 or a Browning HiPower more to their liking. Still, when I became a police offcer, I was issued a Smith & Wesson Model 686. I used it at the Academy to take top gun, while the rest of my class was shooting Glocks. However, in all my years of handgunning, I’ve never seen…

For a guy who got to be known as a 1911 shooter, I spent a lot of time shooting revolvers. One wheelgun in particular was both a process and a tool. Back when the USPSA was being formed, my club was already shooting in many equipment divisions—one of which was “Revolver.” So, I had a 6-inch S&W M-25-2 in .45 ACP that I had to build … well, just to have one. (We can showcase that revolver at a later time.) Soon after that, the International Confederation of Revolver Enthusiasts (ICORE) was formed. ICORE wasn’t interested in making Major, so I didn’t need a .45 revolver to compete there. I tried a number of different—not entirely suited to ICORE—revolvers, but I finally scored a police trade-in M-28. This is a…

As of this writing, Colt Single Action Army revolvers have never been more valuable. Browsing Cabela’s online Gun Library, GunBroker, ArmsList and more, prices range from the tolerable to ridiculous—some in the ballpark of $25,000. As you can imagine, this market is littered with fraud, and many sellers are complicit, knowingly or not. In many cases, you can accurately assess your skill as a Colt collector by the ones you don’t buy. I’ve collected, bought and sold military surplus rifles for most of my life. This was fostered by their comparatively low prices during my youth; Mosin rifles could be had for as low as $65, and a case of 440 rounds, in a sealed tin, came in at a whopping $40. I fondly recall spending virtually all my money…

In the mid-1960s, Smith & Wesson introduced the .41 Magnum to the handgun world, chambering it in its classic N-frame revolver. Writers of the day heralded the new cartridge by referring to it as the ultimate police round. Interestingly, some of the most famous writers, e.g., Elmer Keith, were not cops but rather serious outdoorsmen. It wasn’t uncommon for law enforcement personnel who endorsed the new .41 for police work to have operated in the open country along the Mexican border. Perhaps the new magnum would have fared better in the market had the writers focused more on the .41 Mag’s outstanding capabilities as an all-purpose field handgun rather than a standard-issue gun for police departments that operated primarily in urban or suburban environments. These outdoor writers were all accomplished…

I sometimes get belittled by so-called “defensive handgun experts” because I’m fond of stuffing my lightweight Browning HiPower in my waistband without a holster. This is commonly referred to as Mexican—or appendix—carry. I’m often told this is an inherently unsafe practice because the trigger isn’t covered and it doesn’t provide any retention. Well, this is partly true; the only thing that keeps your gun secure is the tension between your belt and your body. This is a variable tension that’s dependent on what activity you’re currently engaged in. As far as the uncovered trigger, if the gun is shoved in behind your belt so that your belt—and pants—are covering the trigger, I’m not sure what’s going to pull that trigger. Now, maybe you have gremlins roaming around in your…

When I got serious about reloading my ammunition, my tool set was minimal to say the least, yet it worked just fine. The various steps might’ve taken a bit longer, but it taught me to respect the little details to ensure things didn’t go wrong and no one got hurt—including me. That said, I quickly desired to obtain the tools that’d make the processes faster, while maintaining the quality control that the bare-bones rig offered. My main interest was the powder charging process, as my early technique involved using a Lee plastic powder dipper and some loose powder in a small cardboard box or, sometimes, in a fancy glass jar top procured from a Yankee Candle jar. All my powder charges were weighed on a balance beam scale—at first a…

With all of today’s advances in firearm and ammunition technology, the simple element of lead has become something of a given to us. Yet, for how common it is relative to other materials used in projectiles, it’s seldom understood, and there’s a tremendous amount of falsehoods surrounding it and its attributes. For the purposes of this topic, I’m describing “lead bullets” as a traditional projectile composed of molten lead (pure or of an alloy) poured into a mold, sized and lubed, with or without a gas check. Semi-jacketed bullets, even though they’re mostly exposed lead—and plated bullets—are excluded here because of the way they interact with the firearm, and the pressure they can be used at is different than with traditional lead bullets. LEAD BULLET PROPERTIES To get a better…

WARNING CALL BEFORE YOU DRIVE TO ANY SHOW PROMOTERS CANCEL SHOWS AND FREQUENTLY CHANGE DATES AND LOCATIONS CONFIRM BEFORE YOU TRAVEL DUE TO THE CANCELLING AND REBOOKING OF SHOWS THAT HAS TAKEN PLACE BECAUSE OF COVID -19 PLEASE CALL OR CHECK THE WEBSITE OF THE SHOW PRIOR TO TRAVELING TO THE SHOW. SHOWDEX Listings are grouped according to state. Bold headlines show the name of all states in which gun shows have been reported to us. These headlines are arranged according to the full spelling of state names. Under each headline, shows scheduled for a particular state are listed by date, postal abbreviation, city, and site. For more information, see our regular SHOW LISTINGS section. INDIANA Oct 1-2 IN, Valparaiso. Gun & Knife Show. Porter County Exp-Center, 215 East Division…

Taurus has recently launched a new series of “executive-grade” handguns, starting with the debut of the 856 Executive Grade revolver. What distinguishes this series from Taurus’ standard handguns is that each one pays a visit to the “production room” at the company’s Georgia facility, where a team upgrades the guns’ performance and aesthetics. For the 856 Executive Grade revolver, the upgrades to its appearance include a hand-polished satin finish on the stainless steel, and a checkered Altamont walnut grip. The 856 Executive Grade revolver’s performance has been substantially upgraded as well. As a six-shot .38 Special +P revolver with a 3-inch barrel, this gun was designed with everyday carry in mind. To help aid it in this role, each Executive 856’s trigger is hand-tuned to provide a crisper, smoother, more…