Customised revolvers

[somtec]

Hi
Ive got a 1860 army on hold for me at a gunshop until my ticket comes back with the necessary variation.
I already have a 8" barrel and a 51/2" barrel version of this revolver, i like open top colts, of which the 8" was bought already nitro/shotgun primer converted, the smaller one was originally an 8" bp version until I chopped the barrel and shotgun primer converted it myself.
Now Ive been looking at what to do with the new gun when I get it, I need another 51/2" version so that I will have a matching pair for western shooting, but when searching the web found a couple of snubnose versions either factory made by Pietta particularly in France or homemade versions with various different barrel lengths and butt configuration which I really like the look of.
So this got me thinking of not only converting one down to snubbie size, but if iam the only one who likes to do his own gunsmithing or if anyone else has customised any of their revolvers.
cheers
Peter

[Calibre44]

Hi Peter

Any pics to share with us?

[somtec]

Hi
Ive got pics but will have to link to my webshots albums for two reasons, one dont know how to upload direct to sit and two the pics would be too big and iam not sure how to reduce the size.

The first link is pics of my 1860,s

http://good-times.webshots.com/album/569933792WKOoZk

and this one is some pics of 1860 snubbies ive found

http://community.webshots.com/album/569936866ZQvbCL

hopefully you should be able to see the pics

Peter

[Jim McArthur]

Beautiful pistols, Peter! Those snubbies with the birdshead grips remind me of the British Bulldog cartridge revolvers.

Jim

[tim56]

Hi Peter, how about doing us a bit of a write up on how you shortened the barrel. Im still hoping to get a short barreled Ruger old army, i have the slot on my ticket but havent got the readies yet. Looking at prices it would be cheaper to get a second hand 71/2 " one and shorten it but that would be a one way step and if it didnt shoot could be an expensive mistake to make.
Tim

[Voodoo]

Nice job sir !
Could you do some close ups of the nitro conversion you did yourself and perhaps a brief explanation of what you used.
There are probably more of us than you think

[somtec]

Hi
Tim56
You are facing the same problem I had, I had the 8" but wanted a 51/2" to go with it but couldnt find one.
Rang numerous shops with no luck, Kranks quoted about £230 for a new one if I remember right but didnt have one in stock and didnt know how long one would take,usual story in my dealings with them, but I didnt really want to spend that much and another £270+ on a conversion.
Then on a trip to a gun fair at Bisley I saw another 8" version for £90 so the deal was done only for the gun to be put away and not touched for some months.
One day the desire for a shorter version got to much but I didnt want to pay the money so that left the option of cutting it myself.
I do have a small clarke 300 lathe in the garage so it was time it earned its keep, so I chucked the muzzle end and used the revolving tailstock in the forcing cone end. Then using a parting tool cut 99.9% of the way through the barrel until it basically got to thin to support itself and came away. I then tidied the end a bit with some wet n dry just to remove any burrs sort of crowning it but nothing fancy.
Had it not been for the lathe i would have used a pipe cutter to score the surface a act as a guideline for a hacksaw cut and finished it off with a file, pretty much as a gunsmith in some back of beyond western town would have done back in the 1860s.
Next up was to shorten the loading lever, drill it out for the spring plunger thingy and dovetail the bottom of the barrel to take the thing the plunger fits into using my dremel and a dovetail file.
The front sight was a piece of brass filed to shape with a couple of lugs on the bottom which fit into a couple of small shallow drilled holes in the barrel and glued on using jb weld.
Sorry Iam not a metal working type engineer so my description , terminology and techniques arent the best.
Really the hardest part was getting up the oompf to do it and the knowledge that if it went wrong the cost of the gun wasnt the end of the world, now a ruger would get me a bit more jittery cost wise but having seen how relatively easy it actually turned out to be and it shoots ok then i would give it a go again.
I repeat again iam no gunsmith or engineer just your average type person with some spare time a desire for a shorter revolver. Everything I have learnt is self taught by trial and error and a willingness to improvise.
My advise would be to find the cheapest second hand ruger you could find along with a good hacksaw blade and give it a go.

[somtec]

Voodoo
I will take some more pics and post them.

The back plate was some 10mm thick steel plate, nothing special just something i had in the garage, got it off #### i think.
It needed to be round so out came a 4" angle grinder to get it somewhere near round. The I drilled a 8mm hole in the centre to take some threaded bar and a couple of nuts to lock it up tight to enable me to chuck it in my lathe to turn it down to the desired diameter.
Time noe to drill a hole for the firing pin and spring along with a couple of threaded holes to take the firing pin retainig bolts.
Now to enlarge the centre hole using progressively larger drill bits up to the point where my cheap pillar drill could no longer cope and kept seizing up ,so out came my trusty dremel to grind the hole bigger using drill bits as a guide to keep the hole round.
The various cut outs for the hammer, top, frame,bottom and the primers ,side were done with the dremel.

Now the nerve wracking bit, so far the barrel and the back plate were easy enough but it was now time for the cylinder. Again this was to big to fit in the jaws of my lathe so improvisation was called for in the form of a bar that was inserted into the centre hole of the cylinder until it was tight to enable this to be the chucked so that the back end could be turned off leaving the ratchets which fit inside the hole in the back plate.
The original threaded nipple holes were drilled out to take the shotgun primers and then finally six sleeves were turned and glued inside the chambers to act both as ball stops and to beef up the chambers and that was it.
Some fine tuning was then done which resulted in the hammer having to be modified as it couldnt go far enough forward to completely reset the internals to allow the gun to cock and rotate the cylinder etc.

A trip to the range last weekend proved everything worked ok and it didnt blow up which considering i was doing the test firing was a good thing.
I didnt go up to proof type loads just the load I use in my other 8" conversion.

I hope everything can be understood in my last two posts, sorry if they were too long.

[somtec]

Hi
Added some more pics in the first link