old s&w info

[yesterdaysyouth]

so im over at the old man's place last night for christmas, he tells me he has an old revolver and we check it out...

well the first thing i noticed was he was shooting 32 auto through a s&w that was clearly marked 32 long on the barrel, actually i think it was 32 long ctg or something to that effect, the blue was just about gone, i opened the cylinder to look for some info all i found was a single 4 digit number, serial number i guess??

so i'd like to be able to identfy what model and have some idea of the age of this thing... the frame itself was tiny the butt of the gun was rounded with what looked like a wraparound plastic grip, could have been something else?? they looked orginal... one strange thing i saw was the trademark was on the right hand side of the frame, as opposed to all the s&w's that i've seen where it's on the left...

the barrel was really light and about 4 inches, the ejector rod ran nearly the whole length of the barrel with a 1/2 underlug on the very muzzle end, i guess s&w wanted to make damn good and sure the empty brass was pushed past the end of the butt or something...

it was DA/SA and you could tell this thing had been shot alot!!! the trigger felt like it was about locked up but i did managed to cycle the clyinder around, the clylinder itself seemed in good shape no major looseness to it .....

so what do you think??? what do you think it's worth??

[Mike Irwin]

The serial number is stamped on the butt of the gun; the number you found on the cylinder may also be a serial number or it may be an assembly number.

It sounds like:

1. The barrel has been cut back. If the extractor rod lug was right at the muzzle, that's a solid clue for a barrel shortening. On a factory 4" barreled gun the underlug is normally about 1.5 to 2" or so back from the muzzle.

S&W has switched the logo from side to side on their guns over the years.

The grips, if original, are more than likely hard rubber, not plastic.

It sounds like it's a really early Regulation Police.

Value? Probably not much if the barrel has been shortened and the finish is gone.

[telewinz]

They are fairly common and would only be of collectors value if in excellent condition. Be VERY careful, more than a few overseas companies (Spain) made look-a-like S&W's of inferior quality. Sounds to me the main value of the handgun is sentimental.