Monac
Member
Harrington & Richardson, Iver Johnson, and Hopkins & Allen made a lot of top-break revolvers because they made decent guns that were good value for their price, bearing in mind that their price was quite low. They had many of the same features of the top-of-the-line makers such as Colt and Smith & Wesson, such as double-action triggers, simultaneous extraction and ejection, and easy of loading.
But I will say straight out they were not as good as a Colt or a S&W, because they were more difficult to shoot well with and not as durable, despite the large numbers that have survived until now. But they were adequate for what was they were, which was a short-range means of self-defense that could be easily carried if desired that people could afford. They were the High Points of their day, with a similar advantage in price and disadvantage in durability.
It is the durability that concerns me here. As far as I can figure out, one of the ways the cheap revolver makers we are talking about kept their costs down was to make the frames of the pistols out of "malleable iron". This appears to be what we would now call "mild steel". Mild steel and malleable iron have a carbon content similar to wrought iron, which was developed in ancient times, but they do not have the "entrained slag" that wrought iron contained because of the primitive way it was made. Mild steel is made directly by a steel-making process. Malleable iron is made, as I understand it, by taking cast iron and reducing its carbon content to roughly the level of wrought iron. (I don't know how that is done.) The end result is more or less the same substance, which is to say iron alloyed with a low amount of carbon, but the names differ because of the different manufacturing processes.
Anyway, the less expensive makers used malleable iron frames, while Colt and S&W made their frames from regular steel, with a higher carbon content. That yielded a frame that was harder and tougher, more resistant to wear and bending. That is why, I think, H&R's, Iver Johnsons, and similar inexpensive revolvers are often loose or have frames that have "stretched" - they were made of a softer metal, just as modern makers of inexpensive guns use zinc alloy to keep costs down. Malleable iron, mild steel, and zinc alloy are perfectly adequate materials when used correctly, but they are never going to be as durable as a gun of the same design made out of "regular" steel. (Well, unless you use an awful lot of it. That is why High Points are so big for their calibers, and I think it is why Spanish "Ruby" type 32 automatics are so much bulkier than a Colt 1903 - the Spanish used softer steel.)
If I am right - and given the number of things I think I know in the forgoing, that is a long shot - that may explain why Smith & Wesson was able to make top break revolvers in 44 Russian, which was a cartridge only slightly behind 44 Special in power, in the 1870's and 1880's, while many people now think a top-break in 38 Special +P is a hare-brained idea. That would be true if the frame was made of mild steel, like the low priced top breaks of 125 years ago, but perhaps not true at all today, with a gun made of regular carbon steel.
The main reason I am writing this is to find out just what I am wrong about. I suppose it is quite a bit, so I look forward to learning a lot.
PS - What I say about malleable iron in this post is ENTIRELY WRONG. After reading Driftwood Johnson's posts (#8 amd #11 below), I rechecked, and found that it is NOT a mild steel, but still has the high carbon content of cast iron, but has been made malleable (non-brittle) through annealing. It is still softer, I think, than a medium carbon steel, but what I thought I knew about it was wrong. Obviously I should have done the checking first, but I guess sometimes I am just too eager to write.
But I will say straight out they were not as good as a Colt or a S&W, because they were more difficult to shoot well with and not as durable, despite the large numbers that have survived until now. But they were adequate for what was they were, which was a short-range means of self-defense that could be easily carried if desired that people could afford. They were the High Points of their day, with a similar advantage in price and disadvantage in durability.
It is the durability that concerns me here. As far as I can figure out, one of the ways the cheap revolver makers we are talking about kept their costs down was to make the frames of the pistols out of "malleable iron". This appears to be what we would now call "mild steel". Mild steel and malleable iron have a carbon content similar to wrought iron, which was developed in ancient times, but they do not have the "entrained slag" that wrought iron contained because of the primitive way it was made. Mild steel is made directly by a steel-making process. Malleable iron is made, as I understand it, by taking cast iron and reducing its carbon content to roughly the level of wrought iron. (I don't know how that is done.) The end result is more or less the same substance, which is to say iron alloyed with a low amount of carbon, but the names differ because of the different manufacturing processes.
Anyway, the less expensive makers used malleable iron frames, while Colt and S&W made their frames from regular steel, with a higher carbon content. That yielded a frame that was harder and tougher, more resistant to wear and bending. That is why, I think, H&R's, Iver Johnsons, and similar inexpensive revolvers are often loose or have frames that have "stretched" - they were made of a softer metal, just as modern makers of inexpensive guns use zinc alloy to keep costs down. Malleable iron, mild steel, and zinc alloy are perfectly adequate materials when used correctly, but they are never going to be as durable as a gun of the same design made out of "regular" steel. (Well, unless you use an awful lot of it. That is why High Points are so big for their calibers, and I think it is why Spanish "Ruby" type 32 automatics are so much bulkier than a Colt 1903 - the Spanish used softer steel.)
If I am right - and given the number of things I think I know in the forgoing, that is a long shot - that may explain why Smith & Wesson was able to make top break revolvers in 44 Russian, which was a cartridge only slightly behind 44 Special in power, in the 1870's and 1880's, while many people now think a top-break in 38 Special +P is a hare-brained idea. That would be true if the frame was made of mild steel, like the low priced top breaks of 125 years ago, but perhaps not true at all today, with a gun made of regular carbon steel.
The main reason I am writing this is to find out just what I am wrong about. I suppose it is quite a bit, so I look forward to learning a lot.
PS - What I say about malleable iron in this post is ENTIRELY WRONG. After reading Driftwood Johnson's posts (#8 amd #11 below), I rechecked, and found that it is NOT a mild steel, but still has the high carbon content of cast iron, but has been made malleable (non-brittle) through annealing. It is still softer, I think, than a medium carbon steel, but what I thought I knew about it was wrong. Obviously I should have done the checking first, but I guess sometimes I am just too eager to write.
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