Taurus .410/45LC owners...

I've shot the public defender with a 2.5 inch chamber. It has stout recoil......... if you can get the thing to fire. I've personally known two people with Taurus revolvers that had major, major timing issues. The judge I shot (brand new out of the box) had one chamber that wouldn't fire at all.

I will never, ever buy a Taurus revolver, or any other gun for that matter. If you really want a 410/45 hand gun, my advice is to look at Bond Arm's derringers, and if you really want a revolver (which I certainly understand for obvious reasons) then wait for the S&W Govenor to come out.

My appologies to any Taurus owners I just offended. This is just my opinion.

i have the judge in the 3 inch chamber and have shot about 500 rounds in it so far w/o any issues.the recoil to me isn't that much different than my .357 ruger sp101.i say go for it they are a really fun to shoot.

I HAD the 3" (magnum) chambered judge. Even with 3" shells it had less perceived recoil than a stainless steel .357 magnum snubnose that I sometimes shoot and with "cowboy" .45 colt loads it has very light recoil. The judge had some issues with light strikes in double action and cylinder binding in rapid fire. I won't go into why I didn't really find it to be a useful revolver since you aren't asking about that in this thread.

The recoil is considerable, but the ribbed grips do a good job of making it manageable.

Not hard to shoot; recoil isn't unreasonable. Report can be fairly sharp at our indoor range. Mine was always entirely reliable.
Now, all that said...
I bought the gun for snake murdering down at camp; hoped for a little more range than a .38 snub with snakeshot. It no doubt puts more ordnance on target, but the pattern spreads rather rapidly. It has no more range than .38s, tho' it does deliver more on target.
Accuracy is only so-so with .45 Colt loads
This is one big gun; not easily packed in a belt holster.
Mine is also gone; something to think about.
Moon

I like mine I have had no issues and was really surprised by how little it recoiled. My gun is the 6.5 in ch barrel version. If you would mention some things you have fired maybe we could give you something to compare it too. I took the ribbed grips off and put on a set of hogues. The ribs made it feel funny to me. Also mine shot very accurately with winchester hollow points in 45, Dont remember there name though and I dont want to dig out a box. I was just dissapointed in the 410 part though, massive spread. Mine doesnt shoot the 3 inch mags though.

If you get one, be sure to measure the chamber throats....most of the first run had vastly oversized ones..measuring around .463 to .465 which made it a certainty that you would get horrible leading with the Colt loads. I wrote to them several months ago about this. Ones coming in to the shop now check out at .454 to .455 which is just about perfect. I got one of these, 3" chamber, 3" barrel, and it shoots fine, recoils nicely but not nastily, and shoots quite well. 3" #7 1/2 shot at five to seven yards would nicely decapitate a snake and the Winchester personal defense loads hold nice tight patterns with the copper slugs at seven yards. It is too big for concealed carry, in my opinion, and I'm a pretty big boy.

If you want here is a link for research to other Judge owners.
http://www.taurusarmed.net/forums/index.php?board=37.0

I just bought one of the 3" magnum versions and did some testing Saturday. With a two handed grip it was fairly comfortable to shoot but I found with one handed shooting I was getting an uncomfortable slap from the rigger guard on my middle finger due to the short grip but it still wasn't terrible to shoot.
I tried some #4 shot and while I think it would be good for snakes I wouldn't try it on anything else. The 3" 000 buckshot was nice at 10 yards with decent spread and good pattern. the .45 Colt as so so accuracy but would work at short range.
Overall I think it is a fun gun and nice playtoy.

This is mine...


This was 5 rounds of 000 buckshot at 10 yards...

Its not as bad as you think for .410 shells. The .45lc is a different story, but the recoil is manageable and it is not uncombfortable to shoot at all, IMO.

XxWINxX94 said:

Its not as bad as you think for .410 shells. The .45lc is a different story, but the recoil is manageable and it is not uncombfortable to shoot at all, IMO.

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So you feel the colt loads kick more than the .410 shells? Assuming we are talking about average "cowboy" .45 colt loads I found them to be very soft shooting in the judge... now if you are talking about "full-house" colt rounds that is a different story and I don't think I would trust the judge to handle many of the hot .45 colt loads.

I used to own two. Now I own one 3"bbl 2-1/2" chamber in Ultralite. Never malfunctioned.

BUT. It's a snake gun and useful for little else. The novelty wears off really quickly, especially once you start being honest with yourself about how quickly the pattern spreads out.

So you feel the colt loads kick more than the .410 shells? Assuming we are talking about average "cowboy" .45 colt loads I found them to be very soft shooting in the judge... now if you are talking about "full-house" colt rounds that is a different story and I don't think I would trust the judge to handle many of the hot .45 colt loads.

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Yup, thats just what I found. I'm not sure what my .45lcs would be considered, but recoil isn't too bad. They are reloads from a relation of mine. They certainly don't seem like cowboy loads, but thats just what I found from shooting the .45, then the .410. Logistically and scientifically it might be contrary to my opinion, but thats just what I found when shooting mine.

I have never seen any serious problems when looking at one in the shop, but their timing and function has aways been what I would call marginal and would never buy one to defend myself with thats for sure. I would stick with S&W for two reasons reliablity and warranty. But I'm a S&W person myself and I'll stick with my 3" 629 with internal lock removed and a good set of Pachmayr Decelerator grips.

Fmjblack said:

So you feel the colt loads kick more than the .410 shells? Assuming we are talking about average "cowboy" .45 colt loads I found them to be very soft shooting in the judge... now if you are talking about "full-house" colt rounds that is a different story and I don't think I would trust the judge to handle many of the hot .45 colt loads.

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The average cowboy round features a 250 - 255 grain bullet at around 700 ft/sec. The excellent standard pressure load (developing all of ~12,000 CUP) featuring that same bullet atop 8 grains of Unique will produce around 900 ft/sec from the same barrel. The Taurus ought to handle those just fine, though the recoil is much more noticeable.

Now if you took that same 255 grain bullet and stuffed the case full of Pyrodex or black powder, the resulting recoil will be quite healthy.

EnsignJimmy said:

The average cowboy round features a 250 - 255 grain bullet at around 700 ft/sec. The excellent standard pressure load (developing all of ~12,000 CUP) featuring that same bullet atop 8 grains of Unique will produce around 900 ft/sec from the same barrel. The Taurus ought to handle those just fine, though the recoil is much more noticeable.

Now if you took that same 255 grain bullet and stuffed the case full of Pyrodex or black powder, the resulting recoil will be quite healthy.

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There are .45 colt loads that exceed the power of a .44 magnum, but it is generally only recommended to shoot such loads in a very stout revolver such as a ruger redhawk. Even with the 900fps loads I wouldn't be surprised if the judge shakes itself apart sooner than later.

Well I bought my Judge for a playtoy and snake gun with #4 shot. I figured it would be easier for my wife to take out our reptillian friends with it than the little .38 we have with rat shot.

If I get the urge to shoot some .45 Colt my S&W 625 Mountain gun willl take care of that for me. The Judge can come nowhere close to the 625 in accuracy.

I won't shoot cowboy loads. Original 45 Colt factory loads or my "factory duplication" reloads. Interesting to note that the 3" 410 was never referred to as a "magnum" until Taurus started calling it so.
If you want to experience the true recoil potential of the 3" 410 you have to shoot it out of at least an old ten inch barrelled contender with choke and the original 2X4 grips. Hurts. I don't think the short Judges can burn all the powder in the three inch shell and I have not seen any three inchers marked "handgun" yet.

Fmjblack said:

There are .45 colt loads that exceed the power of a .44 magnum, but it is generally only recommended to shoot such loads in a very stout revolver such as a ruger redhawk. Even with the 900fps loads I wouldn't be surprised if the judge shakes itself apart sooner than later.

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That'd be kind of sad if a Judge would shake itself apart on a load that wouldn't bother an Italian Colt SAA clone. The maximum SAAMI load for the .45 Colt is 14,000 PSI/15,900 CUP. You can safely drive a heavy cast bullet to 900 ft/sec and beyond without getting near the ceiling. Jacketed bullets of the same weight are a somewhat different story, but the .45 Colt is happiest with cast bullets anyway.

Check out this link for a video on the Judge's performance and capabilities.

http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?deskto...e.com/watch?v=qRlry5KH6I0&v=qRlry5KH6I0&gl=US

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy Tablet using Tapatalk Pro.

EnsignJimmy said:

That'd be kind of sad if a Judge would shake itself apart on a load that wouldn't bother an Italian Colt SAA clone. The maximum SAAMI load for the .45 Colt is 14,000 PSI/15,900 CUP. You can safely drive a heavy cast bullet to 900 ft/sec and beyond without getting near the ceiling. Jacketed bullets of the same weight are a somewhat different story, but the .45 Colt is happiest with cast bullets anyway.

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I agree, it would be sad. My experience with the judge didn't leave me with much confidence in it's durability.

Had one customer who insisted he could "load 'em up" to very high levels for his Judge. Blew the top off. Sent it in to Taurus, he did, claiming factory loads. They sent us back a new one to replace it.

I agree, it would be sad. My experience with the judge didn't leave me with much confidence in it's durability.

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Nowhere in this thread have you mentioned anything about owning, or even shooting, a Judge. What's the basis for this?

How about hearing from the actual Judge owners. If you haven't handled one,shot one, or owned then there is no basis for being able to make substantive comments on the Judge.

Here's something from another thread on the Judge from here.

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Let's get down to brass tacks.

These two links have to do with the Judge and actual snake shootings.

http://www.taurusarmed.net/forums/index.php?topic=37806.0
http://www.taurusarmed.net/forums/index.php?topic=40569.0

It seems in one of the lastest issues of American Handgunner the author of the article proved that while .38 Special shoot loads worked well it was the .45 ACP shot shells shredded the snake opposition. Same for rats and other vermin.

Other authors in recent periodicals for this year also echoed the same sentiments. Some of them lived in the West, one in Florida, and one in Missouri.

Now, for the scoop on the Taurus Judge and right from the actual owners.
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=544818
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=500365
http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=510595

Read the links within the links that are provided.
There are links within the link that need to be gone through.