.45 Colt and .45 Long Colt ?'s

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XxWINxX94

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Hi all,
My grandfather recently purchased a Taurus "Judge" revolver in 45/410 and he's wondering what the difference is between the .45 Colt cartridge and the .45 Long Colt Cartridge, if there is any. We purchased some ".45 Long Colt" reloaded ammunition at a gun show and compared the 2 cartridges, they appear the same, however I do not reload and would not know the exact measurements of the cartridges. The owner's manual says that you cannot shoot .45 Colt in the Judge. I'm not sure if we were scammed at the gun show, or if there is really a difference between .45 Colt and .45 Long Colt.

Any information provided would be great!
Thanks!
 
Its the same. The .45 "Long" Colt is a popular misnomer. Its just .45 Colt.
 
The .45 Colt cartridge (correct name) was in use by the U.S. Army at the same time as a competing .45 cal cartridge by Smith and Wesson (latter 1800's). The Smith and Wesson cartridge was shorter, so military armorers and users began to refer to the .45 Colt as the ".45 long" which since evolved to ".45 Long Colt" which has become so entrenched a misnomer that it now widely used and accepted long after the competing .45 S&W has fallen out of favor. Both of these were originally black powder cartridges with the popularity of the Colt offering keeping it afloat through conversion to smokeless powder even up to today.

To further the confusion Colt developed (around the turn of the 20th century) a completely different .45 caliber cartridge for John Browning's legendary semi-auto the model of 1911. This cartridge is designated the .45 ACP for Automatic Colt Pistol. The .45 Colt developed for revolvers is also longer than the .45 ACP encouraging the use of "long" in the name to further separate it from the shorter ACP round.
 
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Once upon a time, there was a short version of the .45 Colt made for the US military. It had the same rim as a .45 Colt, but was the length of a .45 S&W -- called the .45 Govt. It was the worst of both worlds and didn't last long, but *maybe* that is the historical reason for phrase ".45 Long Colt" (other once-popular revolver cartridges did have a long and short version.) Or maybe not ;)

I believe Colt stamps ".45 Long Colt" on their revolvers now, so whatever the official name is for the cartridge the folks calling it that are in good company. (I use ".45 Colt" mostly, unless .45LC just looks less confusing in the sentence.)

In my opinion, people who get bent out of shape about it are just looking for something to get bent out of shape about, so it's a win-win.
 
The owner's manual says that you cannot shoot .45 Colt in the Judge.
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That makes no sense at all.

If you could actually find some .45 short Colt, you could most certainly shoot it in a Judge. And there is normal .45 LC marked just .45 Colt available that would be perfectly safe.

The only .45 Colt / .45LC ammo you cannot shoot in a Judge is high pressure ammo designed for use only in Ruger Blackhawks and other very strong guns.

It will be clearly marked on the box & headstamp as +P pressure and/or suitable for use in "Ruger Only" type guns.

rc
 
Perhaps the manual is refering to .45ACP?


Does tha manual actually say .45 Colt, or does it recommend against .45 Automatic Colt Pistol?
 
Pilot- "Long Colt" really isn't a misnomer as there were, at one time, ammo packages so marked. I believe Long Colt was an official Army designation in the 19th century and commercial ammo makers printed it on boxes until fairly recently. I recall that Long Colt was routinely printed on ammo boxes in my youth. NOW many consider it incorrect terminology but in the past it was used frequently.
 
This seems to be a not uncommon phenomenon in the firearms community. Terms change over time, and people are snooty and nitpicky about them. Another example is calling a revolver a pistol. There are many who will work themselves into a high state of dudgeon whenever they hear anyone do it. Yet revolvers were one quite commonly referred to as "revolving pistols," and "revolving breech pistols." I'm not sure when people began to make this distinction between revolvers and pistols, but a lot of people get way too worked up over it.
 
zxcvbob: Once upon a time, there was a short version of the .45 Colt made for the US military. It had the same rim as a .45 Colt, but was the length of a .45 S&W -- called the .45 Govt. It was the worst of both worlds and didn't last long, but *maybe* that is the historical reason for phrase ".45 Long Colt" (other once-popular revolver cartridges did have a long and short version.) Or maybe not
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That is absolutely correct. Although the U.S. Army did use Colt SAA revolvers they also bought a fair amount of S&W .45 Schofields as well. Since the the S&W round was shorter it would fit and fire in the longer Colt chambers. The Army decided to stick with the the S&W round for the Colt so as to make the logistics a little easier, and that is what was issued to the troops. The other reason for sticking with the S&W round was due to it being easier for the troops of the day to fire as compared to the full power Colt .45.

This is the same thing that was done with the 45-70-500. That combo had so much recoil that a lot soldiers could not shoot accurately. There for the Army decided to standardize on the 45-70-405. I posted a good article on this very subject for you to read. Look at the ballistics of the round does it look familiar? it should.

http://www.leverguns.com/articles/taylor/45_short_colt.htm
 
Pilot- "Long Colt" really isn't a misnomer as there were, at one time, ammo packages so marked. I believe Long Colt was an official Army designation in the 19th century and commercial ammo makers printed it on boxes until fairly recently.
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+1. I view it as a valid alternate name as it has been adopted by many manufacturers because of common use. And, as highlighted above, it's STILL useful as some non-expert people will confuse the .45acp (aka, ".45 Auto Colt") and .45 Long Colt if the phrase ".45 Colt" is used. It's obvious to most all of us that ".45 Colt" is quite clear, but it still confuses the new shooters and those new to the .45 offerings.

As a point in fact, Colt's Mfg. has for many, many years referred to the chambering of their offerings as ".45 Long Colt":

http://www.coltsmfg.com/products-c1-q43-Colt_Revolvers.aspx

I'm not sure when people began to make this distinction between revolvers and pistols, but a lot of people get way too worked up over it.
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You know Billy, that's another one that makes me scratch my head. A pistol is a handgun in common use and there are revolving ones and auto ones and even single shot one! Why get worked up over it?
 
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.45 Schofield, .45 S&W, .45 (or .455) Eley, .45 Russian, .45 Rim-fire Short, .45 Automatic Colt Pistol.......back in the 19thand early 20th, they had to come up with a way to eliminate any confusion, so, .45 "Long Colt" became the "accepted" phrase. When the other cartridges fell by the way-side (THANK GOODNES!!!!!!...except for .45 ACP) the accepted phrase was ".45 Colt", but, then there was still possible confusion with the .45ACP. Maybe that is why the Colt site still has ".45 Long Colt"

Plus, basically, it sounds soooooooo super cool to say ".45 Long Colt".........kinda like making it even more special and magical than it already is!!!!

(BTW, I'm a very proud owner of a 7 1/2 inch barreled .45 Long Colt revolver...of 20th century manufacture.........)

Just my opinion..........
 
Oro said:
+1. I view it as a valid alternate name as it has been adopted by many manufacturers because of common use. And, as highlighted above, it's STILL useful as some non-expert people will confuse the .45acp (aka, ".45 Auto Colt") and .45 Long Colt if the phrase ".45 Colt" is used. It's obvious to most all of us that ".45 Colt" is quite clear, but it still confuses the new shooters and those new to the .45 offerings.

As a point in fact, Colt's Mfg. has for many, many years referred to the chambering of their offerings as ".45 Long Colt":

http://www.coltsmfg.com/products-c1-q43-Colt_Revolvers.aspx



You know Billy, that's another one that makes me scratch my head. A pistol is a handgun in common use and there are revolving ones and auto ones and even single shot one! Why get worked up over it?
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Yeah! How come!
 
xxwin94xx,

Is this helpful or have we confused things with too much info? We would like to hear exactly what the manual says, because as the esteemed rcmodel has observed, it makes no sense at all for someone to say .45 Colt is not for this firearm.
 
The .45 Schofield was also known as the .45 S&W and .45 S&W Schofield. It came about as S&W adapted their #3 .44 Russian of 1871 for US calvary use. The original '.44 Russian' break top carried a .430" 246gr LRN bullet over ~26 gr fff blackpowder - not thought to be enough to down one's steed when needing to euthenize it - or produce cover. This was a US Army requirement as late as that of the shortened .45 'AS' specification - which became the 1911 .45 ACP!

The original break top was not thought strong enough to withstand the .45 Colt cartridge of 1873, metallurgy not being what it is today, so it was shortened ~.18" - to lessen that cavernous case - which held 40gr fff in .45 Colt guise. The pressure limit was dropped, too - from 14 kpsi to 13 kpsi in the .45 S&W Schofield. To make the automatic extraction more dependable, it's rim was increased from .512" OD to .520" OD max, too. Actually, many .45 Colts today are on the smaller size rim-wise - .505". The only .45 S&W Schofield I have to reload nowadays was made by Starline Brass - and measures .5195" OD at the rim. That wasn't enough to interfere with adjacent rounds in a Colt Peacemaker, so it could be used there, while a Peacemaker .45 Colt was too long for the S&W Schofield revolver. It was enough rim to make case extraction of all rounds by an extractor star much more sure, a General Schofield, of the US Calvary, requirement. Thus, the logistics problem spelled the doom of the Schofield revolver - but the common name of 'short' and 'long' colt persists to this day.

So, your Grandpa's 'Judge' will chamber .45 Colts, whether you call them 'long' or not, and .45 S&W Schofields - if you can find a specialty loader who still makes the round! There has been one commercially made revolver chambered for that round that I am aware of - the 2000 S&W 'Heritage' series - quite pricey nowadays on the secondary market. Several S&W breaktop clones exist - in .44 Russian and .45 Colt. Of course SA & DA revolvers in .45 Colt abound these days. Good luck!

Stainz
 
Hey guys,
Thanks for the input, I think I'm beginning to understand.
Apparently back in the day, there were many types of .45's offered, and the name ".45 Colt" got too confusing. So, they added "Long Colt" as a suffix to the regular ".45" to avoid confusion with the other cartridges of .45 size. I'm new to this, most of my ".45's" are revolvers that just say ".45 Colt" on them.
I'm not 100% what the manual says, as I don't have it at the moment. I'm just worried that something might go wrong if I put .45 Colt in it. There is a good 1'' space between the tip of the bullet and the barrel on the gun when the round is in the cylinder. That just makes me a little nervous.
 
There is no danger.
(unless you pick up a box of +P "Ruger Only" loads, which will be so marked)

The Judge was made to fire both standard pressure .45 Colt & .410 shotgun shells.

Don't worry about it.

rc
 
xxwinxx94,

The space between the end of the bullet and the "forcing cone" or entry into the barrel is called "free bore". This is the distance a newly loosed bullet must travel before being engaged by the rifling in the bore. Free bore is without exception the enemy of accuracy in a firearm. For this reason many in the gun community regard the Taurus Judge as a poor platform to launch the .45 Colt/.45 Long Colt cartridge. Many amazingly effective loads are being realized from this venerable old cartridge and not a one of them is efficiently handled by a Judge. It will launch them however, and spit a big chunk of lead.

The free bore situation is necessary to be able to chamber the .410 shotgun cartridge as all of these are longer even than the .45 Long Colt. The .410 shotgun cartridge needs a barrel longer than any pistol to achieve it's level of efficiency and effectiveness. Too much free bore for revolver cartridge effectiveness and too little barrel for shotgun cartridge effectiveness. Some see this as the worst of both worlds and some see it as versatile package that does both even if not doing either well.
 
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The owner's manual says that you cannot shoot .45 Colt in the Judge
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I'd bet dollars to donuts the "manual" says not to use .45acp... not .45 Colt as previously stated.
 
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