Back in the 1990's Police Departments were trading their service revolvers for Glocks and other high capacity pistol. That was a great time to pick up a 38 Special.
time and again, this K frame has been my favorite revolver to shoot as it is wonderfully accurate with a light recoil.
The grip frame is small and fits my hands well with a clamshell grip. My hands have short, stubby fingers, and it is unfortunate for me that there is a trend that larger the caliber, the larger the grips. As if human hands grow in proportion to the size and weight of the gun. I assume the firing spade on a 105 mm M1a tank cannon must be the size of a garbage can! What I think is going on, is that the marketing department keeps things proportional as the customer does not like asymmetry. A huge pistol atop a small grip just looks odd, so they must be sizing the grips up so everything looks proportional, even if it takes two hands to hold the grips!
This pistol is one of the very few that I can double action and keep all six shots on my 12" gong at 50 yards. The double action pull is smooth and predictable. I stack it just before hammer fall. I do know, talking to the old guys who shot PPC, their preferred 38 Special was a K frame. The K frames held up well with their target loads of a 148 LWC or HBWC and 2.7 grs Bullseye. These guys literally fired hundreds of thousands of rounds in competition, and at those round count levels, they wore out extractor stars and cylinder hands. But the barrel and cylinder stayed good.
Anyone see this, during an extended stay in a Georgia jail?
I want to give this an honorable mention, the 4" Colt Police Positive. This was a popular and well liked pistol prior to WW2, Julius Hatcher writes about it in his Textbook of Revolvers and Pistols.
It is too bad that it is more a collectable than a shooter. These older pistols have very smooth actions and are very accurate. The Police Positive was made to be a lightweight revolver, lighter than the Colt Officer Model. Light weight made it a desirable characteristic for those who had to carry the thing on their belt all day. Colt really hit a home run when in the early 1930's they offered a version with a two inch barrel.
My PPC Buds told me Colts went out of time faster than the S&W's, but the barrels were tighter and shot better. So I was told of Smolts, a K frame pistol with a Colt barrel.
