charter arms loose barrel shrouds?

[megatronrules]

Hi I recently purchased an older charter arms bulldog on Gunbroker and had a couple of questions. First the gun has a shrouded barrel and uses what looks like a sleeve over the barrel. My question is has anyone ever had a problem with these barrel shrouds loosening on the older stratford made guns?

I ask as I've read about these barrel shrouds loosening On some guns, but it seems this was on the charter 2000 or charco made era bulldogs. Thanks for any info all.

 

[ATCDoktor]

I bought one of their first Bulldog "pug" revolvers in 44 special back in the mid 90's and the shroud would move forward under recoil when using my 240 grain handloads,

These were middle of the road handloads and out of my model 29's ran about 870 fps.

 

[short barrel]

I'm one of those who love Charter Arms, but the truth about them is that they get loose after a while. Not all, but most. I bought a new .44 2.5inch and filed the front sight until the 200 grain loads were dead on. At 15 yards, I could easily hit a baseball size target off hand every shot. But eventually, the cylinder developed wobble. But I think it takes a lot of shooting to make a Charter Arms loose. I certainly believe you get your money's worth. They never failed to go off. Their tiny Undercover Lite is as deadly as a J frame. The .44 Bulldog is still the largest caliber you can get in a gun of that size. So, I say buy one, use it up over a few years, then get another.

 

[megatronrules]

Shortbarrel do you mean the barrel shrouds or the guns themselves?

 

[t1210]

When they 1st went to the barrel shrouds the shroud was just epoxied on. On the later models they went with a pin to hold the shroud in place. I had one of the 1st ones and ended up trading it because I could not get the shroud to stay in place. You might try to reapply some epoxy, or see if you can find a gunsmith who could pin it for you.

 

[JERRY]

the sleeved barrel C.A. guns were among the worst of the bunch..... the Charco guns were stamped Ansonia or something like that, but during the same era the Charco plant put out guns that were left over stamped Stratford.

 

[farm23]

CA has a life time warranty but I do not know if it applies to the Charco models. I wrote to CA with a question of the type of 44 ammo to use and they called me on Saturday with the answerer. It was the gun will handle any standard load but does best with 180 to 200 gr bullets.

 

[Slamfire]

Local gunshop told me that it was not uncommon for the barrel shroud to come loose, and come off, on older Charter Arms. I understand the shroud was attached with glue.

I have no idea what S&W is currently doing with their barrel shrouds, but pictures of the latest S&W revolvers have a shroud.