UC II on Charter's site.
They're playing catchup with Taurus' 856.
Let me know if they've started making the transfer bar out of better material.
I've been around revolvers for 45 years, including S&W armorer school. Charter Arms has been making original designs, which have been proven to reliable, since 1964. They've been making 6-shot .38s and 5-shot .44s since the early 70s. They have had ups and downs like everyone including Colt and S&W, but the designs are sound when properly executed, which they have been for the majority of their existence.
Taurus, on the other hand, has a well-earned reputation over the course of decades, as legendary fail with their revolvers - a bastardized, modified, "simplified" and barely functional version of S&W designs. S&W had a majority ownership in the company in the 1960's but sold it off after realizing Taurus was a hopeless mess unable to produce revolvers to an acceptable level of quality. I will agree they have been an innovator: the Raging Bull and the Judge, for examples. But the execution has been uniformly bad from the inception. Every maker has it's price point, and examples get out of the factory that should not have seen the light of day. What they do afterwards is important. Taurus reputation as the US firearms industry's worst repair service is another of their well-deserved reputations. Which is not surprising with poor quality products made overseas with minimal domestic support. I've had three Tauri in the past 15 years and all of them had issues: one went back to the factory and returned in worst shape 8 months later, the second I repaired myself and the third I sold as is. Waiting over a year for a Taurus "repair" was not uncommon. The metallurgy, design and consistency is just not there.
They did much better with the pistol production copies of the Beretta 92, as they directly purchased the existing Beretta factory and tooling in Brazil, and kept the same people that were trained by Beretta, and used the same quality materials.
I have heard that Taurus has improved their revolver quality and service. Based on their reputation, they would be best advised to change their name to something else, and start over fresh. But from what I have seen of their recent production, I don't see any real changes, still using soft parts that wear out quickly, and the same bad design. Perhaps their service is better, but I'm not about to find out. I went looking for a part for a friend and waited 9 months for it be in stock.
You broke a transfer bar on a Charter Arms? Well, gee whiz. I've seen plenty of broken hammer blocks and hammer noses on S&W revolvers at twice the price. It's mechanical, it happens. I've had more than 2 dozens Charters, fired a few thousand rounds through them, with at least that many dry fires, and never broken a transfer bar. What does that mean? Nothing, as I might break one tomorrow. But I could call Charter Arms that day and have it in hand a few days later. I've also sent revolvers back to Charter over the years for this or that, and they have been returned in a few weeks completely 100%. And that does mean something.
PS. I bought two brand new S&W Classic series revolvers in the past 18 months. BOTH were obviously way out of spec, right out of the box. The first had a bad frame and was completely replaced by S&W - four month later. The replacement is perfect. The second was atrocious and went back, was returned 3 weeks later with an unskilled repair attempt, and is now back at the factory again. A supervisor did call me to apologize for sending out garbage.
PPS. Last three Charters Arms I purchased in the same time frame - no problems! At a lower the price that comparable S&W or Ruger. I'm not expecting Colt Python level finishing, but they work for the purposes intended.
youtu.be
was my experience with C.A.
