Dan Wesson -- Sign The Petition -- A Message To CZ

I have a DW late 70’s 15-2 pistol pack & CZ 715 pack. Shooting them back ti back the 15-2’s a bit more broken in & smoother, plus a much nicer case. I’d love a 44 but have yet to ever come across one that I could get my hands on.

 

Love my 744HV

 

You know, most of us who know anything about it are quite fond of the Dan Wesson revolvers, but truth be told, I am the only person I know outside of the internet that even knew what they were before I showed them to friends and family members. I have four, was lucky enough to find a 445 super mag and a 44 mag in a LGS I frequent several years, and bought my 357 pistol pack not long ago. I've Had the 357 super mag for a few years. They are all great, but considering the extremely poor marketing....well like I said no one I know knows anything about them. There's not going to be much market for a 445 SM as much as I hate to admit it. We here in the revolver section of the forum are some what unique.

 

Love Dan Wessons. Regret trading my first one away, ended up getting one later.

Wish I had both...

 

WOW what a set Nasty Canasta just wow. Very nice groups.

 

I've always said the same thing.

I would think the colt purchase has to have a little too do with it. Not much but a little

But the niche to the Dan Wesson was swapping barrels. And much like the "modularity" with sig 320 pistol.... it's a neat trick but how much does it get used. I Have a sig 320 or two.... but will never change anything. If I like it in full size 9mm and want a subcompact 40.... I'll pay the 3-400 and get one. The cost just isn't there imo. Same for free dessert eagle. I have 50 and 44 barrels. I used the 50 once. See no use in it so it'll be a 44 forever. Even my single sixes never get converted. Now if I could get a "modular" F350 that could easily convert into a GT500 then maybe it would be a selling point. But with guns it's gimmicky to me.

When you are moving mass produced Colts for 1500 each....I don't see why you would make the others.

 

Different markets. I would say there is very little overlap between Colt and Dan Wesson revolvers.

Is CZ going to stop making Dan Wesson 1911's, because Colt has them, or vice versa? If Ruger had bought Colt, would they discontinue the GP? If they bought S&W, would they discontinue the 686? Hell no, they'd keep making all of them, whatever sells. If any of this was the case, there'd be no reason for them to buy Colt at all. They surely wouldn't have spent tens of millions of dollars just to make 200 SAA's a year.

 

Is that a suppressor on the revolver?

 

I don't know exactly what you are referring to but you are most likely looking at an EWK compensator. The EWK compensator will screw into the front of pretty much any Dan Wesson interchangeable barrel in place of the the barrel retaining nut. They are engineered very well and allow for the compensator ports to always properly point upwards,

 

I love my 741, but it's now a Safe Queen. No longer deer hunt in Pennsylvania.

 

Can you provide a link? EWK site seems to deal with automobile parts.

 

EWK Arms apparently does not make that any more.

 

They still make it https://www.ewkarms.com/zen8/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=67_5 model I needed was Dan Wesson 445

 

Compensator as others pointed out, the perk of Dan Wessons is the barrel and accessory swapping... Ifffff you can find them in stock

 

Sorry but all I can see when I clickon your link are barrel wrenches....no compensator(s).

 

I haven't had a Dan Wesson yet, but for me it would not be the barrel swap that attracts me. I agree that I would not swap it -- I'd be more likely to buy another one for whatever lengths I thought I wanted. However, I would absolutely appreciate the ability to reset the barrel-to-cylinder gap. If I had the ability to do that, I can't imagine that I wouldn't be resetting it at least once a year.

I also think the cylinder release and the lock-up on the DW is ideal. I don't find fault with S&W, Ruger, Colt or DW releases, but the DW makes the most sense to me.

The coil mainspring and stud grip frame on the DW is the way to go. Ruger copied it for the GP-100. The older Colt's V-spring was prone to breaking. The new Colt U-springs might be better than the V-springs. S&W leaf springs are ok, but harder to fine-tune. With the leaf, all you can do is adjust the preload (strain screw) or swap between one or two spring rates and bossed (power-rib) or not. With coil springs, you can adjust length and preload, coil thickness, number of coils, diameter... and I think coil springs can be made more durable than leaf springs, especially bent or folded leaf springs.

Karl Lewis' design for Dan Wesson was brilliant in every respect except the aesthetics. The Model 14 and 15 improved on the 11 and 12 in that area, but they never had more appeal than their competitors.

The Dan Wesson's investment-cast frame held it back from S&W and Colt whose forged frames distinguished them above Ruger also. The transfer bar system of Dan Wessons, Colts and Rugers is also inferior to the hammer blocks on S&W.

That I find the least fault with S&W's design is not a matter of bias, but their domination of the market for more than the last several decades is ample evidence. It's a pity their attention to detail and quality is abysmal. There's evidence in this thread that Dan Wesson has had their own problems with quality in the past, but I think the most recent 715 product from CZ's CNC re-tool are likely top-notch. I'll also repeat that I find the coil mainspring, the cylinder release, and the user-resettable b/c gap all attractive features.

I'm looking to dump two L-frames of which I've had enough of their problems, and also sell my last S&W just because it's a j-frame but otherwise perfect -- a truly great gun that's just the wrong size for me. It didn't escape S&W without a quality flaw (faulty rear sight), but they replaced it and it's flawless now. Dan Wesson is on my list of potential replacements. The thing is, I'm demanding of my EDC piece. I prefer 5" barrels, but I'd also prefer that it be IDPA legal. I think a lot of the 715's sold new recently had the 6" barrels. If I buy an older 4" barreled gun, I have more doubts.

 

I can no longer find the compensators on their website either. I believe you are correct, they stopped making them. EWK used to be the only supplier for Dan Wesson revolver parts and barrel/shroud sets. When CZ acquired Dan Wesson they started making barrels again which is when EWK stopped making the barrels, Unfortunately it looks like they discontinued the compensators too.

 

Market share--the DW in
recent years has never really
had it, especially at its prices.

Being left handed I rather liked
its cylinder release feature.
But bottom line it's a negative.

It's history. Collector prices
will go up and up and up.

 

I was looking on GB a couple of weeks ago, and I saw many of the model 15's had asking prices of $1500+ This was for late 70's early 80's guns that were not in what I would consider collector condition. I don't suspect these are the market prices -- just a lot of minimum-bid items with zero bids. I was looking for a shooter, but for those prices, one can still get a pristine S&W 27-2. I"m afraid lack of supply may drive prices on DW's up and out of range for people who want to do anything but speculate. It would be a pity because they're too ugly to be safe queens.

 

The whole cast vs forged argument is much ado about nothing and probably best suited to the marketing department. Fact is, the DW and Ruger designs are superior to anything with a sideplate when it comes to high pressure cartridges.

 

That's odd to me, about half of my DW 15-2's came from pawnshops in Las Vegas, Columbus, Oh, Toledo, Oh, and for some reason Cincinatti seemed to have a lot at one time. The rest came from GB, or gun shops in Vegas and Toledo.

 

8 had an early 80s vintage 15-2v and it was/is an outstanding revolver. I bought it from a friend of mine years ago. He recently asked if I still had it and if I was interested in selling it. Anybody else I would have said no, but I did end up selling it back to him. Sadly, once CZ bought the rights to produce Colt revolvers, Dan Wesson's revolver days were numbered. From a business standpoint, they will sell more Pythons at a higher profit margin because of the Colt name. Sad, because the Dan Wesson, in my mind, is twice the revolver than the new Pythons are, and at less the price.

 

Not on Gunbroker. There are only two CZ-made 715's up right now. One is $1895 and the other $2299. Now maybe those are speculator prices, but if that's all there is...

 

I was lucky enough to find my first DW15-2 w/V6 barrel a few years ago when you could still find them for $500 which led to another 15-2 soon after.

 

I’ll split the baby by advocating for CZ to sell Dan Wesson to Ruger.

-Stan