S&W Triple Lock, 44 S&W, target, plated; what would you do

[StrawHat]

I have heard of that but what was the .45 S&W Special cartridge?
Smokeless Schofield?
FA 1906 .45 Rimmed?
Or something entirely different?

Not the 45 S&W, aka Schofield, and not the FA 1906 but very similar. There is a thread on it over on the S&W forum. S&W put a lot of faith in that cartridge, so much so, they had thousands of the boxes made up and imprinted with the 45 S&W Special nomenclature. When they did not get the contract, the boxes were used for other revolvers, sometimes with new labels pasted over the printing.


Kevin

 

[Onty]

I have to admit that I was wrong regarding nomenclature for the round we are talking about. According to SAAMI specification, it is 44 S&W SPECIAL (44 S&W SPL). Not 44 SPECIAL, nor 44 S&W. Please see SAAMI specification https://saami.org/wp-content/upload...rfire-Pistol-Revolver-Approved-12-13-2022.pdf , page listed 47, page shown on header, top left, 56.

BTW, all drawings are now done by CAD, no more hand drawn ones.

 

[Jim Watson]

Yes, companies were and are possessive about their product names.
Originally it was the .38 S&W Special but only in S&W revolvers, Colt listed it as .38 Colt Special. There was a distinctive Colt loading with the deadly flat nosed bullet, worth an extra 5% in Hatcher Relative Stopping Power.
Colt did, grudgingly, no doubt, mark guns as .44 Russian and S&W Special.
There for a while, you could get .32 and .380 SAP, Savage Automatic Pistol.

But now we have the ammo company in the name, not the gun company, .44 Remington Magnum.

 

[Driftwood Johnson]

I believe the .44 Special was the only .44 caliber that the triple lock came in, as the Special was introduced along with the triple lock. (Edit: 44WCF/44-40 was also offered later.)

According to the Standard Catalog of Smith and Wesson, the 44 Hand Ejector 1st Model, also known as the New Century, and affectionately refereed to by collectors as the Triple Lock, was chambered for 44 S&W Special, 44 S&W Russian, 44-40 Winchester, 455 Mark II, 38-40, and 45 S&W Special. Of course the great majority were chambered for 44 S&W Special, known to the rest of the world simply as 44 Special. Twenty three were reported manufactured chambered for 45 Colt.

The story of the 45 S&W Special has been discussed in other posts.

This is a very early Triple Lock, it shipped in 1907. It is so worn that nobody was interested in it, so I got it for a song. It still locks up and shoots as good as when it was new.




Yes, 1907 according to Roy Jinks. Notice the caliber marking on the barrel. Roy told me they had not made up the 44 S&W Special stamp yet.






According to Neal and Jinks, approximately 5,000 455 Mark II Hand Ejectors, 1st Model were supplied to the British Government between 1914 and 1915 at the beginning of World War One. This model was identical to the 44 Special Triple Locks, just chambered for a different cartridge. Yes, the Brits were unhappy about the possibility of mud clogging up the area of the ejector rod in the ejector rod shroud. I do not know if any problems actually happened, but the Brits did not like the idea. According to Neal and Jinks: "The British government accepted this model only as a necessary substitute while the factory tooled for the production of the slightly lighter model which did not have the shrouded extractor housing and the third locking system."

Note, the "slightly lighter model" was the 455 Hand Ejector 2nd model, which did away with the third latch. The same with the 44 Hand Ejector 2nd Model, the successor to the Triple Lock.



This is a 44 Target Model Triple Lock. These are less common than the standard model with fixed sights. I am not going to say how much I paid for it, but if I found one of these in a barbecue version for $950 I would probably grab it, just because it would be so unique. But don't forget, that $950 price is from over ten years ago.






This is a 455 Mark II Hand Ejector, 2nd Model. Notice the lack of the shroud over the ejector rod.








This one shipped to Canada in 1916. The strange marking under the thumb release is the Canadian Broad Arrow. The typical British Broad Arrow, surrounded by a C for Canada. At some point this one went back to the factory and had a new barrel and cylinder installed, it is now chambered for 44 Special.






P.S. Doing away with the 3rd lock reduced the factory price of a 44 HE 2nd Model to $19 vs $21 for a Triple Lock.

 

[Vern Humphrey]

Just to pour water on the parade, under the conditions stated, I wouldn't buy this revolver. The finish, re-done or not, will raise the price -- someone will be willing to pay extra for that gun. So you wind up paying extra for something you don't want (the fancy finish) and then paying extra to have it stripped off.

I'd look for a similar gun with an ordinary, worn finish and have it re-blued and tuned up by a good revolver smith, and come out ahead.

 

[tmd16556]

That gun really begs to be paired with a purple Cadillac with longhorn horns on the hood.

I’d buy as a shooter at a shooters price, because I like revolvers of that size and era, but I wouldn’t pay extra on the finish or re-refinishing it.

You can always load it with sooty powder like Unique and never wipe it down. Then no one will notice it is so shiny. (Full disclosure: I like Unique a lot but also wipe my guns down).