No problemo...I don't feel disparaged at all.
I'll be the first to tell folks that
I'm NOT the originator of the idea. It is probably safe to say that the idea was probably first kicked around in 2005 when the 460 S&W Magnum cartridge was released.
I remember having a discussion with my brother several years ago about this back when he first introduced me to the world of BP revolvers. I didn't even know what a Walker was back then and the conversation details remain fuzzy. It was probably one of those...."Wouldn't it be kewl to shoot a Walker using s 460 S&W casing filled with BP". I had a discussion with him last year about this and he said "That's what I was trying to tell you a long time ago but you thought I was crazy". I guess it never registered with me until my conversations here on THR. What can I say...I used to be a smokeless only heathen. :banghead:
As far as "talk"...an example, from October of 2007, shows a discussion where the question is asked:
460 S&W case in a walker, has anybody thought of this?
Even within our own forum in The Official THR Walker Club thread you can read Pulp's comments from May of 2008:
It is clear that there has been "talk" about this for quite some time.
I was looking at my notes and see that it was March 2010 (wow, it's been a year already?!) when I had a discussion with Jay Strite of Raven's Roost, now merged with Kirst Konverter concerning this project. Jay told me he wasn't aware of anyone having modified a cylinder to accept 460 S&W. In fact, he said he didn't know if it was do-able and said he'd put in an immediate call to Walt Kirst to find out if the cylinder would be able to handle a 460 S&W cartridge loaded with 60 grains of BP. When he followed up with me he said that Walt felt like the cylinder should be able to handle it without a problem. However, he said that neither him nor Walt would be involved with the work to ream out a conversion cylinder for a project such as I was attempting. Of course there are liability issues and any reasonable person could not blame them for taking that stand. I did send off my Walker to Jay to channel out the recoil shield and purchased the Kirst converter from him.
Jay had mentioned to me a Walker carbine rifle project he was working on for a customer that would use a shortened 45-70 casing as its container. I asked him why he didn't think about using a 460 S&W casing but I never really got the answer. It really didn't matter, I just thought it odd. Maybe they were looking for a larger diameter projectile to use. It's anyone's guess as to what that diameter would be as the shorter you make the 45-70 casing the larger the projectile diameter would be as the the 45-70 casing is kind of cone shaped (trapezoid). He just still might be working on that project.
As Jay Strite and Kirst didn't want to do the cylinder reaming for me I looked elsewhere. My first inclination was to call David Clements. He is very well known for his excellent work as well as unique and creative solutions in the BP world. David was unaware of anyone attempting to ream out a Walker cylinder for a 460 S&W casing. I sent off my Kirst cylinder along with detailed specs on the work to be performed to David. In fact I purchased the reamer bit for David to do the work because oddly, with all the custom work he does, he didn't have the proper reamer for this particular job. David did an excellent job. I had him re-blue the cylinder and that came out factory perfect.
Anyhoo, just want to get the word out that this is not an original idea of mine. There has been "talk" about this for years and years.