I think because they are so few and far between, people have this romantic notion that the top break is blazingly fast to reload compared to a traditional single action or hand ejector. Unless you're using speedloaders or moon clips, they are not, even compared to a single action. I like to run my sixguns fast and there's no way to manipulate a Schofield as quickly as a Colt or Old Model Ruger.
Howdy Again
I must respectfully disagree with you. I shoot Single Action revolvers in CAS all the time. And I shoot my antique S&W New Model Number Threes fairly often too.
There is no comparison to how quickly one can dump all the empties out of a Top Break revolver. I don't use moon clips, my Smiths were built long before moon clips were invented, but even so, all you do is pop the latch, swing the barrel down while holding it slightly sideways, and all the empties come flying out. Which is exactly why S&W developed the Top Break revolvers in the first place.
Let's look at history for a moment. Smith and Wesson controlled the Rollin White patent for cylinders with chambers bored through to accept cartridges. Contrary to popular opinion, S&W did not own the patent, White refused to sell the rights to it. But he did license S&W to manufacture revolvers requiring S&W to pay him a royalty for every revolver they made. I forget now if the royalty was 25 cents or 50 cents per revolver, but when S&W started producing their little Tip Up revolvers in 1857 it came to a sizeable amount. So S&W merrily made thousands of little revolvers, and no other American manufacturer could produce a revolver with chambers bored through for cartridges. Which drove Sam Colt crazy because when White worked for him he had passed on the idea to patent White's idea. So all through the Civil War, Colt and Remington were making scads of big Cap & Ball revolvers, but they could not make any cartridge revolvers or S&W would sue the pants off of them.
The three revolvers at the bottom of this photo are what I am talking about. They are S&W Tip Up revolvers. Up from the bottom they are a No 1 seven shot revolver chambered for what we would call today the 22 Short, a No 1 1/2, a five shot revolver chambered for 32 Rimfire, and a No 2, commonly called the Old Army, a six shot revolver chambered for 32 Rimfire. The big revolver at the top of the photo is a 2nd Model Russian Top Break. These were built on what S&W called the No. 3 sized frame. This photo is just to illustrate how small the Tip Ups were.
This is a No 2 Old Army with six 32 Rimfire rounds.
This is how you loaded a Tip Up. The barrel latch at the bottom of the barrel was raised to unlatch it, then you rotated the barrel up, hence the name Tip Up. Then you pulled the cylinder off its arbor, and poked the spent rounds out of their chambers with the rod underneath the barrel. Then you loaded fresh rounds, popped the cylinder back in place, rotated the barrel back down and latched it in place. A surprisingly simple design. Not particularly fast to reload, and not very powerful. But this is what S&W was manufacturing all the time Colt et al were limited to producing C&B revolvers. (yes, there were cartridge conversion models of the C&B revolvers, but they were just a stop gap.) The Old Army was popular with Union officers, but they generally bought them with their own money.
Crafty old Daniel Wesson was sure the competition was going to be ready to pounce with their own cartridge designs when the White patent expired in 1869, so he developed a completely new type of revolver.
The Top Break. Break it open and rotate the barrel
down, and an extractor pops up and automatically ejects all the empties.
Like the Russian model pictured above.
Or a New Model Number Three.
Or an American Model, Schofield, or 44 Double Action, the three other models built on the big #3 sized frame.
The same with any of the smaller pocket pistol sized Top Breaks.
The first Top Break was the American model, and it featured a 44 caliber cartridge. S&W had experimented with a 44 caliber Tip Up but the mechanism was not strong enough for that large a cartridge.
I have done side by side comparisons. With a Colt you have to manually eject each empty one at a time, rotating the cylinder manually for each chamber, then you have to reload one chamber at a time, again rotating the cylinder manually for each chamber. Watch an old cowboy movie and you will probably see an actor doing so, just as it had to be done in real life.
With a Top Break, you break it open and dump out the empties in one fell swoop. Even without speed loaders it is then quicker to grab a couple of rounds at a time and pop them in the chambers, loading 5 (yes five) before swinging it shut.
Hands down much faster than loading a Colt.
I can tell you if I was in a gunfight in the Old West I would have much preferred having a Top Break than a Colt.
Oh, I forgot to mention. 1869 rolled around, the White patent expired, S&W introduced the American Model, the first of their Top Breaks, and Colt and Remington were nowhere to be seen. When Colt got around to introducing the Single Action Army in 1873, and when Remington introduced their version in 1875, these revolvers were basically upgrades of the old C&B revolvers. Unload and load one chamber at a time, while the Top Breaks could be unloaded and loaded in half the time.
Yes, I have done it.
