I've heard tell of SS's with serial on the butt which letter as SS's. I've never seen one. I would never buy one (without such a letter).

Now, Bob's revolver with a (special order) SS barrel included is a whole different ballgame----one I KNOW absolutely nothing about. Here's what I suspect/have deduced (from messing around): The only thing that requires fitting (to a frame) in order to install a barrel (SS or revolver barrel) to a frame is the latch. The expected redundancy requires me to say a barrel itself requires no fitting to a frame, nor is any fitting required to install a latch in a barrel.

To the matter of dedicated 1st Model SS frames (dedicated to become a revolver or a SS-----dedicated by placing the serial number one place or another): I long suspected there was no such thing---and I was wrong---again---I think. I have a copy of one page of the shipping records for frames numbered from 14201 to 14300. Every single one of those 100 frames (not counting one which would letter as "open on the books") appears to have been made into a SS. (I say "appears to have been made into a SS", a dozen or so (all shipped to one distributor) don't say what they are. I reckon the applicable invoice would say.) One of them (mine) has the number on the front strap. I choose to assume ALL of them have the number on the front strap. I choose to assume ALL of them were selected/designated to become SS's. Can I prove any of this is right? No. Can anyone prove any of this is wrong? No.

So----we're pretty much right back where we started---but we feel better----right?!!

Ralph Tremaine

As an aside: Terry Wagner has forgotten more about SS's and the Model of '91 revolvers than the rest of us know. Should he choose to expound on the matter, take what he has to say as gospel.

As another aside: ALL the top-break SS barrels came from the same forging die(s). The only difference in any of them is the treatment of the bottom of the barrel lug (the "rounded belly"/"flat belly" portion which absolutely cracked me up. Not everyone may know "barrel lug", but ANYBODY can pretty much instantly figure out what "rounded belly"/"flat belly" means---even me!!

And as yet another aside, mostly to mess with your minds, the "flat belly" treatment found on a 3rd Model and the vertical grooves found on the sides of the frames of 2nds and 3rds are there for purposes of weight distribution/balance. That's another thing I can't prove to be right, and nobody can prove to be wrong, but I can demonstrate it to your lying eyes---and you too will become a believer----pretty damn quick!! And if you'd like to sit and stare at these things---the grooves in the frames----and the three steps required to make the "flat belly" on a 3rd (when ONE step would suffice---not counting the shortening of the "flat belly")---and ask yourself, "Why did they spend time/money doing these things when they didn't have to do them--------HMMMMMMMMMM??!!"