i had a Taurus 85UL. it was a good gun, and i hated to sell it. i never planned on buying a S&W, because the prices were outrageous in my area for them, and i never see decent quality used ones. i was planning on buying an SP101, but i stumbled over a 642-1 for $350, so i snatched it up.

other than the grip, which the S&W does better, i don't care for one over the other. i don't care for S&W 1911's, though. i have one from Taurus, which is phenomenal. it's not a Wilson, but it's good.

Being a bit of a revolver guy, I never go through any of the shops I frequent without picking up any revolvers I haven't handled. The overall look and feel of Taurus revolvers has never failed to make me put it back without question. The craftsmanship is lacking IMO.

Unless I find one that I'm blown away by (no pun intended) I'll continue to be Taurus free.

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- The Federalist #46 -

You're welcome. It's the second one I've made in this thread.

I would agree with rburg. Older used S&W's I find superior to both Taurus and current production S&W's.

With current production revolvers from both Taurus and S&W, it's six of one, half a dozen of the other. Regards 18DAI.

I bought a Taurus 94 new about 10 years ago. Had the worst trigger on any firearms I've ever experienced, would misfire two out of nine shots and after a few cylinders the barrel/cylinder gap would carbon up so bad the cylinder would barely turn. Quickly I became frustrated and threw it in the back of the safe. One day I heard about the lifetime warranty and decided to send it back to Taurus.

Taurus tweaked it a little and the resulting trigger pull was much improved. For a while I kept track of how many rounds I shot through it wanting to see how it held up. I became bored though and stopped tracking after 12,000 rounds with only three misfires. This is running what ever ammo was on sale at the time I was buying.

Would I rather have a S&W than a Taurus? Of course. But that does not take away from the fact that this Taurus is filling the role I bought it for, a 22 caliber plinker and camping gun.

I have a Taurus Model 85 Ultra-Light. It's a great little gun and I've shot hundreds of rounds through it so far. 100% dependable. It's the only Taurus I've owned and, I believe, the only Taurus I've shot. I use it as a carry gun.

whats the deal with all the cracking on taurus???? I have 1 and love it, never had an fte or ftf, shoots what ever i load in it. I dont have a bad thing to say about the gun at all. It is a pt101p so needless to say it was about half the price of the beretta and just as accurate. I dont get it??

dpmac83, I think the problem is with quality control. I have several revolvers that you honestly can't tell from a S&W, others I've seen were horrible. I have two autos, a PT99 and a PT101 which I am rather fond of too, but I've known people with the PT99s that had nothing but trouble with them, although it might have been a maintainence issue.

Their quality seems to be hit or miss. I do wish I had more of them though, I'd beat the snot out them and not even give it a second thought.

Barrel blowing off a taurus.

YouTube - 357 Magnum barrel blows off

Barrels falling off a whole bunch of S&W's:

NC Wants Smith & Wesson to Replace Faulty Revolvers

The point is, you can find anything you want to prove a point.

If it is man made, it can and will have problems.
There have been threads of 60's and 70's vintage S&W's having problems that weren't noticed until recently because they were "NIB" and never taken out for inspection by the owner!

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Lost it all in a boat accident

Boy, I started this thread. But reading some of the posts...the question begs asking. Is the "New Taurus" company starting to become closer in direction to the current S&W manufacturing ???????

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Non gratum anus rodentum

In my opinion, yes.

I've never owned a Taurus but have shot them. This was quite a while back and at the time, I was put off by the roughness of the action. They may have improved greatly since then, but what do they offer that is an improvement over a Smith? I guess lower price would be the main thing and for some, that is a legitimate advantage and a very important one at that.

Being lucky enough to be able to afford Smiths, though, I'll stick with them.

I was thinking of finding a used Taurus 5 shot .38 [M85?] as a CCW. I didn't want to lose a good S & W to the police.

Then I got a free [yep free] S & W M36 that was finish-poor but action-tight.

If I CCW, I will do it with the old M36.

I want something that I know is reliable.

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Have guns...will shoot'em.

I used to have a wonderful Taurus the old Model 85, the best gun Taurus ever made. Had it for years until I traded it for a Browning HP .40sw, biggest mistake I ever made. The springs in the HP were so heavy you couldn't even hand eject a round and couldn't hit a plug nickel with it. Traded it for a Sig P220 and have that now going on 15yrs. To me the only great gun Taurus ever made was the Model 85 but they have a few good ones but only one great one.

fknipfer1

The fact is that when the Brazilian Govt contracted w/Beretta to produce a military pistol (the Model 92) the deal was that they had to set up a factory in Brazil. They did and when the contract ended they left the factory, tooling, the materials, and the employees. Hence PT92 was the SAME gun produced by the same people in the same factory using the same material and plans. Taurus has actually since then made many improvements to the SAME gun. Check out your history before bad mouthing something! The PT1911which Taurus has steadily improved is practically flawless. Ask anyone who owns one.

I recently had a nice new example of a factory bobbed hammer LW 85. Nice little gun. My example worked just fine. DA pull on a Taurus is so much different than a Colt or Smith. There is a Taurus forum. You may want to check out the complaints there. It looks like you have to be registered to view the "Taurus complaints" category.

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SOS USA

yes, my PT1911 is flawless. my biggest complaints are the stupid lawyer lock, and the ugly black grips. the grips were a simple matter of just taking them off and putting on wood ones. i bought it over a year ago, and yesterday i hit 3,000 flawless rounds with it.

id never buy a S&W 1911; i just don't like external extractors on 1911's. if they made one with a traditional extractor, i might change my mind.

I have only owned one Taurus; a PT101 .40sw. The gun worked fine but was definitely not in the same league as the Beretta. It lacked the smooth action, fit and finish of it's Italian cousin. I have no ill feelings about Taurus, they just do not produce anything that gets me excited enough to go out and buy one.

FWIW, I did have one Officer who picked up a Taurus 850 .38spl to use as his BUG. He had nothing but issues from day one. He ended up getting his money back and bought a S&W 638 Bodyguard instead.

Taurus was the first gun manufacturer to offer a life-time warranty on their products.

That's because it took a lifetime to get the damned gun fixed.

Cheers,

Sverre