Saw one of these recently, 4" nickel marked FHP 18xx, definitely a 4" not the rare 5"! Year is 1978... Anyone know how many of these were shipped etc...

Thanks for any info.

...And I thought this was going to be a Burmese Python thread......

Me too... Kinda disappointed now :-(

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Dave

The "Yankee" is always looking for a good snake story...

Oh.... If ya wanna swap 2am, closing the bar, snake stories.....

Not nickel. FHP briefly issued some 4" Python "Ultimate" polished stainless revolvers. Traded them in when they went to the Beretta 92. They also previously issued 5" nickel Colt Trooper, Colt THREE FIFTY SEVEN, S&W M27, and S&W M19 revolvers. I saw several of the 5" 19's back in the day, but the only ones I know of now are in the hands of retired troopers or their families and NONE are for sale.

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Retired Dep Sheriff & Armorer

4 digit SN should bump it up in price, but colt did not offer stainless till 1982. What grips do you have?

My first cousin retired from FHP. His service revolver was a nickel plated Colt .357. I wasn't into "Guns" at that era but it was a "357" or "Trooper" but I thought it had a six inch barrel (?). Worn with three inch gun belt and cross draw holster. He made grips out of some type of clear plastic with different color paper (tin foil ?) on the inside of the grips. FHP Troopers were all way "Smartly Dressed). In the mid 1970s the gun shop I worked P/T got in a lot of former FHP service revolvers-nickel Colt Officer Police models with five inch barrels.

I just came across a 1985 4" bright stainless Python with the FHP23XX engraved on bottom of the grip frame. Colt serial number lookup says it is a Model I3041, which is the bright stainless model number. I know this is an old thread, but just thought I'd chime in.

I have a Florida Highway Patrol marked, nickel, 4" Python. Mine is definitely nickel and not bright stainless. Mine is a model I3641 from 1982.

I have read that they made them in nickel, then switched to bright or regular stainless around 1985. I think they stopped the nickel ones around that time. Mine dates to 1985 via the Colt site and is definitely bright stainless. i.e. Has the S stamp under ejector rod, and has the ridged cylinder release.

Congratulations on a nice find.

I wish I had come upon one. The Pythons were before my time

What grips does it have? Mine came to me with a set of Hogue rubber grips, which I know aren't original.

It has the Pachmayr "Gripper" grips. According to Colt Fever, they put these on the early stainless and bright stainless models. They are a lot thinner than the "presentation" Pachmayr grips put on the ones in the later eighties and the nineties, stainless & bright stainless guns.