4" barrel, black hard rubber grips #511048. I've had a set of very early 22/32 HD "Bekaert" walnut grips for years. They fit perfect. Could this model have come with some like these? It is a fixed sight,not a target model.

Thanks,
Ischia

This is one of those "never say never" situations. S&W would willingly sell a gun in a non-standard configuration to almost anybody who asked for a special order, but the two-screw extension stocks were intended for use on adjustable sight target revolvers. The round butt I-frames (.32 HE) had the small rounded stocks; after 1917 the Regulation Police models with the rebated frame were available with the longer square butt stocks, which were somewhat smaller than the two-screw extension stocks. I bet a lot of owners with large hands put the extension stocks on utilitarian fixed-sight models just to be able to hold them better, but that was not a standard factory configuration for either the basic .32 HE or the basic .32 RP.

The early .32 HE target models came with extension stocks, sometimes in hard rubber, but the standard stocks for .32 target models became the smaller RP stocks after 1917. The .22/32 "Bekeart" style guns started with the large extension stocks in 1911, but briefly used the RP style in the years around WWI, then went back to the extension stocks in the late '20s and '30s. The only standard model that was advertised with a choice of small round butt, Regulation Police, or extension stocks was the prewar .22/32 Kit gun, manufactured from 1936-1940.

As an aside, the factory seemed to refer to RP stocks on invoices as "checkered square butt wooden stocks" and the extension stocks as "large checkered square butt wooden stocks."

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David Wilson

Thanks for the info. My early "Bekeart" stocks are of the gold medallion type with no # on the butt( I also have a 22/32 #164122,#1858 on butt) They are MUCH better as to shooting as the original hard rubber ones must have come from the "Land of The Little People" as they are so small. I don't see how an adult could use them. Any idea as to D.O.B.on #511048 & #164122?

Ischia

164122 is probably from 1912. 511048 is probably no earlier than 1930, but might have shipped a year or two later depending on how long it sat in inventory during a period of slow sales.

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David Wilson