The Highway Patrolman (M28) cylinder length is short -- .44 special short. The .44 mag cylinder filled the whole frame window. If the .44 mag and the HP were contemporaries why did S&W design the .357 mag cylinder so @%$% short? I'm not bashing, one of the things that makes the M28 look so freaking good is that short cylinder and that beautiful barrel contour but what was the engineering reasoning?

Stuff like this keeps me up at night!

The Highway Patrolman, introduced in 1954, was an economy version of the .357 Magnum, which was designed in 1935. The .44 Magnum was introduced in 1955.

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John 3:16
WAR EAGLE!

To this I would add-

The cylinder for the N frame was originally designed around the new .44 Special round with the introduction of the Triple Lock. The original N frame .357 caliber gun was the .38/44 HV round, which is of course, being a .38 Special case, is shorter than the later .357, and subsequently the .44 magnum. The cylinder was stretched out to accomodate the new .44 magnum round in 1955.

The first S&W .44 Magnum revolvers were rechambered, specially heat treated .44 Specials. Not only did the longer cylinder give more room for the Magnum round, it also added a bit more weight, as did the heavy barrel. The extra weight helped with recoil.

__________________
John 3:16
WAR EAGLE!

It is kind of a mystery why Smith did not lengthen the cylinder for the N frames, especially after the Model 19 came out with the longer cylinder.

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Richard Gillespie
FBINA 102

"It is kind of a mystery why Smith did not lengthen the cylinder for the N frames, especially after the Model 19 came out with the longer cylinder."

The M19 needed a longer cylinder; N frame .357s didn't.

That would have meant that the bullet would have had that much farther to jump before entering the barrel.

Why mess with success?

__________________
John 3:16
WAR EAGLE!

Could be that S&W recognized the weight issue that too massive a cylinder might present both to the action lockwork, as well as weight of the revolver itself.

The biggest single factor is probably the challenge of how a major production change would impact every aspect of the cylinder length change. Spare parts, parts inventories, warranty issues, compatibility of previous production, and so on. Most people outside of manufacturing don't realize what a really big deal a simple change in production affects the product and support organization.

The large frame cylinder length was established well before the Triple-Lock, in 1888 when the .44 WCF and .38 WCF were introduced in the New Model 3 Double Action. The cylinder was lengthened to 1 9/16" (1.562) to accommodate these cartridges. This remained the standard length until introduction of the .44 Magnum. (Note, the .357 Magnum, M-27, and M-28 cylinders appear longer because they were lengthened at the rear to allow recessing of the case rims. From the rim cut to the face they are still 1 9/16")

This length was still adequate for the .357 Magnum as the SAAMI maximum LOA is actually shorter than .38 Special, 1.540" compared to 1.550".

So, the cylinder isn't short at all, it's perfectly adequate for the cartridge it was intended for. The fact that some handloaders want to shoot bullets longer than those which the cartridge was intended to use doesn't alter this!

OK this gets to the core of my question. Why did the model 19 with its shorter frame window get the longer cylinder treatment but the 27/28 continue with a shorter cylinder? When the L-frames came along the cylinder was longer still.