I am looking at what I think is a Lend-Lease M&P. The barrel is Marked .38 S&W, but the cylinder carries British proof marks and is inscribed .38 Special. I do not see any import marks on this gun.

Does anybody know what this is and what should I pay for it. Seller is asking $375.

Since the .38 S$W case is .007" more in diameter than the .38 Special case, are split cases going to be a problem? Or, were new .38 Special cylinders fitted to some of these guns while in England?

Common butchering... er, modification. Too high in price, IMO. If nothing else is done to it, you can still shoot proper 38 S&W but if you don't load your own ammo it is pricey. Yes, cases bulge and can split.

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No life story has happy end.

That's what I thought. I am going to mic the chambers just on the off chance the cylinder has been replaced. If it has been, my offer will be significantly less.

You often see cautions about splitting of .38 Special cases when fired in reamed-out .38 S&W chambers. I cannot say splits will or will not occur, but I have fired thousands of .38 Special rounds in one with nary a split. The .38 S&W bore is also slightly larger than the .38 Special bullet, and you may (or may not) get sloppy grouping with .38 Special ammunition. You can always fire .38 S&W ammunition if you can find some.

If you purchase it, go ahead and fire some standard .38 Special to see what happens. Even if you get a case split, it won't do any damage to the gun. If this one has been reamed, I'd be reluctant to go much over $200 for it. $375 is way over its worth. You can get a much newer K-model for that or less. One of the local gun shops now has a fine-condition 10-5 for the same asking price, and would be a much better buy than a butchered and mutilated WWII veteran, even at the asking price.

Actually, I have understood there have been some vary good chamber conversions done in England by sleeving and reboring the chambers instead of reaming the original chambers. But I have not seen one myself.

As DWalt mentioned, there were some quality conversions made, but I have never sen one. The .007" difference in the case dimension can split a case and cause a possibly dangerous situation. See the attached picture of what had been a mild 38Special WC target load. Note the bulge in the center section of the case. If this had been a full power load it most probably would have split and shot hot gasses out both ends of the case. I could not recommend you fire any 38 Special in a reamed cylinder chamber of a 38 S&W.

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H Richard
SWCA1967 SWHF244

The serial number should be found on the cylinder, under the barrel and of course on the butt. A sleeved post war conversion is extremely uncommon. With the exception of Cogswell & Harrison and Parker-Hale which draw some interest, such "conservations" go for $200 and less.

Hollow base wadcutter .38 Specials help a little with that .357 to .360 difference

dekeshooter,

If the cylinder is just reamed for 38 Special, once you shoot the 38 Spl cases in your gun, they will be properly re-sized for the chambers. Just discard any that split and if you reload, use 38 S&W dies. Simply use the larger .360 bullets in your 38 Spl cases to match the bore and for maximum accuracy. 38 S&W dies are available on e-bay for a song, or you can still buy them new; I use Lyman dies exclusively.

There's been much to do about the 38 spl case splitting in reamed 38/200 chambers, but truth be told, it doesn't happen that often. And if it does, so what? Cases of the proper caliber for their chambers have also been known to split on occasion. If a case splits and gases escapes from the rear of the cylinder, how is that any more dangerous than the gases escaping from the front of the cylinder at the barrel gap which is routine anyway? Normal safety precautions demand no one be to the immediate sides of anyone shooting a revolver period.

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Jim
S&WCA #819

All of this discussion of shooting .38 Special out of .38 S&W chambers has other issues besides an occasionally splitting a case. The .38 Special works at a much higher pressure than the .38 S&W. Heat treating was done very differently for such guns as Colt P.P.,S&W Terrier's and Victory models and most certainly the top breaks.Even those revolvers were eventually chambered for the Special the cylinders were treated differently.Colt did this extensively,i.e, Official Police,Officers Match(.38 Special) and 3 5 7's Pythons,.(357 Mag.) same frames different heat treating to handle the higher pressures in the cylinders.S&W did this Mdl 19 and Mdl 10, same frame different cylinders other than cartridge length.Colt even made the Police Positive "Special" to designate the difference in cylinder length and stronger to accept the higher pressures.They simply did not punch .38 Special cylinders in a cylinder designed for.38 S&W for a reason.

"Heat treating was done very differently for such guns as Colt P.P.,S&W Terrier's and Victory models and most certainly the top breaks... Even those revolvers were eventually chambered for the Special the cylinders were treated differently"

That topic seems to come up frequently. But no one has produced any evidence, only unsubstantiated statements such as this one presented as fact, regarding manufacturer's heat treating practices. Several times in the past I have invited anyone with actual knowledge regarding heat treatment performed on different guns and different calibers at different times to come forward. So far, nary a peep to be heard.

" Simply use the larger .360 bullets in your 38 Spl cases to match the bore and for maximum accuracy. 38 S&W dies are available on e-bay for a song, or you can still buy them new"

I have always used .38 Super dies for loading .38 S&W. Works fine.

To put it bluntly, $375 is at least twice what the gun is worth, IMO, and the .38 S&W-to-.38 Spec. conversion, while not necessarily dangerous in any significant way, was and remains a half-a***d idea.

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Pisgah

"the .38 S&W-to-.38 Spec. conversion, while not necessarily dangerous in any significant way, was and remains a half-a***d idea"

Not so from an economic perspective. If one had available hundreds of thousands of perfectly usable revolvers, but in a caliber that was not likely to sell that well, what would make more sense than conversion to a more popular caliber?

^what he said.

Whatever heat treating Colt provided, real or imagined is really irrelevant to S&W guns.

Smith 1st heat treated it's 1917 cylinders at government request because they were chambered for the 45 ACP used in the 1911 Auto which required a 21,000 psi operating pressure to operate the slide reliably. That was 6,000 psi higher that any of the other N frame chambered cartridges of the time.

By the early 1920s S&W had implemented heat treating of cylinders on all of their models. The Victory models were chambered in both 38 Spl and 38 S&W (actually the English 38/200 cartridge, the American version known as the 38 S&W Super Police) with the same heat treating. The 38/200 has higher chamber pressure than the American 38 S&W cartridge because of the 200 grain bullet. The only cartridge specific heat treating was on the Registered 357 Magnums in 1935.

So again any difference in strength/heat treating or imagined danger between the cylinders of the 38 Spl and 38/200 is purely speculative.

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Jim
S&WCA #819

As a matter of manufacturing economics and quality control, it does not make much sense to have several different levels of components heat treatment for essentially the same revolvers as it complicates operations. Whether it was done that way is unknown. It is also unknown why the metallurgical technology used by the gun manufacturers seems to be such a secret.

If you letter the gun S&W will sort of pooh-whoo the practice but only disclaims the use of +P's. I have fired the several I have owned and experienced no problems. Yes, .360 bullets perform a bit better as you would expect. Yes, you can continue to fire .38 S&W cases. But make no mistake the British Service ammo was not top-break fodder. I too can not imagine there were multiple manufacturing standards for Victories.

This bears no comparison to really stupid stuff like shaving old Webleys to accept .45 ACP or cutting the forward locks off in "snubbing" Victories.

I have seen more than a few modern .38 Specials that will chamber .38 S&W cartridges.

I have had and still have a few converted 38 S&W pistols. I haven't had any problems shooting eather cartridge in them. I had a sleeved version of Parker-Hales' when I was stationed in Lybia and I didn't see any real differnce in accuracy at close pistol ranges. I have a prewar S&W M&P target that was sent to England and there it was converted to 38 S&W. It shoots fine. I picked it up about two years ago at Cabelas for &165.00.

SWCA892

I no longer have a converted V-model. But when I did, it seem to shoot OK with the .357 bullets. I have loaded and used .357-.358 lead bullets in .38 S&W for my old breaktops and they shoot fine, certainly as well as I can hold. As I have noted previously, I have pulled and measured quite a few lead bullets from antique .38 S&W dud rounds, and they typically have a diameter of .357-.358, not the .360-.361 often stated.

That sure makes me want to slug a Victory barrel.

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Jim
S&WCA #819

Thank you for posting the photo of the empty .38 Special casing, fired in a converted .38 S&W revolver. I'm hoping you will be able to help me with something that has puzzled me for some time now.

Below is a link to a photo of four empty .38 Special casings that were also fired in a converted "Victory" model .38 S&W.

http://www.jfkfiles.com/jfk/images/n...G03_120310.jpg

You may recognize these as the four empty casings from the rounds fired by Lee Harvey Oswald into Officer J.D. Tippit on November 22, 1963, shortly after the assassination of JFK. Oswald's revolver began life as a .38 S&W "Victory" model revolver, sold to Britain in WW II under the Lend-Lease Program, and it had been converted to .38 Special some time after WW II.

These casings display the same bulge near the centre you pointed out in your photo, and this is the part that has puzzled me.

As you likely know, the shorter .38 S&W casing is .3855" in diameter at the neck, and gets gradually wider toward the base, where it is .3865" in diameter. With the .38 Special casing being a uniform .379" in diameter, and longer than the .38 S&W casing, I would imagine the reaming of the chamber only involved reaming that part of the chamber forward of the neck of the .38 S&W casing.

My question is, with the rear part of the converted chamber being .3855-.3865" on a uniform taper, why are the empty casings only bulged in the middle? Why do we not see an empty casing uniformly bulged right to the base (rim) of the casing? Was something added to the base of the chamber to stabilize the narrow .379" casing in the wider .3865" chamber? Is this why the .38 Special casings were difficult to extract after being fired in these Victory conversions?

Thank you in advance.

The solid interior base of the .38 Special (and similar) cases extends somewhat forward of the rim. Therefore it does not expand diametrically upon firing. In my experience with firing .38 Special cartridges in the reamed .38 S&W chambers I have never seen a split case result. Longitudinally split cases do not create a hazard. I have experienced many longitudinal case splits in many different revolvers without incident. Circumferential splitting near the base just does not happen in handgun rounds, but under some conditions of excessive chamber headspace, it can occur with some bottlenecked rifle cases, especially those of the belted variety, after several reloadings. The case usually show signs of incipient head separation (in the form of a bright ring appearing) before it actually happens. Those case failures can be very bad.

It just looks so odd. At the top of the bulge, you can see a definite break in the casing from where the chamber goes from .3855" to .379", as one would expect.

In my eyes, the bottom of the bulge shows an almost identical break, as though the chamber had a short insert at this point to bring the diameter up to .379".

Which brings up another question. If only a small portion of the neck of the .38 Special cartridge was in contact with the chamber, and the rear of the cartridge had a .007" gap between it and the chamber, would this sloppy fit not somehow affect the performance of this cartridge?

If the rear of the chamber was .3865" in diameter, why would the casings be difficult to extract, if the stories are to be believed?

NOTE: Sorry about that. I meant to quote DWalt's post but accidentally quoted my original post.

Welcome to the forum.

1] Look in the bottom of an empty 38 Spl case, actually any modern case and the reason for the "break" in the case will become apparent. The solid case head DWalt explained comes up to the break line you see. Below that, the .011" case wall ends and the case is no longer hollow! How can it expand? The case HEAD is taller than the case RIM.

2] No, the top portion is enough to seal off gases under the relatively low 38 Spl pressure.

3] They usually aren't difficult to extract unless other factors exist. Like crud or corrosion in the chambers, or cheap (therefore thin walled cases) that expand into coarse machining marks.

Hope that helps,

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Jim
S&WCA #819

I'm scratching my head over what anyone would want to shoot 38 special in a 38 S & W? Yea, you might not get split casings but once they are resized as mentioned in one post, then reload with 38 S & W dies????

If you're going to reload, then buy the proper brass and cast the right size bullets. Starling sells 38 W & W brass so there is no excuse to not use the proper brass. A 38 Spl. takes a .358 mold. The 38 S 7 W takes a .360 mold. .002 difference and it may not seem like a lot but using an undersize .38 cast bullet is not only probably going to give you poor accuracy, it will also likely lead your barrel.

A person can do what they want to but as far as I'm concerned, shooting the wrong cartridge might possible be able to be done but it's not the smartest thing to do - but to each their own.

I've seen 380 shot out of 9mm as well - but it's not the smartest thing to do. An 8mm (8 X 57) Mauser cartridge can be chambered in a 30-06 in a lot of cases but the difference is in the bullet diameter. Yep, all of the cartridges I've mentioned headspace on the throat but the point is - "just 'cause you can doesn't mean you should". The 38 S & W cartridge and components are too available to not use them.

If one chooses to reload .38 Special brass which has been fired in a modified .38 S&W chamber, the best approach to get any case life is to resize only about the front 1/2" of the expanded case.

The OP didn't say he reloads and the difference in price between 38 S&W and 38 Spl ammo makes this discussion a valid one.

Equating this old 38/200 revolver phenomenon to the unsafe practices you bring up, is not relatively equivalent and therefore irrelevant.

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Jim
S&WCA #819

Man it depends what year is it ! But 375 for an old one its very good price!

Baculd , Welcome to the forum.

The "converted" BSR is not at all rare , and has had the value pretty well reamed out of it. The value of anything is equivalent to what someone is willing to pay. Me , I have an aversion to reamed BSRs , and the deformed .38 special casings they produce. (Also , pounding on the ejector rod with the heel of my hand gets old real quick like...) I would much rather have an original in poor condition than a "conversion" in good condition.

But , that's just me. Enjoy the forum.

"(Also , pounding on the ejector rod with the heel of my hand gets old real quick like...)"

Hello Waveski

Would you please elaborate on this comment you made to Baculd in the previous post? According to some members, the .38 Special empty casings are not at all difficult to extract from a .38 S&W revolver converted to shoot .38 Special cartridges, yet this comment would seem to contradict that.

Just for historical interest, several years ago I saw a British marked Victory that had been converted to .38 Spl over in Britain. The pistol had been marked by the noted gunmaker (can't recall, but I recognized the name) over there who did the conversion and was re-proofed for the new cartridge and so marked. Very nice job and while the expansion on the base of the fired case was noticeable, it wasn't really all that bad.

So, a quality conversion can be done, it's just generally not seen.

No way to ever know, but importers must've converted a jillion of those .38 S&W Victory models. And chopped how many barrels off? Seems they turn up all the time.
Have seen them in pawn and gun shops with routinely a 'rare/collectible' price on them. Almost funny.

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Ret'd LEO
SWCA #2275

With the encouragement of others who have done so previously. I tried reloading .38 S&W brass with 148 grain .358 lhbwc. Used Bullseye same as with .38 special. Manual gives a < 8000 psi pressure for tis load 148 grain wadcutter seated flush. Very accurate out of an old S&W break top. They were seated about halfway out so the OAL was the same as 145 grain LRN, or a .38 special wadcutter seated flush. The bullets I used were pan lubed, so really only suitable for playing around. I am told the skirt expands, seemed to for me.

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Certified Curmudgeon

I keep hearing how hard it is to find 38 S&W, yet I never seem to have any trouble finding it...generally cost about $35 a box, and I know sometimes 38 spl can be had for half that on sale, but I can always find it.

Robert

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Robert
SWCA #2906, SWHF #760

38S&W ammo is on the shelf at Academy Sports in Mesquite,TX.
I bought some for my perfect shape Smith & Wesson revolver I posted about several months ago.

Traveller11 -

As WR Moore alluded to in #29 , there is a wide range of quality to be found when it comes to "converted" BSRs. I use the quotation marks because , in my opinion , reaming a .38 SW to accept a .38 sp. cartridge is not a true conversion if there is excessive play between the .38 sp. cartridge and the charge hole wall. Now , if the charge holes were somehow sleeved or the cylinder swapped out the .38 sp. cartridge could fit properly , though there would be an excess of a few 1,000's in the bore. I am sure that there are high quality conversions out there ; I have not personally seen one.

As to pounding the ejector rod , my (briefly owned) converted BSR expanded and occasionally split the .38 sp. casings , resulting in difficulty of ejection. Hence the sore hand. I was soured by the experience , sold the BSR , and put the proceeds towards a very nice '42 DSC marked AOP (Arkansas Ordinance Plant).

That's my story.

Side note. If you make cases for your No 3 New Model .38-44 Target by cutting .357 Maximum to cylinder length, you will get about that much bulge. But if you size with a .38 S&W (or .38 Super) die, you will not be working the brass back and forth and it will last pretty well. Until I sold the gun to a collector, at any rate.

Thank you for that, Waveski. That is valuable information.

If you have read my earlier posts, you will know that I am a researcher of the JFK assassination, which occurred 54 years ago yesterday. Also slain that day was a Dallas patrolman, Officer JD Tippit; killed by one of the .38 Special "Victory" conversions we are discussing.

The reason I am so interested in the possibility of empty cartridges being difficult to extract from a .38 Special "Victory" revolver is that several eyewitnesses to the shooting observed Oswald emptying his .38 Special "Victory" revolver of spent cases immediately after the shooting. However, instead of him emptying all six empty casings quickly and easily in one push with the ejector rod, and leaving all six casings at one location, the witnesses stated they saw him shaking the revolver, and only removing one or two casings at a time. This was corroborated by the casings not all being found in one location but, rather, strewn in a path as Oswald made his escape on foot.

Of course, though, this is still circumstantial evidence, and only really helps to prove the type of revolver used in the killing.

Once again, thanks.

It is also interesting that you have pointed out the difference in bullet diameter between the smaller .38 Special (.358") and the .38 S&W (.361").

Below is an evidence photo, presented to the Warren Commission, of a bullet removed from the body of Officer JD Tippit.

https://catalog.archives.gov/OpaAPI/...?download=true

If the photo is enlarged, it can be seen that the rifling marks, left on the bullet by the .38 S&W barrel riflings, are not very deep at all into the surface of the bullet.

Could this be accounted for by the .003" difference in bullet diameter between .38 Special and .38 S&W?

Precisely.

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Jim
S&WCA #819

Generally speaking:

1] The quick and dirty conversions to 38 Spl were done by US importers of yesteryear who then dumped them on the US market in the $29.95 price range by the thousands; with and w/o chopped barrels. These are the most numerous, unfortunately.

2] The proper conversions with relined chambers and barrel were done by well known, reputable gunmakers/gunsmiths in England before importation to the US. Several of those have been presented in these pages over the years. These are much less common.

3] Occasionally we see BSRs imported that were and are properly converted using 38 Spl barrels and cylinders from way back when right up to the present. These are in the minority and usually done on an individual basis.

4] We also see #1 and #2 type conversion methods above done on a one at a time basis in the US by local gunsmiths and in garages. How many done this way is anybody's guess.

5] Unconverted examples are generally in collectible condition, been in collections for years, and only occasionally come on the market or are found "in-the-wild".

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Jim
S&WCA #819

An addendum to Jim’s excellent summary:

An intermediate species combining features of Jim’s points 1 and 2 is actually the most commonly encountered British conversion on the US collector market; they frequently show up on auction sites like Gunbroker.

Those are the guns converted in London by Cogswell & Harrison. They are easily recognized as the company stamped its name into the left side of the frame. They did convert to .38 Special without sleeving, and had the guns proofed at the London proofhouse for .38 Special. The barrel was shortened to about 3.5 inches, leaving the lug, a new front sight was fitted, and the guns were refinished, usually blued, and received very nice proprietary checkered wood stocks which are actually quite superior in grippiness to the originals.

(Pictures aren’t mine, but the best I could find at short notice )

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Thank you again, Jim. You and the other members of this forum are a wealth of information.

Would you be able to tell from looking at the empty casings whether one of these converted revolvers was the simple ream of the front end of the chamber job or a re-lining of the chamber with a sleeve job?

Yes, of course, since a properly sleeved cylinder (if done right) will have true .38 Special-dimensioned chambers and you won’t be able to distinguish the empties from those fired in any other .38 Special revolver. There will be no deformations such as you observed on the previously shown casings.

Thank you! I did forget those! And they're what I consider the premium of all the conversions! I don't remember, did hey actually obtain new replacement 38 spl barrels and cylinders from S&W?

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Jim
S&WCA #819

Thank you for that answer. Would you please look at these .38 Special empty casings in the photo below, allegedly fired in one of the cheaper conversions, and give me your opinion on them?

http://www.jfkfiles.com/jfk/images/n...G03_120310.jpg

Thank you for that answer. Would you please look at these .38 Special empty casings in the photo below, allegedly fired in one of the cheaper conversions, and give me your opinion on them?

http://www.jfkfiles.com/jfk/images/n...G03_120310.jpg

Traveller11 -

Thank you for your post #36. Oswald trailing spent casings from an uncooperative converted BSR - fascinating story.

I do not know that, but (short of examining one), at least in respect to the barrels it should be possible to tell from the positioning of the stamping remnants what barrel length was shortened, which would be a clue. I’ll have to pay attention to that when looking at photos.

One of the first big jobs wee had back in the early post war years was from an importer who had hundreds of .38/200 British M&P revolvers.
We had chamber reamers which were ".38 S&W in .38 Special length"
We never had any complaints from any those we worked on splitting cases.
The importer was sorry he couldn't get more of them at the original price he paid as they had been increased by his source.
Still have a 'new' old stock one of those reamers in the storage locker.

I am assuming the reamer was .38 Special diameter. Correct?

As I remember, it was determined to be impossible to establish with certainty that the recovered bullets were fired from Oswald's revolver. I also remember that there was some problem in matching the recovered bullets to the fired casings, like Winchester bullets and Remington cases. I don't remember the details. It is mentioned in the Warren Commission report but not adequately explained. Maybe Oswald was a reloader.