Let me start by saying I am a Colt collector (New Service, .357, Trooper, 1911) who is just getting his feet wet with S&W. That being said...I have "general" knowledge of the HE line of revolvers, and know that the 2nd model was made between 1915-1917 for the Brits and Canadians in limited numbers, with some being released to the US civilian market. I also know that they were in .455 Eley.
I know that RJ will not be back to do research until the middle of the month, so I thought I would post here to see what response I would get.
Now the question. Do I have one of the revolvers that was sent to the Mid-West and converted or not? The serial number is 47131. The barrel is just marked .455 (not Eley or Webley). The letter "R" is on the bottom of the left grip frame. There are no numbers or markings at all on the cylinder face as it has been converted for 45ACP/ 45 COLT. Blue appears to be original. I have seen a lot of re blues and this one looks factory original.
Any help is appreciated.

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	S&W Under Left Grip Panel.jpg (51.6 KB, 101 views)
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	S&W Right Side.jpg (85.6 KB, 120 views)
	S&W Barrel.jpg (54.4 KB, 102 views)

It is indeed a second model. As you have stated I do not see a SN on the rear face of the cylinder, the indication being that the rear face has been "shaved" or milled off slightly, and the chambers modified to allow the .45 ACP cartridge in clips (or .45 AR) enough headspace to allow the cylinder to close. Second Model .455s are in the SN range #5462 to #74755, shipped 1915-17. I think only about 1000 or slightly more were sold on the U. S. commercial market in late 1917. Yours is not likely to have been among them.

Thanks. The unique thing about it that has me somewhat stumped is the absence of any Brit or Canadian proof marks. There are no markings at all other than the ones that I have pics posted. It will accept ACP and Colt cartridges. But the original chambering was .455. Wonder if it actually left the states at all.

If the Brits had their hands on it then it would display
their markings.
I don't believe this one ever left the states either.
That should be a fun range gun shooting either
ACP or Colt.
Congrats !!

Chuck

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They hold no Quarter

Have not taken it to the range yet, that will be tomorrow. Picked it up as a woods/hunting gun. Love the Colt New Service for that role, but hate that hideous trigger pull.

Welcome to the Forum.

Have you tried .45 Colt in this revolver? I believe it will chamber .45 ACPs in clips or .45 Auto Rim, but the headspace will be too much for .45 Colt. Can you post a picture of the chambers, taken from the rear?


If you can find someone familar with the old Colt actions, a New Service can be tuned to be a really good shooter. I carried a Colt 1917 as my duty sidearm for a while. I shot a 59/60 with it on a state law enforcement qualification many years ago.

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John 3:16
WAR EAGLE!

RDColt,

Welcome aboard.

That's a nice gun especially w/o the English alphabet soup stamped all over it. Although of course many collectors cherish the military stampings. Yours clearly wore much later vintage "Magna" stocks for many years. Since you have a shooter, you'll appreciate those much better than the original round top service stocks for shooting.

These are more commonly referred to as chambered for the .455 Webley Mk II. There are 3 categories of British contract .455 revolvers and yours is in the 3rd category and almost has to be one of the 1105 commercially shipped, see below:

3. Officially it's a “.455 Mk II HE 2nd Model” (sans extractor barrel shroud and 3rd lock, but with slightly larger cylinder/frame window dimensions from the ".44 HE 1st Model Triple Locks" factory converted to .455, and ".455 HE 1st Model TLs" of category 1. and 2. .455s respectively, continued in the .455 1st Model TL Brit serial range beginning #5462 to #74755, shipped 1915-17. By Feb 1916 724 were manufactured for the Canadians, chambered in 45 Colt, presumed for the RCMP [H of S&W, pg. 203]. Another 15 in 45 Colt were sold commercially in 1916. The Canadian military also bought 14,500 .455 2nd Models. And 1105 2nd Models were released for commercial sales in the US, shipped Dec 1917 to Shapleigh Hardware in St. Louis [S&WN&J pg. 216].

Shooting 45 ACP in 455 chambers (they will work with clips when the cyl has been shaved for 45 AR) is controversial. .45 ACP is not a recommended conversion for the 455s because they do not have heat treated cylinders. The 455 Mk II ammo (also referenced as 455 Webley Mk II) is in the 14,000 pressure range and the 45 ACP in the 19,000 range to insure it would cycle the 1911 auto slide reliably. The 1917 S&W and Colt Army revolvers were designed for the ACP and have heat treated cylinders. I caution about the use of full load ACP with its factory loading of at least 19,000 units pressure. The increase of 5000 units over the 455 ammo’s 14,000 units pressure: 5000 divided by 14,000 = a 36% increase. And especially do not shoot +P loadings.
If you reload 45 ACP, just keep them in the 45 AR pressure range because 45 AR (Auto Rim) was designed for revolvers and is in the same 14,000 low pressure range as 455 ammo, thus perfectly safe.

I'm not aware of catastrophic failures due to using factory ACP in 455 cylinders, but that but that's not the issue. Accumulative damage to the cyl and revolver is the potential danger. Dimpling of the cyl notches from the chamber side of the notch is the first usual sign of over pressure loads and will eventually make cases impossible to extract and render the cyl useless.

One more consideration: Smith & Wesson lists the bore dimensions for their .455 barrels as follows: groove diameter--.457 to .458; bore diameter--.447 to .448 inch; 5 lands and grooves, right hand twist; grooves--.144 inch wide, lands--.1368 inch.
45 ACP & 45 Colt Groove diameter is nominally .451", Bore diameter is nominally .445".

Therefore hand loaded 45 Colt or ACP with oversized bullets will have greater accuracy potential in 455 barrels. You can’t use larger bullets because Smith’s chamber throats are .454 (unless of course, the throats are reamed). Therefore, how does the 455 bullets work in .454” throats? The 455 bullets are hollow based.

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Jim
S&WCA #819

Hello RDColt,
Be sure and check the butt closely for markings other than the SN. I have a MkII that shipped to the Canadian Government in 1915 with no marking whatsoever except a small "Crown over 11" on the butt.
Enjoy!
Jeb

Thanks Hondo.
I will be "test" firing this one in the next few days to see what it likes to eat. Sure hope it is some 45 colt. My Colt New Service is a little fickle when it comes to 45 LC, but will digest any 45ACP or AR you feed it. Was hoping to have one that could handle some LC with a decent trigger. I know there are guys who can "tweak" em' to perfection, but being able to change out a main and rebound spring on the S&W for a good trigger pull really appeals to me.
As I stated originally, just thought this was an unusual bird with the .455 designation and no foreign markings. The $575 price tag was more than appealing also.
I personally like the early model grips like the ones on the S&W 1917. They seem to fit my hand and I have better pointability (if that is even a word).

JEB, I initially went over it with a magnifying glass (literally) trying to find foreign markings in the event I was wrong about the finish being original and it may have been extensively polished before reblue...Not one. Even took another look after your post thinking I may have missed something.
Just the "R" on the left grip frame
Serial number on bottom of frame next to swivel.47131
Serial number under barrel (matching)47131
And what I assume is a lot number under the yoke.

You're very welcome,

If by "is a little fickle when it comes to 45 LC" means unreliable ignition, here's why:

Once "shaved" to accommodate its 45 ACP/AR, the headspace between rear of cyl and breech face is too wide for 45 Colt reliable ignition. Since your chambers were extended for 45 Colt, and if the gunsmith was 'clever', the chamber shoulder should hold the 45 Colt case rims back from seating on the cyl face.

If the shoulder in the chamber was extended enough for the Colt rim to seat flush against the cyl face, headspace may be a problem for reliable ignition with the 45 Colt. Although the S&W Hand Ejector firing pins were quite long in this period and in my experience, it may still work for you. You'll just have to shoot it with Colt ammo to verify.

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Jim
S&WCA #819

By way of weirdness here, I have a Colt 1917 bought off this site that shoots both clipped .45 ACP and loose .45 Colt in the same cylinder. It looks like the headspace difference between them is much less than the length of the firing pin. The firing pin hits with enough force to shove the .45 Colt cases forward against their rim and ignition is fine. There is no case swelling above the rim, probably because the unsupported section of case wall there is still thick and most of the difference is unsupported there anyway because of the groove just above the rim. I can't tell anything about the cylinder's original configuration, the chamber walls are very smooth and have the normal step at the forward end of the .45 Colt cartridge case, no obvious sign of rechambering. The gun has the butt markings and lanyard ring of the 1917 but no Army number after the "No" stamp below the lanyard. Above the lanyard swivel is "U.S. ARMY MODEL 1917" and the barrel has the "UNITED STATES PROPERTY" roll mark on the bottom of the barrel. S/N in the yoke cutout on the frame is 276371, kind of high for wartime production. Perfectly fitting Colt black hard rubber grips.

I dunno WHAT it is! (in my best Rosanna Danna voice)

That was apparently how S&W did it back then. You will note that the caliber markings on S&W M1917s was merely "45". IE, not "45 ACP".

My WWI British contract Colt is marked ".455 ELEY" so I can see why someone who is familiar with Colts might expect that S&W would have used the same designation.

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You're shy a few manners.

Unless there is obvious file marks on the butt where the Army # was removed, it probably never had a #. A surplus frame assembled and sold on the commercial market that could explain the super high serial # for a US contract Colt 1917.

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Jim
S&WCA #819

"Unless there is obvious file marks on the butt where the Army # was removed, it probably never had a #. A surplus frame assembled and sold on the commercial market that could explain the super high serial # for a US contract Colt 1917.'

I think that is the situation. My Colt book puts the gun's build or ship date in 1920. The bottom flat of the grip frame has everything except the Army's number, the space is just blank after "No". Checking with a flat straightedge shows the entire surface is flat, nothing removed. The barrel markings consist of "COLT D.A. 45". There is a small rampant colt on the left side of the frame, behind the cylinder release. I figure it is a left-over 1917 sold commercially. The ability to shoot both cartridges is a real plus in my book.

Did the rear face of the Colt 1917 or New Service have any stampings or serial numbers like S&W did?

There were some conversions of M1917s from .45 ACP to .45 Colt done by simply running a .45 Colt chamber reamer into the chamber, but chambering it slightly short. This allowed the .45 Colt case mouth to headspace on the chamber step, not the rim, In practice, it works very well, allowing both .45 Colt and .45 ACP/AR ammunition to be used in the same revolver. Could yours have that type of conversion?

No, the rim of the cartridge case stops it from moving forward.

DWalt, do you have a printed reference to that? I have a couple of Colt books (Wilson's and Severn's), I haven't seen that, but could have missed it, they are both large books.

BUFF,

I don't think it's in a book.

Of course it's little different from cartridge chambering in semi auto pistols and rifles; head spacing on the case mouth. Where I know about it from first is having done it so long ago. I don't ever remember reading it anywhere. I've participated in many discussions about it on this forum as it has come up several times since I picked up a Brazilian for my dad years ago.

He asked if I could ream it to 45 Colt. I said sure but the headspace would be too great. Then got to thinking about it. So I sawed off some 45 Schofield cases short enough to fit in the ACP chambers. Drilled out the flash holes so they wouldn't bind up the cyl if I just loaded them with primers. Well about a dozen all fired in his gun, so he said please do it. I considered the overall cartridge length with the semi wadcutters he loaded and that drove me to maximize chamber length for the 45 Colt. Knowing that 45 ACP case heads stick out of the chambers, and fire safely, so why not 45 Colt? The case head on solid head cases is the strongest part of the case. Never had any balloon head cases to try.

He of course liked the idea of still being able to shoot clipped ACP ammo.

Similarly the principle worked backwards in my Ruger single action 45 Colt some 5 years ago. By surface grinding moon clips from .040" to a .020" I use ACP clipped ammo in a spare 45 Colt cyl for speed loads in the single action. Swapping cyls is a much faster reload than individually unloading and reloading single cartridges.

Suffice to say that's the only history I can recall about it and in post #11 I only surmised that "if the gunsmith was clever" he short shouldered when reaming for 45 Colt in your revolver, so I don't know. But DWalt's memory is no doubt better than mine, and maybe he has a source, although not everything gets into the books. Hopefully if there's anyone with short shoulder conversions, either 1917 or British 455s, they will show them.

There's more info on this forum than can ever all get in a book.

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Jim
S&WCA #819