Tyler T-Grip
 

So I guess this old adapter is worth something now? Used to be black but the paint started coming off. So I scraped the rest off and it's kinda purplish color. Does the trick though.

Just saw a K/L model up for auction with 23 hours left. Sitting at 182.50 and counting. Amazing ...

Pachmayr
 

Got a couple Pachmayrs way back and still use them. I like them way better than the Tylers.

Numrich lists them but they are sold out of most all but J-frame square butt models.

Numrich Gun Parts Corp. - The World's Largest Supplier of Firearms Parts and Accessories

I am just aghast that people are paying upwards of $200 for a piece of aluminum with a brass tab sticking out......and I cringed when I had to pay $50 for a few of my Tyler's.

I'm sure there are some people out there that could just make them.....

Have a T-grip on my J frame RB and one on my K frame SB, will trade both T-grips for a 38/44 HD or 3" RB K frame revolver (LOL!).

I emailed Pachmayr and asked if they intend to bring their models back into production. I was told "Not at this time..." I know there were some marked with the S&W logo but I don't know if they made them or if they were sourced. You would think the corporate types would smell a money maker. Is there not enough of a demand as we think?

*Looks down at T-grip-equipped 64 in holster*

*Looks at empty wallet*

*Looks down at T-grip-equipped 64 in holster*

*Looks at ramen soup and vienna sausages in cupboard*

*Looks down at T-grip-equipped 64 in holster*

And???????

Dang, ya'll got me curious now. I've got a few in my grip box. I guess I'll have to dig them out and see what they fit. I used to give these things away. If I see any of them in the future I'll buy them if they are under $20. Any higher than that and I don't need them. I've got a set on an old model 38 that I thought were bronze until I cleaned them with some carburator cleaner and found out they were the purplish blue mentioned earlier.

On The Hunt...
 

I have dispatched my Buying Scouts with orders to snap up any Tyler T's they find...

I've been getting calls from them all afternoon.

I think we need some government intervention here. There should be a law against the hoarding and speculating of Tyler T Grips and the selling of T Grips for multiples of the listed base price. We need a law to protect the buyer from paying excessive amounts for secondary market T Grips. Call it the Tyler Consumer Protection Act. Finally we need a government bailout of the Tyler T Grip Co, a grip manufacturer too big to fail. Call your congressman today!

They were really hurt by the Gulf oil spill and should receive some BP money to "tide" them over. :p :)

Not to worry...
 

I'm using TARP funds to buy up all I find.

Actually, I was pretty suprised that I am able to still find them in various places, but the sellers are already asking stupid prices for the S&W numbers ... $50 is pretty typical.

Found many for Colts too...

Maybe S&W can start making a MIM tyler-T, and incorporate another lock on it.....lol

Well, I've got a #3 and a #4 I don't need
 

Both are polished aluminum and older production. Nicely made and finished. But I'm looking for a number 6 to fit a Colt New Service. Can anyone help me out?

Just last week I bought 4 Tyler T grips at a garage sale.. All were new in the little black & white box wraped in white paper. Three are black #4`s for the N frame & one is a polished alumn. for the J-frame. Didn`t know I was getting such a deal at .50 a piece. I only bought the Smith`s & left the other makes. I better go back and see if there are any left. Also picked up 5 Tyler trigger shoes. all NIB, and one is gold plated.

As functional as they are and as cool as they look, they're a solution to an ever decreasing problem, both due to the switch to auto-loaders, as well as a wonderful supply of every type of grip imaginable, in terms of styles, materials, and prices. I don't know whether they're still in business or not, but it's a wonder they've made it this long.

PM sent to cprher

Looks like we have a new record $255.00!!! I wish I would have bought some of these several years ago.

...and I just sold a couple #3's for $45 each a few weeks ago



KO

Dang! I wish I'd found this thread a couple of weeks ago, BEFORE I sent them my check. Check was cashed a few days later. I just hope there's a good explanation for their delay and that my grip eventually shows up. My Detective Special really needs one.

Check ebay and gunbroker you should be able to find one for the Detective Special for around 30-40. From other post when they were making the adapters they first made the popular ones long before rare models.

we seem to be losing good suppliers
 

No more Bomar sights,Millet revolver sights,Bomars,Roy's pancake holsters. Good products deserve a market!!!

I think this just shows that "vintage" revolver accessories don't have as big a market anymore.......but still, 2,000 people were waiting for T-Grips so there is a demand for them.

I have always wanted a "Wondersight" for my shooter grade Victory revolver, there's a guy that still makes them, I better order a few before those go by the wayside.......

I stumbled on some number 6's in a small gun shop Thursday. Both polished and black. The #6 fits all large frame Colt's. If anyone needs one and wants to trade S&W Tyler's for them hit me up.

I had this very conversation yesterday with a friend who has experience making and selling cast products. My thought was to take my 1950s vintage T-grip for a K frame S&W and have a mold made to cast duplicates in one of the indestructible resins now available. That allows room temperature production on a kitchen table, with any color you want and a surface that would duplicate my smooth original. (If demand was there I'd find J and N frame adapters to copy as well.)

Molds for low volume production of this kind of product cost in the hundreds, not thousands, and material cost per unit would be very low, but production is mix-and-pour-one-batch-of-resin-at-a-time, so quite labor intensive. Still, he says in a weekend I could knock out hundreds of the things. (It's how he makes one of his products, so this is real world experience talking.) It still would need advice from a patent lawyer that there are NO legal (patent/intellectual property law) risks in doing this, and that fee would probably be the largest single expense.

From reading about the Tyler operation on various forums, it looks like they treat the business as a custom shop - you order a J-frame adapter and they go make it and send it to you. They appear to maintain no inventory - an unbelievable way to run a standard-product business that has been around long enough to know what the market demand is for each of its products. (Of course, maybe it's a you order a J-frame adapter and we wait until we have enough orders to make a run - if that's the case then somebody OUGHT to come along and put 'em out of business with a duplicate product that's readily available at a reasonable price.)

This would be a (resin) grip adapter that matched a Tyler shape for those who want a grip adapter for their gun. It would NOT be an (aluminum) replica of a Tyler for those who want the retro equivalent of Tyler's original product. I'm not sure what the demand is on either side of that divide, which is why I haven't started talking to a lawyer and a mold maker yet.

It's an interesting project to contemplate. Might lose a little money. But might get swamped with orders, and then where would I be?

I think they are a casting, not a machined part.

If they don't want to be in this business, which is the impression I get, I hope they sell all their tooling, molds, etc. to somebody that really wants to take care of their customers.

Not saying that selling T-grips alone could support a business, but it would be a good side-line for somebody.

If there was a patent, wouldn't it have run out by now anyway?

Making new molds (could be expensive) and then finding an aluminum foundry to cast them for you would be the major road-blocks that I can see.

Maybe Ruger will buy the rights to them, they have the Pine Tree casting foundry where all their frames are made. To a company like that, it would cost pennies to set up to make some T-Grips and trigger shoes. The profit margin would be high, how much can it really cost to make a T-Grip?

FIE in Italy and some place in Japan was making T-Grip and trigger shoe "Tyler clones" for years. Plus Pachmayr bought out Mershon, who made rubber grip adapters, and Pachmayr must have cranked out millions of rubber grip adapters. S&W also had branded aluminum and rubber grip adapters but those are harder to find, I don't know if they made them or had them produced under contract.

They are not a good supplier. Good product maybe, but a horrible supplier.

I have one such copy, marked FIE Japan (and "GA-5," which I assume is the size, but I don't know what it fits), and another that bears no markings whatsoever--not even a size number. The former is made of thinner aluminum than a Tyler, but the latter is a near-perfect clone--lacking only a "1" marking (it fits a J-frame) to be indistinguishable.

A modern resin grip adapter could be color matched (fairly closely) to the grips rather than to the gun as with the previous generation. I've seen a wooden grip adapter that looked really nice.

I was another pondering the value of grip adapters in the house. :rolleyes:

I like the idea of a cast resin adapter. It would be just as functional and probably require no polishing or buffing after removing from a mold as a cast aluminum one would. You would have to find a supplier for the clip and screw to attach the clip to the adapter but that shouldn't be that difficult. You could even make the adapters in a marbled walnut color to match the wood stocks or in a silver color to match a stainless frame for example.

With an order placed in December of last year and another in January of this year, Tyler has cashed close to a hundred buck of my checks with no delivery of product. I hate stories that end with "a fool and his money are soon parted" because it seems to often my role in life

My expert agrees that, using the type of mold system I described, the finished product comes out with a surface that perfectly matches the original in smoothness. (Not sure how a silver/aluminum colored resin would shine, though, which might be important to some customers.) He also says it probably would be possible to cast the attachment tabs into the back of the adapter, rather than attaching them with a rivet as Tyler does, although there may be some advantage to the flexibility of the copper tabs in accommodating any slight variations in frames.

Marbled walnut - you're gettin' way ahead of me there. :D

After reading the thread I decided to join you and ordered one last Friday.:eek: See what happens, I will not buy one on that auction site.

Guys, Tyler's may not be as popular as you think. I put one (J frame) on eBay yesterday with a starting bid of $19.95, no bids yet. The prices on Tyler's on eBay lately are CRAZY! I didn't like 'em when they were four or five dollars. Oh, well................

MIM a possibility...
 

No, seriously! This would be a pretty good application for sintered or powdered metal techology...

The Tyler's that I have are obviously sand cast with lost wax and require a good deal of hand polishing and some additional machine work. In short, 1950's processes... Most all of that would be negated with a MIM part.

Another possibility for those of you thinking about wood would be MDF. Bonded under pressure, MDF is stable, light and tough...

Drew

Tyler T Grips update.
 

I called the Oklahoma Attorney Generals office this morning to see if I could get it confirmed as fact they had indeed shut down the Tyler T Grip company.

After leaving a message, I recieved a call from one of their staff in regards to the Tyler T Grip company.

The Attorney Generals Office of Oklahoma has not shut down the Tyler T Grip company. I was told they have received numerous calls in regards to the company. The parties who called to file complaints were all referred to the U.S. Postal Service. The U.S. Postal service will be the investigating agency due to the fact the U.S. Mail was used in what may be fraud and so many states being involved.

Where it goes from here who knows? I guess it's a wait and see proposition now.

Hopefully this was of help to some of you.

Murphy2000

Tyler is very popular. After many years purchasing on ebay I have found that if the items is popular people wait until the last day of the auction trying to avoid the price going out of control.

I have also noticed that the highest prices paid for for T grips goes to dealers that are willing to ship overseas. I do not remember if Tyler ever offered shipping outside of the USA.

Lack of response to e-mails and phone calls, plus this BBB review gives me reason to wait and see.

Tyler Manufacturing Business Review in Oklahoma City, OK - Central Oklahoma BBB

Oooooooh - now it really gets interesting. Mail fraud is a Federal offense. For their sake, I hope they have a good explanation for the Postal Inspectors.

I also hope that they can explain what happened. Several of the family are LEOs and it would ruin them.

Guess I won't hold my breath waiting for them to ship the grip I ordered back in December.

I sent Tyler's a check about three weeks ago and it was deposited within a couple of days. I have their grips on most of my revolvers and will keep buying them if they keep making them. I actually bought my first T-Grip from Melvin Tyler himself at a gunshow in Houston, Texas about forty years ago and have been a faithful customer ever since. I just saw on another forum that the poster recently received a call from Tyler's in response to a letter he sent them. The caller told him that the owner has died after a long illness and that the kids are trying to get things up and running. He was assured that all orders WILL be filled and was asked to "just be patient". I really hope that it all works out.

Well... I'm reporting back on my field trip to the Tyler T-Grip Company. I recently acquired one that came in an original box and had their address stamped on one end. I drove over there this afternoon and found the building with their address now houses "Aunt Pink's Pet Salon"... which was apparently out of business. Now before everyone blows up I believe it was mentioned in this thread or another one that the company has moved, so I wasn't surprised. I was hoping there might have been some kind of sign or notice on their re-location, but there was no such thing. I'll try and make some local calls and see if I can find out anything else. I'll report in later.

How old is your T-grip? If it is really old, it might be one that Melvin made. Since his death, they may have moved more than once. Thanks for trying.

I'm not sure how old it is. The box appears to be slightly discolored and has "#20A-3 POLISHED" stamped on the top of the back. I have a few ideas I'm going to follow up on to try and locate his heirs. There has to be a way to resurrect this company. If I can locate any children and get them to respond, if there is a way I can help them I'll see what I can do.

Here's one address I found...

3804 S E Ave
Oklahoma City OK
73129

...and another...

1326 West Britton Road
Oklahoma City OK
73114

Thanks for the info. I checked out the Britton Road address this afternoon. I'll check out the other address as soon as I can get loose.

May be the BBB has a new address?

If memory serves me right, the company has moved 3 times. T grips in two piece boxes were made back by Melvin. Later generations of the two piece box did not have an address. Right before Melvin died the company started shipping grips in a one piece box with side flaps. Sometime arround 2008/9 they started using a clear plastic bag with a stapled topper.