How common was it in the past to rechamber a 38 44 to .357?
If someone in the WW2 era had a Heavy Duty in .357, was the gun sturdy enough for it, and was there any preferred "Smiths" to have that job done?
I've recently heard of some one having one like that in the immediate post-war years, that had been done immediately pre-war?
Any comments appreciated.

SFAIK, there was no real metallurgical difference between the K and N frames pre-war. [Registered Magnums excepted.] They pretty much depended upon the greater mass of metal in the N frame to cope with the extra pressure from the 38-44 rounds. I wouldn't rechamber one to .357 Magnum myself and if you have one I wouldn't use .357 UNLESS you get a letter from S&W saying it's OK.

I expect folks did so, Lord knows all sorts of stupid, dangerous stuff got done (and still does). However, in them thar days if you did something like that and it....didn't work out, most folks considered it a learning experience and kept their mouth shut about how dumb they'd been. Although I expect a few shattered remnants got returned to the factory with a "Can you fix this?" plea.

It was common enough such that any .38/44 HD or Outdoorsman purchase should have a check to see if a .357 case fully seats. Given human nature and the desire to tinker with one's guns, no way to even guess at a percentage of attempted conversions.

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Alan
SWCA LM 2023, SWHF 220

There were all sorts of idiots then, just as there are all sorts of idiots now. Said idiots love to tinker and always think they know better than the factory and its engineers. At least back then, if you blew one up and took off some fingers or worse, everyone understood it was the fault of the idiot, and not worthy of a law suit.

There is a reason the instructions say that you should never chamber and fire a round for which the weapon was not originally made.

That instruction is all well and good. But, if everyone had obeyed it, no 17 Remington, 22K hornet, 219 Donaldson wasp, 22-250, 243, no 220 swift, no 257 Roberts, no 25-06, no 270, no 7mm-08, no 35 Whelen, 357 Herret, no no no no no. Without guys going out past the factory like Elmer Keith would we have a 44 mag??? The list is endless.

I am not saying you should ream a 38/44. But without guys who decided to step out side of what the factory was making we would be missing a lot of great calibers that were pioneered by wildcatters and experimenters. I am sure a few guns got blown up along the way. Not everyone is an idiot who decides he isn't satisfied with what the factory will make him.

Personally I doubt many 38/44s were blown up by 357 rounds unless they were loaded by the same type guys who blow up 357s, 44 mags, 45acps. etc etc etc.

A 65 year old idiot with all his fingers, toes even though still shot the enfield my dad reamed to a 30-338 many years ago.

PS I have met some quys with engineering degrees who prove to be genuine idiots.

Thanks All.
Any one know of any well know gunsmiths from that era that might have been know to do something like that?

I have owned about a dozen or more .38-44 H.D. and Outdoorsmen S&W's over the years. 1 of 2 Outdoorsmen had been rechambered to .357, and 4 or 5 of the H.D.'s had also been done.

I returned the Outdoorsman to the vender. It was supposed to be original and unfired post-factory. I didn't shoot it before returning it.

I shot several of the rechambered H.D.'s with a few .357 handloads out of curiosity. No drama or unanticipated catastrophies ensued.

I sold one of them to a fellow I frequently encountered at the range I usually used. I told him it had been rechambered, he said he preferred it that way. He would shoot a coffee can full of his .357 reloads when he shot. He kept at it for a couple of years and then moved out of the area.

I think that this may have been a fairly widespread practice until .357 Magnums became readily available in the mid 1960's.

Asking S&W for their blessing would waste your phone call. I can't imagine anybody from S&W telling you, "So you want to shoot Magnums through a .38 Special we made 40, 50, 75 years ago? Sure, go ahead, it'll be fine..."

I will add this. Metallurgy and steel has gone quite a way since the days or the 38/44, but having worked with steel and doing heat treating I have a hard time believing that some kind of metal magic occurs that makes the small cylinder and frame of a J frame any stronger than the way bigger cylinder of a 38/44 cylinder notch being offset and all. You can heat treat and mess with steels alloy all you want, but nobody can change its elastic modulus. Just its hardness and tensile strength.

We see all kinds of 38/44s that have been reamed, When have you heard of one blowing up and remember these are the same era guns Keith was pushing hot 44 specials out of in his quest for more powerful ammo.

The story this all springs from was of a former military guy still employed by the government in China post World War, playing referee between the ChiComs, the Nationalist and repatriating Jap units left in mass at the end of the war. He supposedly favored an HD rechambered to .357.

Per an article in the S&WCA Journal from Fall 2001, Col. Wesson added "a specially heat treated chome/nickle cylinder" to the 38/44 to handle the extra pressure of the 357 round, which at the time was a 158 grain bullet at a very respectful 1515fps.

Addendum: OK, the above was sent via my phone, which I hate typing on. The article was referenced because I thought I remembered hearing that S&W did out their guns through some process. What I didn't know was that they had also changed the composition of the cylinder itself. So the question is, was this change done to all subsequent guns or just the ones destined to become 357's? If not, I through out this for consideration: the 38-44 HD was a substantial gun on it's own and could probably withstand 357 pressures for a while. How long is a **** shoot. If the gun has the same material/heat treatment reported in the Journal, then I see no issues. Otherwise, I strongly suspect that sooner or later you'd pay to play the game of converting it to 357 mag. Unless the cylinder can be verified to be the same, I'd leave it alone. In fact, even if it was verified, I'd leave it alone. I hate to modify a piece of history. I'd either seek another cylinder (possibly already modified) or buy a real 357.

Also, a note on the reported velocity. Pushing a 158 grain bullet at 1515fps is wicked. But here are a couple thoughts on that report: pressure testers of that era were notorious for being wrong. Even as late as the 70's, many of the loads published in reloading manuals as being safe have since been dialed back when their pressures were found to be out of bounds by newer, more accurate equipment. Same thing goes for the chronograph. Perhaps the bullet really did hit 1515fps, but I got to believe the pressure was far more than they thought. A more realistic velocity for a 158 grain lead bullet is in the neighborhood of 1200 to 1300fps, although Lyman does list one load for their 160 lead bullet using 16.5 grains of H110 that gave 1463 out a 4 inch barrel. I even find that odd since only one of their 155 grain bullets made it into the 1300's (which coincidentally was also powered H110, only with 15.7 grains.

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So many S&W's, so few funds!!

In the Nov. '53 AR, Elmer Keith recommended The Christy Gun Works of Sacramento, stating" they can and will rechamber your Outdoorsman to the .357 Magnum", also noting "it makes an excellent conversion....".

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Good shooting.