did s&w make 657 blued in 3" or 2.5 " thanks in advance

Yes - they made a 657 in 3" (but they are not blued) with a round butt back in 1986. This had the standard ejector shroud. According to info I've seen, only 5490 of these were made. I picked one up a month or so ago - here is a pic...



Later - they made one with a full underlug ejector shroud, and these are even more rare.

Right now, they are making a 657 UDR with a 2 5/8" barrel.

I'm not 100% sure, but I don't think S&W ever made a 57 (blued 41 Mag.) with a 3" barrel - but there were a few gunsmiths putting them out as customs.

Hope this helps,
Bob S.

the 6 in 657 denotes a stainless 41 mag.

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KK4EMO

As already pointed out, a 657 is the stainless steel brother of the blued or nickel Model 57.

The shortest factory produced Model 57 would be 4". It was available in blue or nickel finish.

There were many gunsmiths/shops in the 80s that were famous for cutting down the Big N-frames to barrel lengths of 2 1/2"- 3" and trimming the frames to K-frame round butt dimensions. John Jovino is the best know name among this crowd. One or more of our fellow forum members have Jovino Effectors built from blue steel model 57s. I am sure we will see some pictures before this thread is over.

While I do not have one of the Jovino Effectors, I do have one of the 41 Magnum Terminators that were produced back in that period by Astra.