An Interesting Find

[Mike Grasso]

I've never really been into buying antiques. I have a few Winchesters and Colt SAA's but I'm more of a "Now that's interesting" kind of a "collector".

Yesterday at the Indy 1500, a good friend of mine, Tamara Keel (Firearms writer and blogger) was visiting at a friends table and showed me a S&W Safety Hammerless?, it was originally a .32.

Somewhere, someone, somehow did an incredible amount of work to it. They sleeved the cylinders and bbl to .22. Built a spring and tube system under the bbl to house a push rod extractor. Even recessed the chambers correctly. The refinished the weapon and added a Marbles front sight.

All in all it's a very interesting piece. All I need is to order a matching pair of grips and I'm good, the revolver came with a right side S&W and a left side "owl" grip.

Serial is 60,9XX so I'm guessing mid 1890s...

What's your expert thoughts?

Mike

 

[H Richard]

Looks like someone invested over $600 to create a gun worth $150.

 

[Mike Grasso]

That may be. but I never did say what I paid, did I?
And quite frankly, does it matter? But go ahead, everyone is entitled to an opinion.

 

[old11bravo]

Very curious indeed! Thanks for posting.

 

[Club Gun Fan]

I like it. I had a friend who passed a few years ago. He could whip up something like that in a weekend.

 

[gjamison]

A lot of talent went into that gun. Would have bought it in a heart beat!
Great find!

 

[Jim Watson]

Amazing.
Simpler to build and install a push rod ejector than to make a new .22 star?

 

[Mike Grasso]

It's just "NRA Weird". Shoots fine with CB Mini caps, a few light strikes but seriously, I didn't buy it for an everyday shooter! In fact I'm not entirely sure why I bought it other than it was quite different!

 

[jrs70]

I like it.

 

[rct269]

The obvious question is why would someone build something like that? The equally obviously answer is because they could. I stand in awe of such talent!

Ralph Tremaine

 

[da gimp]

the reason for the new ejector push rod, was that the smith was not able to create/precision drill & time a new ejector star/cylinder is my guess...much simpler/cheaper to do it this way... the owner either didn't like the cost of the original center fire .32 ammo, or had little access to it in his locale & was just too cheap to buy another pistol in .22 calibre.

Neat pistol... it could have a new home here in Missouri......... if my lady didn't find out about it (grins)..........Congrats on picking her up.

 

[Mike Grasso]

Some nice work...

 

[Dan M]

I like it but then I have always liked the odd guns. Here's a M&P I used to own that was colterized

 

[Old 44 Guy]

Who ever the gun smith that did the work is genius, Good job.

 

[TIMETRIPPER]

Does look to be well done. Nice touch at the rear of the cylinder. There was a converted S&W top break DA revolver for sale on GB a while back. Don't know if it sold but IIRC the seller had a rather high reserve price of somewhere over $500.

I've always wondered why S&W ignored the 22 rimfire after they ceased production of their tip up revolvers in 1881. The only S&W top break designed for the .22 RF was the single shot target model and that came out more than a decade later in 1893. And the M frame didn't begin production until 1903. Other manufacturers produced a wealth of top break and solid frame 22 revolvers. H&R, Hopkins and Allen , Iver Johnson, Marlin, and a host of others sank their production teeth into making 22 RF revolvers throughout the last two decades of the 19th century. But S&W, father of the 22 rimfire, ignored their creation. Maybe they had their hands full of other developments.

John

 

[Buford57]

I came across a .32 HE converted not nearly so artfully to .22LR in a pawn shop outside Ft. Knox a couple of years ago. The oddball factor almost got me.

This gun would have been hard to resist.

 

[SPEEDGUNNER]

That's a purty lil' pocket gun ya got there pardner...

 

[DWalt]

I've always wondered why S&W didn't make a .22 RF top break on a .32 top break frame. I'd think it would have occurred to management that there was a good market for such a design. H&R and IJ sure sold a lot of top-break .22s back then.

 

[Club Gun Fan]

I've always wondered why S&W didn't make a .22 RF top break on a .32 top break frame. I'd think it would have occurred to management that there was a good market for such a design. H&R and IJ sure sold a lot of top-break .22s back then.

Where are H&R and IJ today? Did you ever think of working for S&W in Marketing?

 

[Captain O]

Looks like someone invested over $600 to create a gun worth $150.

To each their own, said the lady when she kissed the cow!