My first revolver, S&W 500
- Thread starter psle1000
- Start date
The 500 is the greatest crowd pleaser of all time. Go to the range and you hear bang, bang, pow, bang......then KA BOOOOOM!!!! <-The 500 guy fired one off. Everyone stops and looks.....*** was that? You smile and fire off a couple more. No seriously the 500 is an awesome gun. I've got the 6.5 inch barrel and love it. It's my fishing gun, my trail gun, my everything gun for any BIG bears. I also carry a 44 mag when not in Grizzly Country. The full load hard cast lead in 340 grain Buffalo Bore or HSM works just fine. Recoil you ask? Sure there's recoil, full load 44 mags to some people are tough, and full load 500's are really tough. But if you practice you'll know what to expect and how you best deal with it, once you do it's not an issue. Like others have said the 500 is fun to shoot. When I take my friends out to shoot I let use the .45 then .44 and then a couple of 500 rounds. The gun they talk about after is always the 500. But, you don't need to shoot expensive ammo at targets. Get some cheap, well ,I mean inexpensive stuff to practice with. Unless you reload and you might....go for some HSM ammo in the 3000 grain, very easy to shoot. Good luck and most of all HAVE FUN!!!
RobsTV
Member
Congrats on your new 500! Glad to see you weren't scared off by all the hype.
I must have a defective 500, or perhaps the compensator works very well? Recoil is good, but nothing that would stop anyone from shooting several cylinders of 350grain bullets chrono'd at 1600fps. I've seen people say they shot their 500 one time and sold it because it was too much to handle. Huh? This too was my first revolver, and for comparison, I shot a friends 44 magnum that same day. The 44 magnum had around the same amount of kick, probably due to the 1.5 lb weight savings the 44 magnum has over the 8 3/8" 500..
While the 500 is a beast, it's myth is much larger than reality, at least with 350 grain slugs. I'm sure the 440 grain or larger slugs would be a handful. But you don't have to shoot any of the heavier rounds unless you really want to.
For target shooting at a covered outdoor range, it is both a blast and a curse. Some will complain about the noise or being hit by something everytime you shoot, so you quickly learn to switch to a quiet gun after every cylinder full, so that other nearby shooters can shoot comfortably. The whiners do get annoying.
Here is a photo of my 51 year old wife shooting the 500. Wow, she did not drop dead or break any body parts, and she wants to shoot it again.... I always do require anyone that wants to shoot it to watch several YouTube videos first, just so they can see the worst that happened to some, mainly so they hold on tight. Never anyone complaining that it was too much gun.
I must have a defective 500, or perhaps the compensator works very well? Recoil is good, but nothing that would stop anyone from shooting several cylinders of 350grain bullets chrono'd at 1600fps. I've seen people say they shot their 500 one time and sold it because it was too much to handle. Huh? This too was my first revolver, and for comparison, I shot a friends 44 magnum that same day. The 44 magnum had around the same amount of kick, probably due to the 1.5 lb weight savings the 44 magnum has over the 8 3/8" 500..
While the 500 is a beast, it's myth is much larger than reality, at least with 350 grain slugs. I'm sure the 440 grain or larger slugs would be a handful. But you don't have to shoot any of the heavier rounds unless you really want to.
For target shooting at a covered outdoor range, it is both a blast and a curse. Some will complain about the noise or being hit by something everytime you shoot, so you quickly learn to switch to a quiet gun after every cylinder full, so that other nearby shooters can shoot comfortably. The whiners do get annoying.
Here is a photo of my 51 year old wife shooting the 500. Wow, she did not drop dead or break any body parts, and she wants to shoot it again.... I always do require anyone that wants to shoot it to watch several YouTube videos first, just so they can see the worst that happened to some, mainly so they hold on tight. Never anyone complaining that it was too much gun.
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Kilibreaux
Member
The beauty of the .500 is you have the ability to load your own from mild to wild (as an above poster stated). Heavy hardcast slugs at decent speed will extract the steam from any animal on earth - bust through bone and vaporize tissue. The .500 is everything the .44 is taken to an order of magnitude greater. With any OTHER caliber if you're headed into dangerous animal territory you MUST think in terms of maximum loads, but with the .500, "mid-range" exceeds them all!
While you may be new to big-bore revolvers you are clearly not new to weapons of mass destruction...the .500 is a PERFECT first revolver choice!
While you may be new to big-bore revolvers you are clearly not new to weapons of mass destruction...the .500 is a PERFECT first revolver choice!
DonD
Member
After shooting .500 Mags for 9 yrs, I'm somewhat bemused that I hadn't noticed differences in muzzle blast before.
I shot my 8 3/8" original style yesterday. Used some "plinking" loads with Trail Boss, some mid range loads with H4227 and then some medium heavy loads with Lil Gun, the latter two with 385 gr hard cast slugs.
The plinking loads were, of course, mild and I wear double ear protection. The H4227s louder and deeper, the Lil Gun loads sounded more like a big bore rifle.
Always fun to see the large quantities of dirt fly at the backstop. Unfortunately, haven't had access to a stream I enjoyed about 40 yrs ago. It was so narrow and the sides so deep and steep that shooting into it was safe from ricochet. The mud that flew and the water geysers the .44 Mag I had at the time produced were very entertaining. Would love to replicate that with the .500s. Don
I shot my 8 3/8" original style yesterday. Used some "plinking" loads with Trail Boss, some mid range loads with H4227 and then some medium heavy loads with Lil Gun, the latter two with 385 gr hard cast slugs.
The plinking loads were, of course, mild and I wear double ear protection. The H4227s louder and deeper, the Lil Gun loads sounded more like a big bore rifle.
Always fun to see the large quantities of dirt fly at the backstop. Unfortunately, haven't had access to a stream I enjoyed about 40 yrs ago. It was so narrow and the sides so deep and steep that shooting into it was safe from ricochet. The mud that flew and the water geysers the .44 Mag I had at the time produced were very entertaining. Would love to replicate that with the .500s. Don
Shot 10 rounds today. that the most the guy at the in door range will let me shot. got a nices feel for here and boy was it fun. cant wait to shot it agen. my shoots werewere center but it was alittle low. so i need more time at the range. i love this gun!!!
les strat
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+1000. Very cool gun for bear protection. Not at all for SD. For hunting, I'd want at least 5" or more. Still a cool hand cannon though!
jtcarm
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+1. You're obviously an experienced shooter, but starting off with a hand cannon can give you a flinch that's hard to break.
There's plenty of stories of .44 magnums being bought for next to nothing with a box of ammo less 6 rounds
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