They were and are excellent DA/SA pistols and it's a shame as today they'd easily be $1000+ as you actually have to machine metal instead of pressing a button and injection molding hundreds of frames at a time.
I'm gonna suggest a used Chief's special
Thanks. Funny enough, pretty sure Pierce Brosnan wore a Galco Exec in one of his movies too. I looked at it too, but it didn't have enough stability points, and fits more like a traditional shoulder holster with only one loop over the shoulder. It also clips to the pants, and I like that my shirt or jacket can ride up and you can't see anything attached to my waist.
“Tomorrow Never Dies”
I'm really curious how the threaded portion was added. That entire upper is the barrel IIRC (not a separate barrel press-fit into the chunk). Did they leave extra material on the billet and machine the threads into it or weld the threaded piece on after? The finishes are different so I suspect it's welded on after.
I would be lying if I said I wasn't intrigued by acquiring a third gen Smith currently. Those that have them or had them recently: how difficult was it to get reliable magazines and spare parts for them?
$1000+ would be fine if they marketed it as a premium defense, target and competition pistol. abandon the notion of police and military sales.
looks like numrich has most small parts in stock and aftermarket mags are available. factory mags are expensive.
Welding an extension on wouldn't be the way to do it. Previously what you'd do is bore out the tip of the barrel to an oversize, thread it, and screw a stepped threaded extension into it which is then reamed to be concentric to the existing barrel. The barrel is all one piece, yes, but they probably just leave excess material on the front like the long barrel variants and either thread mill the extension or chuck the breech end of the barrel in a lathe and cut threads on the extension. Yeah, the finish looks different, but the machine finish of the threaded portion is going to be different so it could all be the same process and just looks different where the metal has a smoother finish. I haven't put hands on one so I couldn't tell you what kind of coating it is.
You're probably right about it being a threaded plug. Probably straight 49/64"-20. However I'm pretty sure the 10" and 14" barrels were both a single milled piece. At least I can't find any seams:
Yeah, they're one piece. What I was saying was that the blanks just have extra material on the front similar to a long barrel blank, not that the long barrels are two piece. That would be very difficult to do safely. Your aftermarket threaded insert to convert an old short barrel Deagle to threaded would have an ID slightly larger than the groove diameter of the barrel itself. The reason you'd shoulder/step the insert would be so that with it seated (torqued fully) it isn't bottoming out on what is the new barrel crown, recessed into the front of the part. If you were to bottom it out inside instead of on the face of the whole thing, you could distort the ID of the barrel itself.
Unrelated but the way Chiappa fused the barrel on the Rhino leaving that ugly seam always pissed me off.
I noticed that pattern
For $250 a Made in Brazil J frame clone ain't too bad.
I used to collect the older 2nd gen versions since they were not as well-known as the 3rd gens and were usually cheaper depending on model. I used to have a 659 (all stainless pistol they all had in Reservoir Dogs), a 669 (same gun, just compact), a 439 (blued, not stainless, and single stack), and a NYPD trade in 5946 DAO made in S&W's old Houlton, Maine factory. out of all of them the 5946 was my favorite, with a reduced power hammer spring and Hogue checkered wood grips. Lighter spring brought the trigger pull down substantially.
Especially the 645 and the 4506, since the 645 and 4506 was used by Don Johnson in Miami Vice and Denzel Washington used two 4506s in Training Day. They are usually more expensive then the 5906s and almost as expensive as the competition/Target Champion/Team S&W 5906s.
Not to get too pedantic but since we're talking about the technical aspects of gun parts, that's just a barrel shroud and it is retained by a spanner nut on the muzzle (barrel nut). With sufficient machining quality it would be possible to make the seam a lot less visible but it would always be that way as it got dirty. The barrel itself is threaded into the frame similar to most other revolvers, it's just a three piece assembly of the barrel, nut and shroud vs the one piece barrels with the ejector rod shroud machined onto them as is typical on something like an old S&W. Some newer revolvers have a flange on the front of the barrel that retains the shroud and that's an inferior design to what Chiappa or Dan Wesson use with the barrel nut.
Lucky you - I just got an email that the gun is NOT under warranty, so I get to soak up the cost of the parts and need to spend however long it's going to take to rebuild the bolt in the hopes the damn thing will work. And for you folks in the gallery - replacement polished chrome magazines are $70 each. I'm just glad I didn't get the gold-plated model. And please, Akran, send me the exact info for the Steinel ammo - JHP or whatever bullet you used, bullet weight, grains (if applicable). These things are as difficult to feed as a kid with food allergies!
I was lucky enough to get a 5906 with a laser grip for five bills (plus all the Commifornia extortion fees). It's awesome. I want a 1006 (10 mm) - just because.
Magazines are easy - I walked into a gun store and found a MecGar. I don't know about other parts, and I don't really think it will need them. It's built like a tank. I knew someone (now deceased) with a very early model 59 and he never had a problem with it.
