Cimarron Thunderball Review

[OD#3]

I keep hearing about how Pietta has really gotten their act together with the GWII and that they now rival Uberti.  I had to see for myself.  I picked up a Cimarron Thunderball.  It isn't a GWII, but it is a Pietta.  When I was trying to research these, pictures were few and far between, so I'm hoping my review may help some people.

First off, this is a handsome revolver.  I know it is a fantasy configuration, but I like it, and first impressions were good.  Lockup was rock solid with NO wiggle, and endshake was nonexistent.  Action was smooth, timing was good, and trigger was ATROCIOUS!

 



This is no 1st gen copy.  The trigger guard is thick and has no bevels.





Gaps were evident in the grip fitment, but I figured that I was getting what I paid for, which was not very much.



The zero-wiggle lockup was probably contributed to--in part--by the obvious abuse this revolver had suffered.  Although new from the factory, most of the cylinder stop notches looked like this.  It was as if someone had let the bolt drop past the notch and then spun the cylinder backward until the bolt slammed into the notch from the other side and peened it--at least six times.  Or someone had tried to see how fast and hard they could cock it.  Regardless, these notches were banged up a bit.



I was wondering why some of the reviews of this revolver referred to it as the "Thunderball 8".  I had no clue what the "8" meant until I saw what looks like an ordnance bomb in the rollmark that I'm sure some people mistake for the number 8.



Deep cast checkering on the hammer that looks rough and pebbly up close but is actually quite handsome and feels pretty good.



Stainless steel is known for its sticky machining qualities, and most machined areas left unpolished were very rough-looking.  Although I appreciated that they didn't polish the sight groove.





I really like the cylinder bevels--much heavier than on my Uberti.



Again, there were a few gaps that shouldn't be there.



And I don't know what the purpose of this circumferential groove is on the base pin.  I've never seen that before.



This Pietta is an improvement over my Uberti in the machining contours of the inside of the frame.  Although it is rougher-looking in some areas, I think this has more to do with the machining qualities of the stainless than Pietta's work.  I'd be interested in seeing some pics of others' staiinless Ubertis.  But I really like the inclusion of the recoil plate/firing pin bushing, the shape of the hand slot, and the bevel beside the loading gate shaft--I had to bevel that edge myself on the Uberti.









The "removable" cylinder bushing appears to be staked in place.  I've not seen that before.



And it doesn't go all the way to the ratchet teeth like I expected it to.  I don't know how "correct" this is though.  I was happy to see the chamber entrances slightly chamfered.



Narrowed mainspring.  I prefer Pietta's hand plunger arrangement to Uberti's.  That tiny setscrew is very hard to start and easy to lose on the Uberti.  The Pietta spring is just retained by the backstrap.





Pressed-in hammer cam.  I don't know if this cam is hardened or not, though.  It could be hardened steel left in the white, or it could be hardened stainless, or it could just be a separate cam that isn't any harder than the integral cam on the Uberti.  But...it is more authentic this way.



Good looking hand and bolt.  I thought these looked better than the ones on my Uberti.






I found the reason for the truly awful trigger pull.  This is one of the roughest-looking sear surfaces I've ever seen.



I'm not sure what I'm going to do about that.  This will require more than a little smoothing.  I'm afraid that the amount of metal needing to be removed may mess up the timing too much.  As it is, the bolt drops into the notch right at full cock.  It is probably going to be undertimed a little bit if I stone this.



And this is the absolute worst job of mating the backstrap with the trigger guard that I've ever seen.  It looks like they didn't get them lined up before drilling the screw hole.  I'm not set up to drill out a larger hole and re-thread for a larger screw.  I've just had to blend them some with a file and live with the resulting gap that will be left in the grip.  Truly awful fit here!





Overall, my impression of this Pietta is mixed.  I appreciate the more authentic parts like the firing pin bushing, the pressed-in hammer cam, and the ejector rod barrel stud (not shown)--my Uberti ejector rod screw just screws into a threaded hole in the barrel instead of the Pietta's more correct stud.  I suspect that some of the issues with this revolver have to do with its stainless construction, which probably doesn't lend itself as well to clean machining and long-term wear-resistance.  And I actually am in the minority by not minding the method that Pietta uses to machine the stop notches on the base pin.  They make it a little harder to line up, but they would absolutely keep the base pin from clocking and wallowing out the frame holes. 

I have no idea how the mis-aligned gripstraps made it past inspection, why someone on the line thought it a good idea to abuse the cylinder stop notches, or why Pietta considered a stepped surface to be ideal for the sear nose.  I spent hours with needle files tediously cleaning up the cylinder notches, but I don't know if I'll address the sear nose before test-firing or not.  I'll post a range report later.  I have to make more ammo, since I used up the old stuff testing the Uberti.  I do have to say, though, that this is a handsome-looking revolver.  I hope it shoots well.

[OD#3]

Well, I accomplished two more things.  First, a good friend on another board lent me some tools awhile back, and I got out the universal stoning fixture and fixed the sear.  It went from this....



To this....



The trigger pull improvement was dramatically improved, and it didn't affect the timing enough to matter.

However...I did figure out how the bolt notches got so screwed up.  My timing checks earlier were done with a little drag on the cylinder to check carry-up; I had only cocked it freely a couple of times.  Evidently, Pietta didn't fit the hand very well, as it offers no control during rotation to prevent over-rotation.  By that I mean that when the first step of the hand starts to rotate the cylinder, the cylinder can freewheel too easily and will often rotate with its own momentum well beyond the cylinder stop notch.  If cocked very slowly or with a finger dragging along the cylinder, the second step carries the cylinder properly and the bolt pops up in the correct position of the leade. 

So now I get to investigate what causes that.  I don't know if it is the first step that is supposed to control free-wheeling, and if perhaps the bevel on the nose is too deep, or if the second step is to blame.  It isn't the height of the two; the carry-up timing and presentation of the chambers in the loading gate at half-cock are close to perfect.

[OD#3]

Okay, it isn't the fitment of the hand.  Its the hand slot in the frame; it wasn't cut far forward enough, so the hand doesn't protrude forward enough for bottom of the top step to provide any retardation of the cylinder.  Usually, when one puts a SAA on half cock, the bottom of the top step of the hand acts as a camming surface against the curved surface of the top of the ratchet below it.  If you put your SAA on half cock and rotate the cylinder until it almost clicks, you can let go of the cylinder and this camming action will usually spring the cylinder backwards again until it stops.  It is this pressure which acts as a brake and keeps the cylinder from freewheeling forward.  My new Pietta doesn't do this, and I didn't realize what was wrong until I compared it to my Colt.  The two are machined in the same way, and the contours of the hands are nearly identical.  But the hand on the Pietta wasn't protruding nearly as far as the one on my Colt.  The web of steel in the recoil shield just below the hand is much thicker on my Pietta than on the Colt, preventing the hand from springing forward as much as it needs to. 

Fixing this is slow-going.  I'm using needle files with safe sides to avoid widening the slot, but progress is very slow.  I'll post an update when/if I get this thing running right.

[Advertising]

[Major 2]

a shot of my Cimarron / Uberti Model P, Stock #MP4502, Single Action Army in Stainless Steel.

Note the bushing , Fit & finish overall is excellent

[OD#3]

I'd forgotton about yours.  That machining looks so much better.  One of my earlier pics, when the hammer was at half-cock, illustrates my problem.  See where the tip of the hand is compared to where it should be?

[Major 2]

Not to mislead ... my gun has been run through Long hunters

I have an invoice , claims  action & springs , Hammer & bushing work , polish & forcing cone @ 11°,

It is a 2014 date code , and a beauty ... won it on GB with my opening bid ... one guy tried to snipe me but missed the 15 min. rule.