I just picked up my new Cimarron 1873 Short rifle in .45 Colt yesterday I ordered it through my smith/ FFL. First off when we unboxed it at the smiths shop, he immediately noticed a very small hairline crack in the stock, where the straight grip meets the receiver on the left side. We’re not sure it goes all the way through, but he’s gonna call and see if he can’t get a new stock shipped out to him. So we’re gonna have to see where that leads. That being said, the fit&finish is flawless. It’s a brand new gun, so it’s stiff, but last night while watching Lonesome Dove 😁 I kept working the action, and it’s a lot smoother now. I ran some .45 Colt snap caps through her a bunch of times and the loading gate is getting smoother as well., and she cycled those snap caps really really good, and I can’t believe how fast it cycles, so I think I’ll make my COAL the same as the snap caps. She’s got a heavy trigger, I measured the pull weight and it’s consistently 7 1/2 lbs! It’s heavy but still a good trigger, there’s no creep, and it breaks clean. I just slugged the barrel, the actual measurement is .4505, so figure .451, I’ll size my cast boolits to .453, that should work pretty well.
I’ll tell ya’lll it’s one purdy un, that’s for sure, I’ve wanted a 73 for a very long time, and aside from the stock issue that I have no doubt will get worked out, I’m pretty impressed with the rifle.
Paul