Good evening,
After being on a product notification list for nearly two years, I was finally able to order one of the last few available 5.5" .38 Special Cimarron 1860 Richards-Mason Type 2 conversions
It should arrive here in a few days, but the one singular thing I would absolutely *love* to change is the backstrap and trigger guard. On every original example I have seen, they all appear to be brass, not steel. Am I misunderstanding the use of brass on the original models? I'm not going for 100% historical accuracy, but the brass just looks right in my eyes.
How much of a pain is it to swap these parts out? When I had a few cap and ball pistols in the past, I tried to swap out pieces here and there and things just flat out didn't line up. One side would be very proud of the other, and there wouldn't be enough material on the opposite... It was irritating to say the least.
Currently I have three other "cowboy" pistols, a Uberti 1858 that I have done nothing with but smooth out the burrs, a Pietta made four click Cimarron frontier that I swapped out springs on, and a "old model" Uberti Cattleman that I swapped out the hammer for a four click unit and changed the grips out for a set of repro "double eagle" grips. The grips were, quite frankly, a royal pain to fit but it turned out ok. I'm not incompetent with these guns, but should I expect to have to order a new grip as well and fit it to the frame? I get that Pietta parts don't work with Uberti, but are Cimarron open top replacement parts plug and play?
These pistols sure look sharp as-is, but IMO if they came with brass like the Uberti 1851 conversions they would be just about perfect.
Thanks in advance for any and all help.