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Tall Tales / Re: May we move on, for coffee and chat ?
« Last post by Niederlander on May 01, 2024, 09:31:02 PM »We're having a bit of a thunderstorm here in central Nebraska. Not much rain from it, but I love the thunder and lightning!
Mako, are you sure Colt actually marked any guns .44-40 in the 1800s? I'm aware of the Colt Frontier Six Shooter barrel markings and the little. 44CF mark sometimes found on the trigger guard, but I didn't think Colt marked any 1st gen SAAs .44-40. But I'm not terribly experienced and am mostly parroting those who know more.Jim,
Dave,
Marlin got their first patent for a lever action rifle in 1879. Colt's had been producing "Frontier Six Shooter" that were marked .44-40 two years previous to that. I'm sure Marlin didn't want the 44 WCF, but Colt's already had given the cartridge a second name in 1877. Ids there some earlier Marlin in .44-40 that I am not aware of?
~Mako
I went through some of my old paper references. The .38 Long was introduced in 1875. It was avalable as both a heeled bullet with a 0.879 case (130 gr bullet 15 gr BP 770 fps) and as an internally lubed bullet with a 1.017" case (150 gr bullet 18 grain BP 770 fps) both with the same overall length (1.324").Frisco,
The 1878 UMC catalog lists the 38 Short adapted to Colt's B.L. Police Revolver and the 38 Long adapted to Colt's Navy Revolver. Both are heeled, C.F. cartridges. The 38 short had a 0.765" case.
My guess is that only Colt produced the internally lubed bullet and UMC produced the heeled bullet, hence the differentiation between the .38 Long and .38 Long (Colt's). This would fit in with Colt and the .41 cartridge used in the Thunderer. It was rifled for the heeled cartridge, but Colt stopped production of the heeled cartridge and only produced the internally lubed version for it.
Mako,Dave,
I had a LEO friend (he was with the PD, I was with the SO) who called the 40 S&W the "38-40 Short, Straight, Rimless, Smokeless". Try stamping that on your duty weapon...lol.
As for the 44-40 designation, I read somewhere that name came from Marlin when they introduced their new short action lever rifle in that chambering. There was no way they were going to stamp "44 WCF" on their rifles/carbines so they came up with the 44-40 name. They even loaded their version with 215g bullets, not the 200g RNFP of the Winchester cartridge. I did in fact read that in a real book, not on the Wicki thing. (smile)
Dave