I thought of tacking this post onto my fairly lengthy NWMP Impression thread here in the Barracks, but I am excited enough to make it a new thread. In that NWMP thread I recently mentioned that I had an opportunity to acquire a Uberti Schofield, which I proposed to use as a stand-in for the more historically appropriate S&W Russian Model revolver, thirty of which the NWMP acquired and issued in 1874.
Well, life certainly does work in mysterious ways ... turned out that the Schofield had already been sold, although the dealer does have a Russian model in stock ... but it is nickel-plated (not terribly suitable for NWMP issue ... plus, I have never liked shooting nickel-plated revolvers as the sights "glare" too much for my old eyes)
and it is priced $300 higher than the Schofield!
Definitely needed to think about it ... although getting a Russian Model revolver was certainly tempting, the nickel plating and sizeable price difference were decidedly off-putting. On the other hand, Uberti top-break S&W models are relatively hard to come by in Canada ... a Google search will turn up a number of dealers with them listed, but almost invariably, when you get there you are met with the dreaded ""Not In Stock" ... and when you can track down listings of used revolvers they seem to invariably be "Sold" ...
While pondering this dilemma, I decided to run another Google search this evening and,
wonder of wonders, up popped a brand new private gun sale venue listing for a nice used Uberti Russian model - in my calibre of choice, .45 Colt!
Price is $350 less than the new Schofield and $650 less than the new Russian model from the dealer!
Needless to say, an
"I'll take it!" message was promptly dispatched ... my only fear now is that somebody else has beat me to it ...
One thing does strike me as somewhat odd about this particular revolver ... which you may have noticed in the above photo - namely that the extractor spring housing below the barrel is shorter than it should be on a true Russian Model (or a Schofield or most other early S&W models.) Mind you, in my online researches lately, I have seen a couple of other Uberti Russian Model revolvers exhibiting this characteristic ... and tonight I think I have figured it out: Uberti must have made some Russian Models using barrel assemblies for the No.3 Frontier model revolver -
Not a deal-breaker for me ... I do wonder if there were any such original "mix and match" revolvers back in the day? Anyone know?