The Colt Walker allowed Colt to rise from the ashes of his Patent Revolver Company, and in 1848 the new Colt’s first purely civilian revolver was the 1848 Pocket Model, known as the Baby Dragoon.

This was a (nominally) .31 caliber percussion revolver built on a small frame. These were provided in a variety of barrel-lengths and could be had with or without the loading-lever mounted under the barrel. They were instantly popular, and these new revolvers and their successors in 1850 (called the 1849 Model) included mechanical improvements that formed the basis for the famous 1851 Navy and 1860 Army models.

Some of these guns were later converted to fire metallic cartridges by gunsmiths, which were typically chambered in .32 Rimfire, but to the best of my knowledge Colt never did factory conversions of these guns.

Colt did produce cartridge versions of their Pocket Navy chambered in .38 Colt Short, and in modern times conversion kits for the .31-caliber reproductions were made that used the .32 S&W cartridge.

These were not exceptionally successful because (many?) .31-caliber percussion revolvers are actually .32 caliber (.320″) and .32 S&W are actually .31-caliber (.312″) Because of course they are. This meant that .32 S&W cartridges fired through the .320 bore often didn’t stabilize well, tended to be inaccurate and produced ‘keyhole’ hits.

When I decided to do my own conversion on an anonymous Italian reproduction I modelled it on the later Colt conversions and chambered it for .32 S&W. To measure the bore I forced an oversized soft-lead slug through the bore and measured it afterwards. The bore came out, as expected, at .320″. I planned on using hollow-base wadcutters to compensate for this; the skirt of the bullet would expand to fill the bore and engage the rifling.

From here I’ll tell the story with pictures-

I fired five shots over the chronograph and into the ballistic gel. They averaged 769 fps. and 118 ft./lbs at the muzzle, with an extreme spread of 36 fps. The bullets all penetrated very close to 13-1/2″ into the gel. I didn’t fire them through denim because, uh… I forgot to.

I’ll need to take it to the range for a good workout, but I’m pretty pleased with how it’s working out. I am going to mount the breech-ring on the breech with screws; very occasionally the breech-ring will move enough to momentarily bind the action.

The gun needed holster, of course. I modelled mine on the simple ‘gun-bucket’ style popular in the 1870s.

Addenda

This morning I fired the Remington Factory ammo into the gel. The bullet penetrated 10-1/2″ and wound up nose-forward. As you can see the rifling grooves are quite deep and plain. When measured the bullet had ‘bumped up’ to .320″. Apparently the very soft lead bullet works just fine, at least in the modified forcing cone of this gun. I’ll take it to the range and run some more rounds through it.

Michael Tinker Pearce, 28 January 2021

I have some handguns for specific purposes. I have a long-barreled .44 Magnum for hunting. I have a number of smaller guns for concealed-carry, and some just for recreational target shooting. Most of them aren’t quite as specialized as my Taurus Model 415 .41 magnum. That’s my, ‘Peeing-in-the-woods-oh-crap-is-that-a-bear?!’ gun.

There isn’t much chance I’m going to run into a dangerous animal in the woods while hunting, but it could happen. It makes sense to have a carry gun; something powerful enough to deal with an irritable or inquisitive Black Bear.

To be clear, this is not a ‘hunting handgun,’ it’s a sidearm to carry while hunting, just in case. IN Washington state a handgun used to hunt big game must have at least a 4″ barrel, so this one is right out of the running.

So, relatively small, only slightly larger and heavier than a S&W K-frame but firing a very powerful cartridge. Easy to carry, doesn’t get in the way too much… but it kicks hard. The stock grips do a pretty good job of making the recoil tolerable, but they are a bit ‘sticky,’ tending to grab clothing, and the squishiness of them isn’t ideal for control in rapid-fire. I made a set of custom grips, and while they impart excellent control they are painful with full-power loads. That’s a compromise I can live with; I mean, it’s not like I am going to care if I need to use it. But if I could come up with something better…

A couple of years ago a friend gave me a set of grips for a large-frame revolver for Christmas. Very fancy, with black enamel and mother-of-pearl inlays. I have a large hand, so these worked out nicely. Some time later I sold that gun, but I kept the grips. I mean, I was bound to get another gun they fit sooner or later.

I ran across those grips last night and thought, ‘I wonder…’ The thing is the Taurus is based on their Tracker revolvers, meaning it has a non-ergonomic grip-frame; one piece grips are slipped on over the frame and secured with a screw at the bottom of the grip. So they might fit, but they’d need some adaptation to secure them.

The solution was pretty simple; I cut some wood pieces and glued them into the grips to properly surround and secure the tang.

So, quite a good fit and provides a really nice grip. But it seemed out of place against the matte stainless finish of the gun. OK, that’s easy enough to solve; some buffing, some 3000-grit sandpaper and Flitz metal polish and the now-shiny gun looks much better with the grips.

So, How’s it Shoot?

Better than I do, but that’s not unusual. The large grips have done the trick; while recoil with full-power loads was not what I would call pleasant it wasn’t bad, and with .41 Special loads (210gr. LSWC @ 900 fps.) it was downright tame. I mean, relatively speaking. This gun consistently shoots high and right; I’m likely to modify the sights.

OK, But… Why?

Not many people will bother to work on a Taurus, and the reason is simple; they can be an iffy proposition. Quality control on Taurus has been… let’s call it whimsical. Generally the Model 85s are consistently good, and some of their new semi-auto pistols are well regarded. Others are catch-as-can; if you get a bad one it’s bad. If you get a good one it can be very good indeed. This irregularity has caused people to regard them, somewhat unfairly, as junk.

This is a good one. But leaving that aside the question remains; why spiff up a working gun like this? My response is, why not? Why shouldn’t I have a ‘fancy’ gun as a sidearm for hunting? I’m not stalking perps through dark alleys; it doesn’t matter if the gun is reflective or has fancy grips. If the gun is holstered the shiny bits are covered; if I need it the shininess is irrelevant.

Anyway, it’s my gun, it’s cool and I like it. Good enough.

Michael Tinker Pearce, 18 January 21