WB
Huey made me think...
Thursday, October 24, 2019, 20:14

I made my own .44-40 Win. revolver. Long ago I read where this guy in G&A did it, the "Western style" writer. I thought he was kookie. Back then very few late guns were available in .44-40 if you really wanted to shoot it. I wondered why back then in the late 1970's.

All he did was ream out a .44 Mag. cyl. to .44-40. Mentioned something about the chamber throats, blah, blah...

So some 35 yrs. later I embark on the same venture. It was on a spare .44 cyl. I acquired and fitted myself. I also rented a "piloted" reamer with 0.430" floating end bushing. I did it as right as one could. My real trick is during reloading, I sort of neck size and bump the shoulder just a touch so not to overwork the brass and get a reasonable fit compromising plunk and headspace in the chamber. That's why my loaded rounds are not as pronounced "necked" as factory. The bullets are .430", these actually 330 gr. TC at 1200 fps.

The Super Blackhawk gun was built in the mid 1980's. I like the SBH spur hammer and grooved trigger, but not the Dragoon style trigger guard and longer funky grip they have. I have both the custom .44-40 cyl. and original .44 Spec./Mag. cyl. Makes a very pleasing revolver touching many fun points that mean a lot to me. I can shoot some fun rounds from it. GNR customized the cylinder for me. The gun was a SSK priss job. Action, re-blue, and some parts satin chrome, with a mag-na-port and RR front insert sight. I didn't like it so I fitted a shorter stainless BH gripframe and some real stainless parts and pins. Also a "bullseye" ejector rod. Still need a custom cyl. pin from Kellye, maybe GNR has them. I think the grips were from that "Bearpaw" fellow Taffin speaks of on occasion. It pushes several personal buttons, like Huey's does him.

Some ammo I seat oddly to distinguish it from .45 Colt or .44 Mag. at a glance. Sometimes I forget to.

Both cylinders mic at 1.173" O.D., also both bolt cuts mic an average of 0.048 (.44-40) and 0.050" (.44 Mag.) deep cuts. The cuts are not EXACTLY in the center of the chambers. My .44-40 cylinder shows about 0.086" thick at it's thinnest point of the chamber. The .44 Mag. is 0.089" thick. The difference on both is within 0.001" by my measuring at 0.038-0.039" thick factoring the bolt cut dept from the cyl. thickness (which as I said is not exactly correct). Not sure what that means but it is what it is. I think I remember a .45 Colt I had was around 0.025" at that measurement. FWIW.

My other projects are focused on the .38-40, .401 Herters, .401 GNR, 10mm, and .40 S&W. I'd wager the .38-40 was very close to the .44 WCF measurements. Ditto the .401 GNR and .44 Mag. It's fun to speculate anyway.