629 Mountain Revolver presented to my grandson

[ezekiel38]

Last December with the help of 2 Dogs and Scott I sent a tired 629-2 to Karl Sokol at Chestnut Sports in Vermont for a rebuild to the action and appearance of the weapon. The gun was going to be given to my grandson Isaiah as he likes to fish in the high mountain lakes and streams of northern Idaho and Montana. Thought it would serve him better than his flypole as that is the only protection he has been carrying here in the Rockies. The Revolver has come back from Karl and it is a great firearm to pass on to a wonderful, mature grandson of 22 years. Many thanks to all that assisted, especially to Karl as he did "due diligence" to the revolver. Leather for the 629 will wait until we can determine what he prefers. Until then it is loaner cowhide.

My grandson was given the revolver today, but we are entering a training program on marksmanship. decision making and animal behavior. As a bonus he wants to learn how to reload! Enjoy the pic!

[bigbrowndog]

Very nice, gesture on your part.
One I’m sure he’ll appreciate.

Trapr

[nolongcolt]

Good deal, looks like he has the hands to handle that monsta'.

[mk70ss]

Well done sir.

[paul105]

Great gift for a fine young man. A gift I'm sure he will cherish for a long time. As mk70ss said, well done!

Paul

[bula]

Am glad to see that this came to be. Remember you bringing it up some months ago. A 5wt may be lethal to brookies and cutts but won't impress a bear ! Had an incident with a grizzly sow and cubs well up in the 'Bob in the early '80's. One of the reasons I pack. 

[ezekiel38]

Thanks for the nice comments, starting to work on a curriculum for this grandson to work through so that he will have a true appreciation for the weapon and the responsibilities of carrying it.

Going through my load book I realized I don't have any target, plinker type loads to shoot in 44 Mag brass. My lowest stuff is 950-1000 fps that make up 90% of my shooting with 44s.. Looking for some neophyte loads for this cartridge case. 180-210 grain in the 7-800 range loads would be greatly appreciated. My grandson has only shot a handgun once before in his life, ten years ago.

I think he and I will do a hunter safety course for starters, and look at other forms of formal firearms instruction that doesn't involve anything AR or plastic fantastic.

[bigbrowndog]

8.0 gr of Unique with that light of a bullet should give you close to those results.

Trapr

[matt56]

I have loaded up to 12.0 grains of unique under a 210 gr gold dot. This load gets me 1200fps from my 4" model 69. It's a very manageable mid range 44 mag load and my choice when carrying the 69

[jfs]

The photo say`s it all.......

[Fowler]

Start mild, 5.5 or 6.0 gr W231 and a commercial cast 250gr bullet will go 750-800 fps and let him learn to love the gun before going to any stiff loads. The old 10gr of Unique and a 250gr bullet is a fine load but still and handful to the inexperienced handgunner. He has a lifetime to build up to full power loads, he should treat that gun as a 44sp for the first few years...

[rjm52]

...much better than a 9mm when it comes to bear....

I've been to Karl's shop twice..a real nice guy. He put a set of sights on one of my Combat Commanders. Also bought a 57 4" from a friend who had the action tuned by Karl...was very smooth. I sold it to another friend who still has it and loves it...

Here is a commercial caster who has HP bullets for .44s at very reasonable prices.

www.gtbullets.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=8

I had three 629 MGs at one time and my favorite self-defense load was a duplicate of the Speer 200 grain Gold Dot HP Short Barrel Load that ran 1080 fps... 10.0 of 231 ran right at factory velocity. I would imagine 9.0 of Unique would do about the same with the 190 grain cast HP that this dealer sells. Loads are in the Speer #14 Manual.

Mackay Sagebrush only uses two loads for most his .44 shooting... 8.5 and 10.0 grains of Unique with a home cast 240 Keith or 190 WC. 8.5 for target work and 10.0 for business...

Great to see young guys with revolvers instead of plastic...

Bob

[bula]

Downloading a short barreled 44mag is something I'm getting ready to do myself with a 4" M69 here. I've been using nom weight JHP on 10grs of CFE-P. Shown as a starting load in one of my manuals. Your going to want more volume for the young man, and cast bullets. This seems to be a good place to talk about deepseating. A Thompson type SWC, seated up over the shoulder seems to make a lot of sense. Wish I could give you charge weights of several suitable powders but I can't. I have some PC'd 237gr SWC's that I'm looking to deepseat over Power Pistol for the summers fun, myself. Hopefully Mr Bradshaw will visit this thread. Deepseating, and 4" N frames are old friends of his ! If lighter yet, next to gallery loads your wish, Matt;s has a 135gr bullet that is really just a round ball with a flat base added. Several folks cast 180-185gr FWc  or DEWC's. 

[bula]

The Dec.'14 issue of Handloader has 3 articles of info for short barreled 44's. If the deepseating thing doesn't interest you, think Trail Boss powder a good option then. 

[ezekiel38]

Thanks to you all and especially to Fowler and bula. Been ruminating on this and I'm going to start him with an old 5.5" 22 Target Ruger SA with five in the magazine and get some fundamentals down. Then "gallery or cowboy action" loads to break him in on the 44. Trailboss sounds like a good go to powder for that big 44 case.

As a side note, found a 100 235 grain GC 44s that Isaiah's great grandfather cast about 10 years ago, when he gets ready to shoot that bullet I'm going to let him load them and then shoot them.

This project becomes more fun day by day!