Post by treborsnave on Apr 15, 2020 21:40:15 GMT -5
I've been reading posts on the board for the last couple of days; I haven't been hanging out here very much for the last few years. Working at home gives me time to play catch-up. I thought I'd post a write-up on my NM 45 Colt. I guess you could call it a "semi-custom" but perhaps "owner modified" or "work in progress" would be better.
It was shipped to Missoula, MT in 1994, and as I recall I paid the hefty sum of $285 for it, new in the box. I found when I took it to the range that it printed about a foot high at 25 yards, even with the rear sight screwed down as far as it would go without locking up the cylinder. I shot over a couple of deer with it before putting it in the back of the vault. I finally got disgusted and decided it needed to be fixed or sold. Daddy always told me to never sell a gun, so fix it. I sent the cylinder off to have the throats reamed out, and then drove to Butte one winter day so Bob Munden could give it an action job. He was kind enough to take me back to the shop and let me watch and talk while he did the work. I don't know if it was the cylinder ream or the new forcing cone Mr. Munden cut, but next trip to the range found me scrambling for a screwdriver as now it shot low! A side effect of the trigger job is that it'll only set off Federal primers so I've been thinking about trying a new mainspring to get a little of that reliability back. As you can see, somewhere in there I put a Super Blackhawk hammer and a Belt Mountain base pin on. The grips came from pvtschultz but they're a lot more golden colored than in the picture. I had one of those Qualite brass grip frames on it but it never fit right so went back to the aluminum; I've been following the new brass grip frame thread pretty closely!
About the only thing left to do is a black powder chamfer on the cylinder, and to burn some powder. Weather's supposed to be nice this weekend, maybe I'll break isolation and go to the range!
Who else has a gun that just ain't quite right, yet?
It was shipped to Missoula, MT in 1994, and as I recall I paid the hefty sum of $285 for it, new in the box. I found when I took it to the range that it printed about a foot high at 25 yards, even with the rear sight screwed down as far as it would go without locking up the cylinder. I shot over a couple of deer with it before putting it in the back of the vault. I finally got disgusted and decided it needed to be fixed or sold. Daddy always told me to never sell a gun, so fix it. I sent the cylinder off to have the throats reamed out, and then drove to Butte one winter day so Bob Munden could give it an action job. He was kind enough to take me back to the shop and let me watch and talk while he did the work. I don't know if it was the cylinder ream or the new forcing cone Mr. Munden cut, but next trip to the range found me scrambling for a screwdriver as now it shot low! A side effect of the trigger job is that it'll only set off Federal primers so I've been thinking about trying a new mainspring to get a little of that reliability back. As you can see, somewhere in there I put a Super Blackhawk hammer and a Belt Mountain base pin on. The grips came from pvtschultz but they're a lot more golden colored than in the picture. I had one of those Qualite brass grip frames on it but it never fit right so went back to the aluminum; I've been following the new brass grip frame thread pretty closely!
About the only thing left to do is a black powder chamfer on the cylinder, and to burn some powder. Weather's supposed to be nice this weekend, maybe I'll break isolation and go to the range!
Who else has a gun that just ain't quite right, yet?
