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The heart of the gun - and the reason for its prominence - is the distinct stepped cylinder. This, along with better metallurgy allowed for a true 44 caliber belt pistol. The Colt 1860’s stepped cylinder and frame. Like the original, the gun weighs only two pounds, 12 ounces - just over half the weight of the Colt Dragoons the gun replaced in service.
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The gun boasts a feel, look, and operation like the original. When I received my Uberti Colt from Taylors & Company, I was struck at the build quality. Quite a few original Colt pistols are still out there to be owned and shot, but for the money a good replica by Uberti is the best bang for your buck. 44 caliber killing power, made more cheaply than before all while being half the weight of the previous Colt Dragoon pistols then in Army service. Throw in a more efficient rack and pinion loading lever and a more economical round barrel and you had a pistol that boasted the Colt Navy’s carry ability with. Slap on a 44 caliber barrel and you suddenly have a belt carry-able. First up, a belt size 44 caliber pistol was on the agenda, but where to start?Ĭolt found their way by taking the 1851 Navy grip frame and cutting it for a Navy cylinder belled out at the end for a. Colt was among the first to harness one of the new steels - silver steel - to produce firearms. This a complicated process, worthy of its own article, but the skinny is that steel manufacturing suddenly got cheaper and easier. The Bessemer process was soon to change all that, using air to remove iron impurities. The Uberti Colt 1860 revolver with some loose components. These handguns could not be carried on a belt and had to be carried on pommel holsters on a horse’s saddle.
#Colt 2nd generation black powder revolver series
Colt found success with their 1851 Navy, a belt sized gun in 36 caliber, but the large 44 caliber bore required by the US Army at the time for use on both horses and men could only be contained by very large handguns, like the five pound Colt Walker and the only slightly lighter Colt Dragoon series of handguns. Colt’s revolvers of that time were made of wrought iron, which had obvious pressure limits.
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BackgroundĬolt’s 1860 Army revolver owes itself in large part to metallurgical technology advancing at speed in only the previous ten years. The American Civil War (1861-65) was just around the corner. The adoption could not have come at a worse time, as South Carolina left the Union in that year. For that we have to rewind to 1860 with the adoption of the then brand new Colt 1860 Army pistol - a 44 caliber percussion revolver that was space-age compared to its predecessors. In the spirit of the Army’s recent adoption of the Sig P320 automatic pistol, I decided to take a look at one of the United States’ first service handguns. The gun world takes notice when the US military adopts a new firearm, particularly when it comes to new service pistols.