1917 Smith and Wesson – The ExhaustNotes Blog

Diving Deeper: Two More .45 AutoRim Loads

By Joe Berk

This one is going to get a bit complicated and maybe a little bit long. Bear with me. I’ll do my best to make it interesting.

.An empty 45 AutoRim case. I was seeing blowby with both the 4.5-grain and 4.2-graini Bullseye loads. It didn’t seem to affect accuracy.

I tried two loads in this session. Both used the Xtreme plated 230-grain .451 roundnose bullet seated to an overall cartridge length of 1.260 inches, CCI 300 primers, R-P .45 AutoRim brass, and Bullseye powder. One load had 4.2 grains of Bullseye; the other had 4.5 grains. I shot 18 rounds of each flavor at targets 25 yards away, using a two-handed grip. I measured velocity using my Garmin chronograph. Four things were immediately apparent:

- - The 4.5-grain Bullseye load grouped much better than the 4.2-grain load.
  - Both loads were approximately 4.5 inches below the point of aim at 25 yards.
  - Recoil from the 4.5-grain Bullseye load was perceptibly higher than the 4.2-grain load.
  - The 4.5-grain Bullseye load velocities were significantly higher than the 4.2 grain load.

You can see the accuracy difference (and the fact that both groups shot low) in the two targets below:

A two-hand hold, 25-yard target with the 4.2 grain Bullseye load. This load was not too accurate, and it was about 4.5 inches low.

Another 25-yard target, with the 4.5 grain Bullseye load. The extra 0.3 grains of Bullseye tightened the group considerably.

Here’s what the chronograph data looked like:

Chronograph data for this blog. Only the last two rows are relevant; the top row is discussed in an earlier blog.

I wrote about the first data row in the above table in a previous blog (that load used a powder-coated 230-grain bullet loaded with 6.0 grains of Unique powder). The second and third data rows are the ones of interest in this blog. These two rows show the copper-plated roundnose Bullseye loads.

As I fired the loads for the two targets above, I kept an eye on the velocities and I thought I saw a decrease when shooting the first round through the sixth round in each cylinder. I wondered if this was due to bullet pull. That’s when the bullets pull forward in the case due to recoil (the bullet wants to stay put as the gun recoils). In extreme cases, the bullet can pull forward far enough such that it protrudes from the cylinder and interferes with cylinder rotation. I wasn’t seeing that, but I thought that what might be happening is the bullets were pulling forward a little bit with each shot and progressively increasing the case volume behind the bullet base. That would result in lower pressure and reduced velocity.

Bullet pull after firing 5 rounds in the same cylinder with the 4.5-grain Bullseye load. The crimp is a good one, but the Xtreme bullets are both slippery and soft.

I ran a test with each load to identify how much of this was occurring (see the table above). I loaded six rounds, fired five, and then removed the sixth round to measure the increase in cartridge overall length. The cartridge overall length prior to firing was 1.260 inches. After firing five rounds and pulling the sixth, with the 4.2-grain Bullseye load the cartridge length increased to 1.286 inches (the bullet had moved forward 0.026 inch due to recoil from the other five rounds). With the heavier recoil 4.5-grain Bullseye load, the sixth cartridge’s overall length increased to 1.291 inches (its bullet had moved forward 0.031 inch). As expected, the hotter load had resulted in slightly more bullet pull.

To further assess the external ballistic effects, I plotted velocity versus shot number for all 18 shots for both loads. I was expecting to see the velocity decrease as I fired each six round group, but the chronograph data and the x-y plot shown below didn’t show that. I then posted a trendline for each load, and they are essentially flat (actually, the trendline for the 4.5-grain Bullseye load shows the velocity increasing, but the increase is so slight it is probably not meaningful, and another 18-shot string might show the velocity trend to be flat or slightly negative). It was an interesting hypothesis, but the data didn’t support it.

I thought perhaps bullet pull was adversely affecting velocity. Not so; the velocities appear to be independent in each cylinder full of ammunition for both the 4.2-grain and 4.5-grain loads. The dotted lines are trendlines.

You might wonder: Could I increase the crimp a bit more and eliminate all bullet movement? Not with these bullets. The crimp is already pronounced and I’m still getting a bit of bullet pull. These are slippery bullets. I’ll live with what I’m getting, and the velocity data shows the small amount of bullet pull is inconsequential.

The front sight on my 1917 Smith and Wesson repop.

The front sight on an original 1917 Smith and Wesson revolver.

Let’s turn back to the subject of the gun shooting too low. We covered this in an earlier blog shooting lighter bullets. I found that I could hold the front sight higher in the rear sight, use the traditional 6:00 hold, and get decent results on target. I decided to leave the front sight alone. It is a real shark fin, but it is what the original 1917 front sight profile looks like. That got me to wondering: Did those original 1917 revolvers shoot low, too?

Several different approaches for reprofiling and lowering the original front sight on a 1917. To me, they all look wrong.

I think the answer is yes. I’ve never shot an original Smith and Wesson 1917 with hardball ammo (or any ammo, for that matter). But in poking around a bit on the Internet looking at photos of the original guns, I noted that some owners had modified their front sights to make them shorter (which would raise the point of impact). I suspect this was done for the same reason I considered doing it. Their guns were hitting too low. The modified 1917 front sights, however, don’t look right to my eye. I’m going to leave my front sight alone.

While pondering all this, I had another thought: When the 1917 revolvers were issued to soldiers in World Wars I and II, our soldiers were trained to shoot these handguns with one hand, like bullseye competition shooters still do. The two-handed Weaver hold that we use today didn’t come on the scene until the 1950s. I wondered if shooting one handed would shift the point of impact up. I think the answer is yes, because the muzzle flip would be more pronounced with a single-hand hold.

Because it was late at night when I was writing this blog, I couldn’t get to the range immediately to check this hypothesis. But I could ask Google and see what it had to say. Here’s the question I asked:

How much higher will a .45 ACP revolver shoot at 25 yards using a one-hand hold vs a two-hand hold?

Here’s how Google responded:

There is no single fixed number, as the shift depends on individual hand strength, gun weight, and bullet weight, but a .45 ACP revolver will typically impact 2 to 4 inches higher at 25 yards when fired one-handed versus two-handed. Because a bullet travels relatively slowly through the barrel—especially heavy, low-velocity .45 ACP rounds—the gun begins to recoil upward before the bullet exits the muzzle.

I read that and thought to myself: Duh. Well, yeah. Of course. I was surprised I didn’t tumble to that sooner.

I’m the kind of guy that has to pee on the electric fence to find out for himself, so the next day I went to my indoor range (it’s been too hot to shoot on the West End Gun Club’s outdoor range). I set up a target at the 50-foot line and fired a cylinder full with one hand to test my new-to-me (but obvious to probably everyone else) hypothesis.

I have to tell you: I haven’t shot bullseye pistol competition in decades, and holding the big Smith 1917 up with one arm, at arm’s length, was a challenge. The revolver was sashaying around like an exotic dancer in a room full of big tippers. But I heard Sergeant Major Hickman’s voice from 53 years ago: You’re not going to get it rock steady unless you’re dead. Just do your best, focus on the fundamentals, and let the fundamentals do the work. So that’s what I did, and son of a gun…

Not too shabby for an old guy. Sergeant Major Hickman would be proud.

The revolver still shoots a little low, but it’s close enough for government work. I may start shooting Bullseye-style again. It felt good. I’d like to get better at it.

1917 S&W Kentucky Windage

By Joe Berk

The Model 1917 saga continues. After looking for a variety of ways to replace the front sight with something shorter (the gun shoots low with most every load except the hardball government load, which is probably what these guns were regulated for), I found one in Dawson Sights. But it wouldn’t look authentic, and I wanted this pistol to look like the ones issued to the Army in World War I and II (the color case hardening, highly polished blue, and fancier grips notwithstanding).

My 1917 Smith and Wesson, with star clips, .45 ACP ammo, and 200-grain semi-wadcutters. Did I mention that I love shooting this revolver? It’s my Indiana Jones Special.

I was shooting my standard accuracy load for the 1911 (4.2 grains of Bullseye, and a 200-grain cast semi-wadcutter Missouri bullet). I used the star clips (I was shooting with .45 ACP brass, not AutoRim ammo).

Because the 1917 shot low, I thought about putting a line on the front sight, or painting it. I discarded that idea because paint on a front sight never lasts. Then I went with Elmer Keith’s recommendation: Just hold the front sight higher in the rear sight groove, and keep the target on the top of the front sight. That’s what I did.

A normal sight picture with a 6:00 hold. Note that the front sight is in sharp focus; the target and the rear sight are slightly blurred. Using this sight picture put the bullets from my 1917 several inches low.

My adjusted 1917 sight picture. I found that holding the front sight about 2/3 to 3/4 of its height higher within the rear sight (as you see here), and keeping the top of the front sight at 6:00 on the target (so as to not obscure the target) worked well.

Here’s my first target, shot at 45 feet, to sort of get things dialed in and to determine how much the front sight should exceed the rear sight.

Yep, my shots are all over the paper. I was experimenting with front sight height holdover to find the best sight picture.

The first two shots below the center bullseye (on the target above) made me realize I was subconsciously reverting to my old sight picture. I made a conscious effort to keep the front sight high, and I shot the remainder of my shots on the center bullseye and the red stickies. I took a little while to get used to the new sight picture.

The above target gave me a pretty good idea of what I needed to do with respect to the sight picture. The upper 2/3 to 3/4 of the front sight needs to be above the top of the rear sight, and the top of the front sight needs to be at 6:00. I moved a new target to 30 feet and shot the next group (with 18 shots). I think 10 yards is a good distance for dialing in a combat handgun.

Yep, that works. Notwithstanding the two shots that went high (my fault entirely), with the new sight picture I could put my shots where I wanted them to go.

All the above were shot single action. I may try shooting some double action on my next outing. This is a big gun, though, and I think double action shooting won’t be too easy.

You might wonder: Why does the gun not shoot to point of aim with a standard sight picture? Keep in mind that this was a gun designed to shoot military hardball ammunition as an expedient during World War I. That’s a 230-grain full metal jacket moving at about 830 feet per second. I found (see my earlier blog) that when shooting a comparable reload (a 230-grain cast roundnose bullet with 5.6 grains of Unique), this revolver shoots just about to point of aim at 10 yards using a standard sight picture. That’s what the gun was designed for. With a different load (such as the one described above), the point of impact will shift (as it did for me).

I’m going to leave the revolver alone (no change to a newer, lower front sight) and shoot it frequently. I like it a lot. Best to leave things as they are. I feel like I know the gun pretty well now. I sure to do love shooting it.

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My First Custom Gun

By Lew Ballard

Editor’s Note: Lew Ballard posted the text of this story on a Facebook page I manage on .45 ACP revolvers. It was so good I asked Lew if I could publish it on ExNotes, and he graciously agreed. Lew apologized for not having kept photos of his custom 1917 (the subject of this story). A Google search turned up a number of custom 1917 revolvers, including Elmer Keith’s personal 1917. It’s the one you see above, which sold at auction in December 2023 (rather appropriately, for over $17K). I love anything about 1917 revolvers, and I’m guessing you do, too.

With that as a backdrop, here’s Lew’s story.

Over the years, now decades, that I’ve been not only shooting, but also interested in guns, I’ve put together a number of custom firearms. Generally, I hire the work out to people who are qualified, although at times I’ve proceeded, through main strength and awkwardness, with some custom modifications on my own.

I still remember the first custom gun I commissioned, and even after all this time, looking back at how young I was, and how little I really understood at the time, I think I did pretty well.

Allow me to set the stage, with a little background. Although I had a little shooting experience growing up, I didn’t have all that much, but when I turned 21 I decided it was time to buy a gun. Particularly, a pistol. In early 1988, shortly after turning 21, I started looking, and I found a pistol that I’d buy again today. It was a 1911 in .45 ACP. More particularly, it was a Colt Mk IV Series 70 Government Model in Colt’s electroless nickel finish. Coltguard?

The Mk IV Series 70 Government Model was, for all intents and purposes, a 1911A1 fitted with a collet bushing instead of the solid bushing John Moses Browning had designed originally. This was intended to enhance accuracy, although I think they reverted to the solid bushing later on, for parts breakage issues.

Now, this was so long ago that gun writers, in gun magazines, only recommended a few places that could do a proper feed job so that a 1911 would cycle any ammunition other than hardball. Man that was a different world, wasn’t it?

I was living in Houston, or at least commuting back to Houston from Sherman TX where I was attending college, and I nervously went to a local retailer, Carter’s Country, right there on the Katy Freeway in Houston, to see if they could do a feed job. They said they could, and for some reasonable sum they did it, and afterwards I shot a bunch of 200 SWC .45 ACP loads through that Colt. Along with a bunch of Blazer 200 grain JHP ammo—the old “flying ashtray.”

And I wore an onion at my belt, which was the style at the time.

I had chosen a 1911 in part for pragmatic reasons, but I am honest enough to admit that there were also “vibe” reasons. I’d been reading Mickey Spillane for five or six years by that point, and Spillane’s characters almost always packed a .45—whether we’re talking Mike Hammer, Tiger Mann, or other one-off protagonists. The Shadow, as drawn by Mike Kaluta, packed TWIN .45s. Robert E. Howard’s El Borak—the Texas gunslinger in Central Asia/Afghanistan, well he packed a big .45 automatic as well, even if he generally ended up doing most of his fighting with cold steel. Should I mention “two world wars” while I’m at it?

In those dim, distant days of yore, I also read gun writers. I read Jack O’Connor and Elmer Keith and Ross Seyfried and “primus inter pares” Jeff Cooper. Jeff Cooper made a profound impression on me. I was, in effect, a Cooper Trooper. Jeff Cooper was a big fan of the .45 ACP. Man, I thought that Colt Government Model was the bee’s knees. But this is all just introduction, because I don’t think a feed job, a polishing of the feed ramp, really qualifies as a custom gun.

Essentially, around this time, I got interested in revolvers. Sigh, looking back, I can remember going to gun shows with tables positively groaning with service .38 Specials and .357 Magnums that were being surplused out by police departments, during the drive towards the wondernine. Is “wondernine” even a term, anymore? Probably not. A “wondernine” was a double stack, double action 9mm. In my mind, the term came about with the US military trials to adopt a new service pistol, which turned out to be the Beretta 92, as the M9. At this point in time, I just thought the whole idea was silly.

I needed a big bore revolver.

I’ve never really been a big Magnum cartridge fan. I’ve always liked moderate cartridges. I have shot and enjoyed .44 Magnums, but I always kept coming back to the mild, sedate, staid ballistics of “230 grains, at 850 fps.”

I still feel that way. When we talk about revolver cartridges, whether it’s a .44 Special, or a .45 Colt, or a .45 ACP, or a .41 Special, I tend to think “200 to 250 grains, between 850 and 1000 fps” as a sweet spot. Plenty of power, not too much recoil, not too much blast and flash. Easy to shoot quickly—certainly compared to “hotter” loads.

So I thought I needed a big bore revolver, and at this point I was thinking of a double action revolver—and this was a good time for big bore double action revolvers. I considered the .44 Special and .45 Colt, but I kept coming back to the .45 ACP, especially once I discovered the Smith and Wesson model of 1917.

Historical sidenote: during WW1, the US realized that 1911 production was limited, and so contracted with both Colt and Smith and Wesson to produce revolvers chambering the .45 ACP, using half moon clips to adapt the rimless .45 ACP design to a traditional revolver. I really have no experience with any Colt New Service revolvers, as they felt awkward in my hand. Ah, but the Smith N-frame, now that was a different matter!

The Smith and Wesson 1917 was a fixed sight N frame revolver, with a tapered 5 ½” barrel, chambered in .45 ACP. It had a square butt and a lanyard loop.

And about that time, several American companies started to reimport Brazilian contract S&W 1917s. Hazy memory says they were sold to the Brazilian Navy in 1937. I don’t remember which company imported the two I bought. Navy Arms? Century International Arms? International Arms Company? If I had to guess, I’d say it was Navy Arms.

I went to a gun shop in Sherman, TX and offered them a deal. I’d trade my Colt to them if they’d order two of the S&W Brazilian contract 1917s for me. They agreed, and a couple of weeks later, I did the swap.

I shot them as they were, for a while. I don’t think I ever used the half moon clips, which held three rounds, since the full moon clips had come out, holding six rounds. They were . . . very nice. They were also surprisingly light and handy! At that time, the trend was towards untapered barrels in production revolvers, and full underlugs. We could call that the Python influence? Let’s just put it this way. Compared to a 6” 29 with a heavy barrel, the 5.5” 1917 felt super light. I’m not sure I’d want to launch any Elmer Keith memorial .44 Magnum loads through a sixgun of that weight, but then again, I wanted the mild, sedate ballistics of the .45 ACP.

Then I got to thinking, “Gosh, a little long, when one ponders on it, aren’t they?” And I ran across an article by Masaad Ayoob, in one of the many gun magazines that were out at the time. Combat Handguns, maybe? I don’t know. Mas had had a 1917 customized: barrel chopped, somewhat refined. Well, that gave me an itch I just had to scratch. I wasn’t even sure if it was possible, in my area, to have something similar done.

A little investigation, however, revealed that Briley Manufacturing was in the Houston neighborhood I lived in, when I lived in Houston. I photocopied the Mas Ayoob article and headed that way, together with one of the 1917s.

I explained what I wanted to have done, and they thought about it and said, “Sure, we can do that.”

This is what they did for me. They bobbed the barrel. I remember I wanted something less than 4”, but only a little less. They cut it just far enough ahead of the ejector rod lug to look right. Three and a half inches? Three and three quarters? Something like that. Recrowned the barrel. Fitted a ball detent in the crane, for an improvised “triple lock” thing. Manufactured a new half moon front sight, serrated “like it was a silver dime” and widened the rear sight notch a bit. Action job. A general “go through it and make everything right” approach. They bobbed the hammer spur but then serrated the top of the hammer for easier thumb cocking. (Yes, I retained the single action capability.) Then they refinished the whole thing with Parkerizing.

I ran it with the service stocks, and kept the lanyard loop in place, and put a black finished aluminum Tyler T-grip on it.

Whee doggies!

I was as happy as a fellow could be. It was light, it was handy, it had a great trigger, it was as accurate as I was (if not more). The new front sight and the opened up rear notch gave it a really good sight picture. It had aura and drip and rizz, to use modern terms. I kept it in an Uncle Mike’s nylon holster that I’d originally got for a 3” Ruger GP100 until shame got the better of me and I bought an El Paso Saddlery 1920 Austin holster for it.

I shot a bunch of Remington hardball through it. I shot a fair amount of Blazer 200 grain through it, although I remember the aluminum cases being a bear to bust loose from the moon clips. Then one day I found a closeout deal on a case of Remington AutoRim ammunition. The AutoRim was a .45 ACP case, fitted with a very thick rim so it would work without moon clips, loaded with a 230 grain lead round nose bullet. I think I got that case of ammunition for under half the price I was paying for new commercial hardball.

Such vibes! Much rizz! So drip!

It’s gone now. I didn’t sell it. I’d like to think I’d never have sold it, although I can’t swear I wouldn’t have. When I joined the USMC, I handed my guns over to a friend to look after while I was away, and when I got them back, this custom revolver wasn’t there. Story I got was that John had been out boating at Lake Houston, and it, umm, fell into the water.

Oh well. It was just a thing, even though it was a very nice thing. Also, that was pretty much the end of me and John hanging out and doing things. As I look back, though, from this vast span of time, I still think that my first custom gun was a dang nice custom gun. It felt like I was carrying or shooting a chunk of Americana while I had it. And I miss it to this day.

“It looked mostly like this, if you moved the front sight behind the collar of this one. Just a bit shorter,” Lew wrote.

1917 Smith and Wesson Repop

By Joe Berk

The revolver du jour is a Smith and Wesson Model 22, which is one of a limited run Smith sent to Turnbull for their signature color case hardening. It is a repop of the famed World War I Model of 1917 Smith and Wesson, a revolver we’ve written about in these pages before. This revolver is beautiful, with Altamont grips, high polish bluing, and mesmerizing color case hardening.

I have a big bottle of Red Dot powder and I’ve been using it for reloading 9mm ammo. I wanted to try it in .45 ACP. I thought I would try it in my 1911A1 .45 Auto until I realized I’m not supposed to bend at the waist for another couple of weeks (a consequence of my back surgery), and that meant I couldn’t pick up my brass. So I decided to shoot it in one of my .45 ACP revolvers (so I wouldn’t have to chase my brass).

.45 ACP cartridges in the 1917. The color case hardening sure does pop!

When you shoot .45 ACP ammo in a 1917 revolver, you have to use a clip to provide the right headspace, and to allow the ejector rod to eject the cartridges. Putting each cartridge into the clips is kind of a pain in the you-know-what, but it’s an elegant and simple solution to the problem the Army faced in both World Wars when there weren’t enough 1911A1s to go around. After firing, you also need to extract the empty brass cases from the clip. I used a Brownell’s tool for both inserting the ammo into the clip and for removing the empty cases after shooting.

The Brownell’s tool for inserting and removing .45 ACP cartridges from the star clip.

After my first few shots, I realized again that my 1917 shoots low (I knew this previously but had forgotten it). On my first target, I held at 6:00 on the orange bullseye, and at 10 yards my shots were 3 inches low. Not a problem; I simply held at 12:00 on the bullseye, and I shot the multi-round group you see below. I shot that group standing up. I’ve done better in the past, but this wasn’t too bad for an old guy.

Results with the Red Dot load. I held at the top of the orange bullseye. The revolver as configured from the factory shoots 3 inches low.

The group was not great, but it was not terrible, either. I went home and started wondering…could I get a replacement front sight that wasn’t quite as tall?

A shark’s fin of a front sight. Smith dropped the ball on this design.

I searched the Internet, and what I found is that on these guns the front sight being too tall (which causes the gun to shoot low) is a known problem. I had called Smith and Wesson’s customer support a few years ago to discuss this, but they told me the gun was too old for them to do anything (this particular revolver was manufactured in June of 2007). In my recent Internet sleuthing, I found that Smith had owned up to the problem and were replacing the front sights at no charge, but that was nearly 20 years ago. When I called a few days ago, the nice lady at Smith and told me they no longer stock the part (I should have been more persistent in the first call to Smith and Wesson). She also told me that because I live in California, even if they had the part, they could only ship it to an FFL. Our California legislature and our Brylcreem governor had struck again.

I loaded another batch of ammo identical to the recipe described above, except this time I used 4.2 grains of Bullseye propellant (the first load had 4.5 grains of Red Dot). I had the same issue with the gun shooting too low, but wowee, did the groups ever tighten up. The photo below shows two groups. On the head shots, I held at the top of the target’s head; on the bullseye shots, I held at the top of the bullseye. Both are six-shot groups, and both were with me resting my elbows on the bench. Once again, I realized why I love reloading so much. And Bullseye powder, too. There’s a reason they call it Bullseye.

Here’s the chronograph data for the above two loads:

One thing about the Bullseye and Red Dot loads in a revolver: They sure get your hands dirty.

Post Bullseye reloads dirty hands. Red Dot is even worse.

I didn’t do any load development for the two recipes above. I already had the Bullseye ammo loaded and it had proved to be very accurate in the 1911A1. There’s not a ton of published data for Red Dot, so when I found a source with this data, I just picked a load (4.5 grains) and went with it. This was intended to be a quick look and not an exhaustive assessment, and it was. For the two loads I used, and as you can see from the table above, the Bullseye load has a much lower standard deviation than does the Red Dot load. The Red Dot load’s average velocity, though, is closer to factory ball ammo. I probably could have increased the Bullseye load to bring it up to factory levels, but it is so accurate I’m going to leave it alone.

As a follow up check on this front sight business, the next day I grabbed some .45 ammo I had loaded a couple of years ago with AutoRim brass and Jim Gardner’s excellent 230-grain powder coated bullets. I had loaded that ammo with 5.6 grains of Unique, which has been my accuracy load for the .45 ACP in a 1911 for literally decades.

.45 AutoRim ammo with 230-grain Jim Gardner powder coated bullets. The AutoRim ammo is much easier to shoot in a 1917 or .45 ACP revolver, as it does not require the use of clips. Alas, the Gardner bullets are no longer available.

I knew the velocity would be a little higher than what I was seeing with the Bullseye load described above, and I expected the load to print a little higher on the target. I was right on both counts.

Chrono data for the Unique AutoRim load.

My first cylinder of AutoRim ammo loaded with 230-grain bullets and 5.6 grains of Unique. I held at 6:00 on the orange bullseye.

I liked what I saw on the target above. The 1917 was still shooting a bit low, but not by as much as it had with the Bullseye load. I proceeded to put the rest of the 5.6-grain Unique load into the orange bullseye, this time with my aimpoint being the center of the bullseye. Just for good measure, and to make sure this zombie wouldn’t be getting up again, I put my last three rounds into its head.

For other than the shots that went low, I held in the center of the orange bullseye. This is close enough for government work. These shots were all fired off hand. The 1917 is a lot of fun to shoot.

Unfortunately, I think Jim Gardner is out of business. I liked his bullets because of the extra thick powder coating and because they shot so well. These were the last of the 230-grain Gardner bullets I had in my stash, so I will start hunting around for a new source.

So there you have it. I may poke around a bit and do something with the front sight, or I may leave it as is and simply remember to hold high on the target. I could go a little hotter with the Unique/230-grain-bullet load (the online Alliant guide shows I could do so), and that would probably bring the point of impact to the point of aim. I like the way the 5.6 grain load handles, though, and as I said above, it hits close enough for government work. I want to shoot the 1917 with it at 25 yards and see where it groups (above or below point of aim, and by how much). I may try a few more loads in the 1917; these will be topics for future blogs.

How about an original 1917 Colt? That story is here.

.45 ACP ARX Bullets In Revolvers

By Joe Berk

I went to my indoor handgun range to try the ARX bullets in two .45 ACP revolvers, my 1917 redo revolver and the 625 Performance Center Smith and Wesson. The 1917 is the one you see at the top of this blog. It’s a beautiful N-frame Smith styled to look like the 1917 US Army revolvers with a 5 1/2-inch barrel and a lanyard ring. Smith also added a nice t0uch: Turnbull color case hardening. It really is a beautiful revolver.

6 ARX rounds in a star clip, ready for shooting in the 1917 Smith.

The 625 is a special number Smith offered about a decade or so ago. It has a custom barrel profile, ostensibly a smoother action, and better sights. It came from the Performance Center with a gold bead front sight, which I didn’t care for, so the revolver went back to Smith for a red ramp front and white outline rear sight. I thought the red ramp and white outline would be like what came on Smiths in the 1970s, but it wasn’t. The red isn’t nearly as vibrant, and the white outline is sort of a dull gray. Live and learn, I guess.

The Smith and Wesson Performance Center Model 625. This one wears custom grips.

I also added custom grips to the 625 (which I refinished myself, as I didn’t care for the red, birch, and blue clown grips that came with the gun). I know this Model 625 Performance Center gun to be an extremely accurate revolver. With 200-grain semi-wadcutters and 6.0 grains of Unique, this is one of the most accurate revolvers I’ve ever shot.

But enough about the revolvers. This blog focuses on how the .45 ACP ARX bullets performed in these two handguns. Everything we’ve written about the ARX bullets has been, up to this blog, about how the bullets performed in semi-auto handguns. I shoot .45 ACP in revolvers, too, and I was naturally curious about how the composite bullets would do in those.

Another 6 ARX rounds in a star clip and the Model 625.

Here’s the bottom line:

- - The ARX composite bullets are not quite as accurate in my revolvers as they were in the 1911 with two different loads. The groups were good (as you’ll see in the photos below), but they weren’t as good as they had been in the 1911.
  - Both revolvers shot low at 30 feet. The 625 shot about 3 1/2 inches below the point of aim. The 1917 shot about 5 inches below the point of aim. In the 1911, the .45 ACP ARX load was spot on, putting the shots right where I aimed.

Here’s the relevant load and chrono data:

And here are the targets I shot with each revolver and the two different loads. First, the Model 625 targets:

The aim point on this target was the 6:00 position on the upper orange bullseyes (as it was for all the targets shown here). The bullets hit 3 1/2 inches low. This is the target with the 8.8-grain Power Pistol load. The groups were nothing to write home about.

The Model 625 put the 7.0-grain Winchester 231 load in the same spot as the 8.8-grain Power Pistol load. The group sizes were about the same.

The next two photos show the 1917 targets:

The 1917 group with the 8.8-grain Power Pistol load was about 5 inches low. I wasn’t trying for head shots.

The 1917 seemed to like the 7.0-grain Winchester 231 load a bit better, but the groups were still the same 5 inches low. As with the above targets, the aim point was at the 6:00 position on the upper bullseye.

As you can see from the above data, velocities from the 1917’s slightly longer 5 1/2-inch barrel were a bit higher than from the 625’s 4-inch barrel. In the revolvers, the Winchester 231 velocities were higher than the Power Pistol loads (but not by much). The opposite was true in the 1911. Group sizes maybe were a bit better with Winchester 231 in both revolvers, but not as good as with the 1911. The 1917 has fixed sights, so my only option there is to hold higher on the target. The 625 had adjustable sights, but I don’t think there’s enough adjustment to make up for the 3 1/2-inch drop.

One more observation: Winchester 231 is a much dirtier powder than Power Pistol. I didn’t notice this with the 1911 comparisons I did earlier, but with a revolver, it’s quite noticeable.

One of the ARX bullets’ principal advantages is they keep the bore clean. There’s no lead or copper fouling. When shooting any kind of bullet with Winchester 231 in a revolver, though, you’ll get plenty dirty.

In my opinion, the 118-grain ARX .45 ACP bullets are much better suited for the 1911 than they are for a .45 ACP revolver. That’s my opinion only; your mileage may vary.

So there you have it. This is our 6th blog on the ARX bullets, and I don’t have any more planned. I think ExhaustNotes has the most comprehensive evaluation of these bullets you’ll find anywhere on the Internet or in any of the print pubs, and I feel good about that. I like these bullets, and I really like them in my 9mm Springfield 1911, my 9mm S&W Shield, and my .45 ACP Springfield 1911. I ordered a bunch of both the 9mm and .45 bullets, and they are what I’ll be shooting for the foreseeable future.

Prior ExNotes ARX bullet evaluations are here:

25 and 50 Yard ARX .45 ACP Results
Winchester 231 and Alliant Power Pistol .45 ACP ARX Results
Dialing In A .45 ACP ARX Load
9mm and .45 ACP ARX Load Testing
ARX Bullets In Two 9mm Pistols

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Gats and Hats II: A Jovino Model 25

The revolver you see in the blog today is a rare animal, one of 650 customized by New York City’s John Jovino Gun Shop. I guess the best way to start this post is with the John Jovino story. The Jovino Gun Shop is no longer in business, having fallen victim to the Covid 19 pandemic, but until then it was the oldest gun shop continuously in business in the entire country. John Jovino opened the store in 1911; he sold it to the Imperato family in the 1920s (the Imperatos are the folks who started and now operate Henry Firearms). Jovino’s was famous and it’s been in more than a few movies (and even in my favorite TV show, Law and Order).

The John Jovino Gun Shop in Manhattan, said to be the oldest gun shop in both New York City and the United States. Unfortunately, it is no longer in business.

Back in the 1980’s, Jovino’s built custom guns. Their primary clients were the NYPD and other police departments, as well as individual police officers, so many of the Jovino customs tended to be duty-oriented carry weapons. The one you see here is no exception. Jovino’s started with 6.5-inch-barreled Model 25 Smiths chambered for the .45 ACP cartridge and they turned them into 2.5-inch snubnosed revolvers. The conversion from a stock Smith and Wesson Model 25 to a Jovino snubbie, though, was not just a simple chop job. Here’s what the wizards at Jovino did to these guns:

- - Shortened the factory barrel to 2.5 inches.
  - Installed a crane lock to replace the ejector rod lock.
  - Relocated the red ramp front sight.
  - Rounded the butt to the S&W K frame round butt configuration.
  - Tuned the double and single action trigger.
  - Radiused the hammer spur (you can see it in the photos).
  - Polished the trigger face (you can see that in the big photo at the top of this blog).
  - Fitted Pachmayr rubber grips.
  - Reblued the cut barrel (the new bluing is actually a bit darker and more polished than the stock bluing).

As you probably already know (and you certainly know if you follow the ExhaustNotes blog), the 1917 platform Smith and Wesson and Colt revolvers can fire .45 ACP ammo if the cartridges are mounted in clips, or they can fire .45 AutoRim ammo. .45 AutoRim ammo is essentially the .45 ACP cartridge with a rim. For this test series, I used reloaded .45 AutoRim ammo. It’s the ammo you see in the photo below.

A gat and a hat, with six rounds of reloaded .45 AutoRim ammunition.

The original grips that came with the Jovino Model 25 snubbie were Pachmayrs, and they probably make more sense (more on that at the end of this blog). I didn’t care for the appearance and for reasons it would take a therapist to explain, I wanted ivory grips (I think it has something to do with watching Patton too many times). I settled for fake ivory, which provided the look I wanted without the cost. Don’t tell the General.

The Pachmayr grips that originally came on the Jovino Model 25 snubbie.

When Jovino cut the Model 25 barrels down to 2.5 inches, there wasn’t enough room left in the ejector shroud for the front cylinder lock, so Jovino incorporated the ball-detent cylinder lock you see in this photo.

When the new grips arrived, I liked the S&W escutcheons and I liked the look, but I didn’t like the fit. I didn’t realize what I had in the Jovino and the extent of the customization that went into these guns. I ordered grips for an N-frame round butt Smith and Wesson, but they stood a bit proud on the revolver’s grip frame (the back strap). That’s because the Jovino customs reworked the frame from a square N-frame grip profile to a Smith and Wesson round butt K-frame profile, but I’m told the K-frame grips won’t match exactly, either. I bought the larger N-frame grips figuring I could take grip material off, but I couldn’t put it back on. I didn’t dare attempt to sand the grips on the gun, so I very gently went to work on them with sandpaper off the gun, repeatedly installing and removing the grips to take off just enough material to get a good grip-to-frame match. When I was just about there, I found that by stepping down to 400, then 600, and then 800 grit sandpaper, I could match the polished look on the rest of the grip. I was pleased with the result.

The grips look good. So does the revolver. One of the Jovino custom touches was to round the hammer spur profile. I like what they did.

I tested three .45 AutoRim loads:

- - A 200-grain Speer swaged semi-wadcutter bullet loaded with 4.2 grains of Bullseye.
  - A 200-grain Precision Cast semi-wadcutter bullet loaded with 6.0 grains of Unique.
  - A 233-grain Missouri K-Ball cast roundnose bullet loaded with 5.6 grains of Unique.

.45 AutoRim ammunitiion. Note the rim on the brass cartridge case. The case is identical to .45 ACP ammo in all other dimensions. From left to right, you see the 200-grain swaged Speer semi-wadcutter bullet, the 200-grain Precision Cast cast semi-wadcutter bullet, and the 233-grain Missouri Bullet cast roundnose K-Ball bullet.

I had already tested my Jovino revolver for accuracy at longer distances a few years ago; this test was to be different. Like the .38 Special Model 60 accuracy tests we wrote about a couple of days ago, I set up a few “Betty and the Zombie” targets at 7 yards and I fired double action as quickly as I could. I’m told the typical hostage rescue zombie gunfight occurs at 7 yards, so I wanted to get a feel how I would do in these encounters. You know, so I’d be ready.

What was surprising to me was just how incredibly smooth the double action trigger was on the Jovino. In a word, it’s amazing. Shooting double action was fun. The slick trigger and the Model 25 Jovino’s red ramp and white outline sights seem to glue the front sight to the zombie’s left eye, until that part of the zombie disappeared and I was shooting at a hole. These guns are impressive.

The 200-grain semiwadcutter with 4.2 grains of Bulleye was a very pleasant load (for me, not the zombie) with modest recoil. The 233-grain K-Ball Missouri load was a much more emphatic load. That one pounded me around a bit more, but it still hung in there on the zombie. All of the loads shot essentially to point of aim. Each of the targets below were hit by five full cylinders of .45 ammunition, or 30 rounds apiece. There was not a single miss among all 90 rounds.

Zombie versus .45 AutoRim ammo loaded with 200-grain Precision Cast bullets and 4.2 grains of Bullseye.

200-grain Speer bullets and 6.0 grains of Unique. Sometimes zombies don’t go down with the first shot, so I lobbed in another 29.

Betty was plenty nervous, but she held still. The zombie did, too. He took 30 rounds of 233-grain K-Ball Missouri bullets propelled by 5.6 grains of Unique.

So what’s the bottom line to all of this? The Jovino .45 ACP revolver is accurate, it has a superb trigger, and it is just plain fun to shoot. That last load was a bit much. The 233-grain K-Ball Missouri looks pretty much like their 230-grain roundnose, but the difference in recoil is both perceptible and significant. You can go quite a bit hotter with this load, but I won’t. When I finished shooting, I was surprised to see I had done a bit of damage to my thumb. I think it happened on the last round or two because there’s no powder residue where the skin tore away, and it happened because the faux ivory grips have a bit of a corner to them. The rubber Pachmayr grips wouldn’t have done this, but they don’t look as cool as the grips the Jovino wears in these photos. The gun doesn’t do this firing single action, but I guess my hand rode up a bit firing double action. Sometimes these things happen when you take on the odd zombie or two.

Zombie combat. It’s a tough job. Somebody’s got to do it, though.

The Jovino Model 25 is probably the finest and smoothest revolver I’ve ever shot. It’s a keeper.

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Reloading .45 ACP for 1917-style revolvers

The Model 625 with a box of my reloaded ammunition. The ammo in this photo had Xtreme 230-grain roundnose bullets. I found the Missouri cast roundnose bullets to be more accurate in my revolver.

Good buddy Rick C., one of the world’s great philosophers, once told me that every time he reloads he learns something new. I think he was right. This story focuses on reloading .45 ACP ammo for the Model 625 Smith and Wesson revolver, and what I learned during a recent reloading session.

The Model 625 is a beautiful revolver. It’s a direct descendant of the Model 1917 that Smith made for the US Army in World War I. The only thing I sometimes find annoying about the 625 is that sometimes reloaded 45 ACP that chambers easily in a 1911 auto won’t chamber in the revolver. This blog focuses on that issue.

The 625 and a box of ammo. This is a sweet-shooting and accurate handgun.

A typical 6-shot, 50-ft Model 625 group with my favorite load. That ain’t bad from a 4-inch revolver.

There are two kinds of ammo for these revolvers. The first is standard .45 ACP, firing the same cartridge as the 1911. The other is .45 AutoRim. Firing .45 ACP ammo in a revolver like the Smith and Wesson 625 requires the use of either star or moon clips (the star clips hold six rounds; each moon clip holds three rounds). Individual cartridges clip into these. The clips provide proper headspace by holding the cartridges in place in the cylinder, and they allow the extractor to push the rounds out of the cylinder. They also work as speed clips because you can insert six rounds into the cylinder simultaneously. Theoretically, you could fire .45 ACP ammo in a Smith and Wesson revolver without the clips, but then you would need a probe to knock each case out of the cylinder. The .45 AutoRim cartridge is very similar to the .45 ACP round, but it has a rim. That eliminates the need for the clips.

.45 ACP ammo in 6-round star clips. The clips allow chambering .45 ACP ammunition in 1917-type revolvers. They are necessary because the .45 ACP cartridges don’t have a protruding rim to allow extraction.

Over the years, I’ve found that .45 AutoRim always chambers easily in a .45 ACP revolver. With .45 ACP reloads, however, that’s not always the case. That’s not good, as it sometimes prevents closing the cylinder. Even if you can close the cylinder with difficult-to-chamber .45 ACP reloads, the loaded cylinder will often drag on the frame, making cocking or double action fire difficult.

I recently loaded a batch of .45 ACP ammo that I intended to fire in my Model 625, and as is my normal practice when loading for the 1911, I put just enough of a flare on the empty cases to allow the bullet base to start into the case. After priming the cases, charging with propellant, and seating the bullets, I adjusted the seating die such that the brass just kissed the crimping ring in the seating die. At this point, I thought it would be a good idea to check the first 10 rounds in the 625 to see if they chambered fully, and you can probably guess where this story is going. A couple of rounds only went about two-thirds of the way into the chamber. I put a little more crimp on the cartridge; of the two that would not chamber, now one would and the other wouldn’t.

In examining the loaded rounds, I could see where the case had expanded circumferentially slightly after the bullet had been seated (it had a slight bulge at the base of the bullet. I wondered if perhaps the Missouri 230-grain roundnose bullets I was loading were just too big, so I measured them. The box told me the bullets had been sized to 0.452 inches, and that’s exactly where they were. Then I measured the case outside diameter for the loaded rounds just below the case mouth. They measured 0.475 to 0.476 inch. Then I went online to see what that dimension should be. Here’s what I found:

The drawing above is misleadingly dimensioned. The dimension we’re interested in is the 0.473 case outside diameter at the case mouth (it looks like an inside diameter on the drawing, but it’s the outside diameter. My reloaded ammo was 0.002 to 0.003 inch above this. I played around with the crimp a bit, but I couldn’t get that number to come down via crimping with my RCBS bullet seating die.

Then I had an idea. I removed the decapping pin and threaded shaft from the resizing die, and adjusted it to just kiss the loaded round a little to square up the bullet in the case and decrease the diameter at the case mouth a bit. I adjusted the depth of the seating die in the press such that I obtained a 0.473 outside case diameter result at the case mouth. The first case chambered. I then repeated the partial resize on 10 cartridges; all but one sucked right into the chamber with no circumferential play. I still had that one, though, so I played with the resizing die adjustment again until the dimension was right at 0.472, and that did the trick. It removed the flare completely, and every subsequent cartridge I loaded using this technique chambered perfectly. Basically, I was using the resizing die as a crimping tool.

It bothered me that I had to go .001 below the 0.473 inch spec to get the ammo to chamber 100% of the time in my revolver, and I was a little worried about what this might be doing to the bullet diameter. I wondered what factory ammo measures, and then I realized I had some. So I pulled it out of the ammo locker and measured it. The factory ammo measured 0.470 inch at that dimension (0.003 under the 0.473 specification), which explains why factory .45 ACP ammo always chambers so easily in this revolver. I also checked the drawing for the .45 AutoRim cartridge. It shows the case outside diameter at the business end to be 0.472, which is coincidentally exactly what I found to work perfectly for my reloaded .45 ACP ammo in the revolver.

I was a little bit worried that in running the cartridges part way into the resizing die I might be swaging the bullets to something below .451 inch (the minimum bullet diameter for this cartridge). To check on this, I measured the case wall thickness. On my Winchester .45 ACP brass (which has a wall thickness perceptibly greater than other brass I sometimes use) the wall thickness is exactly 0.010. Since my ammo measured 0.472 at the mouth after my post-load resizing/crimping operation, that should leave the bullet at exactly 0.452 inch (or 0.472 – 2*0.010). That’s exactly where it should be. The cases hold that wall thickness for some distance into the case, too. I think what the operation is doing is aligning and straightening the bullet in the case.

I’m not using any lube for my secondary resizing operation. I have carbide dies, and they do not require it.

The proof on all of this was how the rounds grouped, and folks, they grouped well. It was a little windy when I fired these groups at the West End Gun Club, but the gun and the ammo did what they are supposed to do.

Four groups of 6 shots each with the Model 625. 5.6 grains of Unique with a 230 cast roundnose bullet has always performed well for me in both revolvers and 1911 semi-automatics.

I like this modified approach (resize/decap, clean, prime, bellmouth, charge, seat, remove the FLRS decapper, and then crimp the ammo to 0.472 with the resizing die). It works well, it produces an accurate load, and every round chambers easily in the Model 625.

My shooting buddies Rick and Robby tell me that the Lee factory crimp die does the same thing as what I’ve described above. I ordered one for the .45 ACP and I’ll reload ammo using it, but that’s a topic for a subsequent blog.

Like what you read above? More Tales of the Gun stories are here.