Redhawk 45

[hpdrifter]

Well, I made a mistake today. I stopped at LGS while returning from another stop.
I found a Redhawk 45 colt, Stainless 7" barrel. They have it marked $795.
I have this Blackhawk Hunter in 44 mag that I'm thinking about trading in.
I prefer 45 colt over 44 mag and I can do away with reloading for another caliber.........and casting
Does the Redhawk in 45 have the same issues that the Blackhawk has?

Throat variations and tight forcing cone?

What do you think about swapping out; Black for red?

[Tatume]

The chamber throats on my 44 Redhawk were 0.431" and nicely uniform. Groups were so-so until I fire-lapped it. Now it shoots very well.

[DougGuy]

Take a .452" boolt with you and see if it will slide into the cylinder throats from the front. If they won't then the throats are less than .452" but the fix is an affordable, one time deal...

[kingstrider]

I bought a newer .45 Redhawk last year and reamed the cylinder throats along with my Blackhawk and Vaquero to make them shoot better. From the half dozen or so Ruger 45's I have seen the throats are always tight.

[Bigslug]

I've come to prefer swing out cylinders, all-at-once ejection, and DA triggers. I rarely even thumb the hammer back at all anymore, so my SBH has been tending to sit in the safe of late. Given the choice of buying either with the same barrel length, it'd be the Redhawk, no question. Another nice thing - given the same external dimensions on the launch platform, the .45 is going to weigh less by virtue of having bigger holes drilled in it.

I can't speak to the throats on the older .45C Redhawks, but my newer .45C/ACP one is .451 on all six holes. Safe to assume they were thinking jacketed.

I would pretty much take for granted on any new Ruger or Smith that you'll have some frame crush to lap out at the back of the barrel. On a visit to my folks' place, I broke out the pin gauges and checked every revolver in both collections. Suffice to say, there's a lot of work to do.

[Tatume]

I would pretty much take for granted on any new Ruger or Smith that you'll have some frame crush to lap out at the back of the barrel.

The brand new Ruger Super Blackhawk I got just a week ago is shooting groups I won't even reveal, because you wouldn't believe me. If it has frame crush, it's going to keep the frame crush, because the best shooting revolver I've ever seen is not going to be altered.

Some do have barrel problems. I've satisfied myself on that count, having recently fire-lapped two Rugers that improved substantially (a Redhawk and a Super Blackhawk). But do not assume that all new Ruger and S&W revolvers have a condition needing attention. Shoot first, ask questions later. :-)

[Rick R]

Shoot first, ask questions later. :-)

Reading different shooting forums over the Years this should be engraved on all of them.

I purchased a 4" Redhawk in .45 Colt a few years ago that is extremely accurate. Boolits sized .452 go into itty bitty groups smaller than I can possibly shoot.

[hpdrifter]

Well, I just went and got it. A little less painful than I thought it would be. 8-)

the cylinder locks up a bit before the hammer is all the way back, giving it a little "notch" right before fully cocking. But I can accept that.

The cones seem to be .4515 to the best of my abilities with calipers. I've had my Blackhawk 45 reamed to .4525 and I get that when I check them with the same calipers. Don't mean I'm measuring correctly, but there is some consistency.

I've shot it about 10 times at 15 yards and it seems pretty good. Just offhand so I can't really tell, kinda hasty shots. Seems more accurate than I probably am.

Will shoot a bunch more before I decide to have/do any work on it.

The BC gap looks about like my Blackhawk.....it measures .004-.005. I'll take that. The Hunter had about .008. May not be that tight, but it's a lot tighter than that Hunter was.

[hpdrifter]

The trigger when I got it had about 7-8 lbs of single action trigger pull. Didn't help accuracy any, especially off-hand.

I cured some of that today after all the festivities. I learned how to tear it apart and re-assemble.

I stoned the sear and notch a little and reduced the trigger pull to about half of what it was.

Too late to do any shooting. I'll see what it did for accuracy tomorrow.