Guns that tame the .357 Magnum

[RealGun]

My hill walking gun tames hot 357 loads pretty effectively. It is a Ruger GP100 Match Champion with Pachmayr Diamond grips which really tame push-back. I carry it stoked with Buffalo Bore 180 grain hard cast RNFP Magnum loads. It is lighter than the standard GP100 and better balanced.

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What do you need to shoot with ammo that stout along with the accompanying recoil and commotion?

 

[IWAC]

My hill walking gun tames hot 357 loads pretty effectively. It is a Ruger GP100 Match Champion with Pachmayr Diamond grips which really tame push-back. I carry it stoked with Buffalo Bore 180 grain hard cast RNFP Magnum loads. It is lighter than the standard GP100 and better balanced.

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I'm going to buy a set of those Pachmayr Diamond grips for my Match Champion! What holster is that? Nice looking!

 

[labnoti]

Actually Harry didn't carry a 357, he carried a SW Model 29, 44 Magnum. Skip to about the 1:00
mark for the quote.

Indeed, the fictional character didn't carry a .357, but made a reference to the ease of shooting "wadcutters" in a .357 gun. He said he shot, "light specials" in his .44 and that in a gun as big as it was it was like shooting wadcutters in a .357. We could argue about whether he was shooting .44 Special in the Model 29 or handloading some other special load, and whether he was only shooting that in the competition mentioned in the dialog or on the street as well, but at the end of the day, it's fiction. What is fact is that shooting "wadcutters" or 148 gr lead HBWC at .38 Special pressures in a heavy steel revolver produces less felt recoil and is more easily controlled than shooting hot .357 cartridges from the same gun. We can assume by "wadcutters" he was referring to .38's since they're cast lead and would foul the barrel at .357 Magnum velocities where those 148 gr bullets could be pushed to more than 1600 fps. We can only assume by ".357" Harry was referring to a Model 19, since the original .357 like the .38-44 Heavy-Duty was based on the Smith & Wesson N-frame, as is the "Model 27" and those guns are all as big and are actually heavier than his Model 29 for a given barrel length.

My original point was that Harry made a reference to shooting .38's ("wadcutters") in a .357 gun that suggests that shooting .357 Magnum cartridges does not involve light recoil or easy control. They're hard to shoot. I posted that video that showed even guys like Jerry Miculek have to be on their game to keep the .357 Magnum under control.

In my experience, shooting full-load .357 Magnum from short-barreled guns is totally different than shooting the same ammo in a long barrel gun. From the short barrel, the .357 is a lot more powerful than .38 Special +P, but it's not much more powerful than 9mm. The main difference is it offers heavier bullets. But going to a long barrel with .357 Magnum can double the muzzle energy from the short barrel. With a 6" barrel, .357 can have as much as triple the muzzle energy of some factory self-defense loads in 9mm from a 4" barrel.

Consider that Harry's "light special" in .44 caliber was most likely a reference to .44 Special unless he hand-loaded. Comparing muzzle energy with a .44 won't always do because the bullets can be much heavier. Instead we can compare recoil energy. .44 Special recoil energy in a 3 pound gun ranges from about 4.0 ft-lbs with a 165 grain bullet to 6.9 ft-lbs with a 240 grain bullet using Hodgdon maximum load data. .357 in a 3 pound gun ranges from 10 to 13ft.-lbs of recoil energy. The short-barreled .357's will never produce this kind of energy, but it is there in the .357 Magnum for the guns that can extract it.

So if you put .357 Magnum catridges in the same N-frame Harry was shooting with what were apparently .44 Special cartridges, the recoil energy with the .357 would be a lot more. Harry's comments seem to suggest the N-frame "tamed" the .44 Special, but we know the .357 can produce as much as double the recoil energy.

 

[mistermills357]

I had a Speed Six .357 with Pachmayer rubber grips, and they did a good job of handling the round.
The gun still had a habit of twisting and bucking a little bit, but I did not care, it was a favorite of mine.

 

[mistermills357]

I used a Pachmayer Gripper on a Speed Six .357, it still bucked and twisted, but it was a lot easier to handle.

 

[PzGren]

Everybody who shot my New Vaquero was surprised how little felt recoil there was!

 

[Crowman]

What do you need to shoot with ammo that stout along with the accompanying recoil and commotion?

Bear & hawgs