I am not trying to pick things apart, but the other thing i noticed was the "blue" of the heads of some of the screws to me don't quite match the patina of the rest of the revolver. Now on the other hand, quite possible i am off base.
what intrigues me about this stuff is a early 44.40 i have that the barrel was cut down. The head of the colt collectors group in the state saw it and called it an "indian gun" in that indians often did that to early colts. I ain't good enough to know the truth of it. I should post a picture for comment.
Colt SAA's are almost in a world of their own collecting-wise. Relatively to other collectibles, lots of them were made, but besides the rare variants, even common guns are desirable. For instance, the 41 Colt is much rarer than the 45 Colt but the 45 Colt 1st gens will almost always bring more given the same condition. That said, ultra rare examples bring the most and high condition guns bring more than lesser ones. This particular specimen is nearly unique. The circumstances lend credence to its not having been cut. Cutting the barrel lowers the value dramatically. That said, if the barrel on this gun has been cut, I don't know how much it would effect things since the rarity of the piece so far overshadows the other details. Cut barrel, refinish, mixed numbers...these are the big value killers. I don't think the gun has been refinished. A knowledgeable collector as the OP obviously is, should be able to tell rather easily if the barrel has been cut, claims of super-fakers notwithstanding. Some screws apparently have been replaced. Replacement screws have the least impact on value of any detectable replacement on an SAA. On two extremely high condition guns, one with replacement screws and one without, the one without would bring more money...but it would be hard to tell that the screws were replacements (assuming fitting screws of the correct period's appearance) on a high condition gun in the first place!
All that said, I don't think a few replacement screws affect the value of this gun at all. The reason they appear to be replacement screws is the difference in appearance of the screws in question and a couple of other screws on the gun which are pretty obviously original or very old replacements.
