Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns The 38 thread

Anyone have a Colt Officers Match, Target, Special, et al? I’m leaning hard towards grabbing a 40s production 38 Heavy barrel. Have never owned one but they look like a fun and inexpensive, relatively, way to dip into the Colt pool.

Part of me wants one of the hideous Officers Model Specials for whatever reason. They had better shoot because they’re nothing to look at.

I've had both a pre war and a 50's 5th model.

They shoot, you won't be disappointed in either. The pre models are cone cut specifically steep for wadcutters.

Need to find another 5th model Officers Model Match. Pissed I sold it for other stuff.

I bailed on a 5th model at auction a couple weeks ago when it got too rich for me. Should have probably stuck with it for another hundred to see what happened.

I assume even with the forcing cone cut for wadcutters they’ll probably shoot a RN or SWC acceptably well?

All but the 1st models based on the Army special use the same lockwork, correct? I’ve never been a big time Colt mechanic, never saw the volume of them I did S&Ws, but I do know my way around one to some degree.

A Shooting Master would be neat to go with my N frame 38s but they’re more than I want to spend unless I found a deal.

The Officer's Model Targets (pre-war) like sharp shouldered designs better than RN, like a WC and SWC and the twist is a bit steeper than Smiths for stabilizing them a little farther out. Of course a round nose with a shoulder of some kind are all over, but the pre-war stuff were designed for slow fire wadcutter work.

Yes, E and I model lock work are "basically" the same, but there are differences even in the frames and parts and the most drastic changes are somewhere in the 20's as far as I can tell, so I tend to avoid anything needing work from that era or earlier because while they do make newly manufactured parts that can be fitted to the standardized stuff, the really old stuff just wasn't "standard" like the 30's and after..

The fifth models were/are awesome, accurate guns with modern click adjustable sights. I kept the 5th Model 22. It shoots like a rifle.
The 38 Colt I had shot better than the two 14's and 2 15's in my pic, but funds wound up chasing my current 32 fetish.
And being a manly man, the Smiths didn't have the bluing wear the Colt had, so my sense of fashion helped its departure.

The .38 is all I plan on shooting in my 3 inch king Cobra. The magnums are for the 6 inch version and the Henry X.

I’d love a Model 64 tapered barrel.

I have a 64 in the FBI configuration, i.e., three inch bull barrel and round butt frame. Great carry gun, IWB.

Anybody know when they started putting heavy barrels on the Model 15?

The Standard Catalog specifically mentions when the 4" Model 64 went from a tapered to a heavy barrel but nothing is mentioned about the Model 15. My M15-2 from the early 60's has the tapered barrel and narrow rib but a 15-7 from 1995 has a heavy barrel (no taper) and wide rib, basically it looks like a 4" Model 14. A late production Model 67-5 also has a heavy barrel.

Not that the 15-7 and 67-5 are boat anchors but one of the big draws of a 4" K-frame .38 is sitting squarely in the Goldilocks zone - not too heavy, not too light but just right.

Very true. The K frame is the K frame. Change out barrels, cylinders and chambers, add some trigger and hammer opt ions etc but metallurgically same animal.

Hard to beat a Colt Diamondback in 38 Special. Butter smooth and accurate.

Jim,

My 15-2 in the picture is a wide rib, bull barrel, unlike yours.

Can't help on the whens and where's, but I think you could still order about any Smith you desired in 38 or 357 into the 70's.
Other cartridges and frames, not so much.

LEO held sway with the K frame during that period, but I've never seen a 15 or 19 with a Patridge front sight, but I believe they were available.

I wonder if all their owners all lost the drop clearing leather....

It's a Police Positive Special dolled up to look like a Python.

And a Python is a Trooper/357 dolled up to look like a Python. Is that what we're getting at? And yes, contrary to popular belief Pythons in the hands of Hartfords most experienced didn't make them any better or worse than what they made on the production line.
If you've ever been inside a Colt DA of old the parts are fitted to work first in unison without any hiccups. That alone requires some finesse, otherwise the actions would still be used today with CNC or other machining. Any amount of polishing after that may or may not produce a cleaner action. Or you can polish all the points of index and declare them "match grade" by the most experienced armorers, but that doesn't always necessarily make them so.
Ive had a 1960 Trooper that was better than the Python and so have 5 Officer's models, pre and post war, both for action and accuracy. Granted that's one Python for six others, but that's my point.

I've had a 38 Diamondback and find its better in 22 and would have been excellent in 32. More metal, on average, always seems to make more accuracy whether handguns or long guns.

I'll take my two 38/44's to hit with any day of the week. The five incher hits better for all who have fired it over the 8 inch 14 and six inch single action 14, even with the same loads. Noise, racket and recoil, even with the 38, shows up on paper.

True of any machine with levers and fulcrums, geometry is more important than a mirror finish on interfacing parts.

Are your 38/44s long or short action guns HawkI? I have both and maybe one of the few who do or at least will admit to preferring the short action lockwork. Shot side by side I swear I can discern a difference in lock time. An early post war K38 with the fishhook or speed hammer may have been the ultimate to come through my hands insofar as having a great action right out of the box.

My 50’s production Outdoorsman is like your 5” you described, if I need to hit something that’s the gun I’m most likely to do it with. Aside from the depth of the chambers and lack of checkering it is every bit the equal of the flagship 357/pre27 of the same era.

A 158 @1200 isn’t a load for shooting all the time. At least not by me. But if a newer 15/67 is what you have, that load might not be a bad thing to have when you are out in black bear country.

Expat

All three 38/44 Outdoorsmans I'm aquainted with are post war short actions, but all three are pre-models. I think the only 23 I've ever seen was on Gunboker. All three are serialed in the time frame Smith came out with the "U-type" spring that actuated both hammer and trigger return, but none had the U spring, which turned out to be not so hot, but I thought having one would be interesting.
The 38/44 Heavy Duty is pre-war long action and yes, you can tell. It also has the pre-war nubbin of a hammer as well, which is standard in the older long action guns.

The later Smiths are even shorter for throw; a buddy has a 629 DX that's pretty slick if you like the short actions and most of the non-hammer mounted pin guns are like that.

40's vintage Officer's Model Target and late-40's and upward Officer's Model Match are excellent revolvers but for my money please make it a pre-war Officer's Model Target heavy barrel. There's a reason those Colts dominated the pre-war bullseye game, based on their nonpareil workmanship and their attention to throating/forcing cone/rifling dimensions aimed at long sharp shouldered bullets as Hawk I pointed out. The heavy barrel versions provide wonderful slightly weight forward balance for target work.

The sight adjusting is a little awkward for modern shooters due to elevation being adjusted via the front sight blade and rear sight adjustment only accommodating windage. (And for Pete's sake learn the correct sequence for loosening/tightening the two front sight screws, and keep them tight - replacement screws are scarce and most assuredly not the correct thread pitch. Ask me how I know. There is but one guy in the country who's made it a crusade to manufacture and sell the correct screws, the aftermarket screws in general from "normal" supply houses are .010" too small diameter even though both are nominally the same thread pitch.)

This is good info, thank you.

I have the hots for one of the Officers Models of late and I don’t know a lot about them. I’ve been doing some heavy reading over on the Colt forum and it looks like all of them are great, but like HawkI said it may be best to stay away from the earliest production for a regular user.

I’m sure price will ultimately dictate what I end up with but given my choices I’d prefer a Heavy Barrel or the silly looking Special.

The 2nd and 3rd generation guns take the cake for looks and finish work. But the homely Special calls to me for some reason. Sort of like the High Standard “Space gun” 22s with all the wild weights, wings, and compensators. They scream 1950s cutting edge bullseye gun.

Only have one Colt .38, a 5th generation Officers Model Match made in either 1964 or 67, Colt isn't specific on their serial number lookup.

Got it on gunbroker about two years ago, price was in the $600 range which was downright cheap compared to any Snake gun and really most S&W's during that time frame. Metal finish was around 95-96% and it had the original box which is still in decent shape. Apparently the original owner(s) had been very enthusiastic with a cleaning rod so I had the barrel shortened by a .1" and recrowned. It was a "good" shooter but the new crown restored it to a great shooter.

Grew up on Smiths and always thought the original Colt Troopers, Official Police and 357 models looked clunky in comparison, but after actually owning one and handling it there is definitely a je ne sais quoi to a Colt. The action is lighter, everything goes snick snick when you open and close the cylinder or cock the hammer.


These days there is an ongoing battle between my heart and my eyes. My heart says to get a nice pre-war Colt but my eyes say if you can't mount a red dot sight on it then don't bother. The war isn't over by a long shot so who knows...

I'd have to say my favorite Colt DA revolver of all time is the pre-War Officers Model Target. No they don't have the DA of a S&W, but they're exceptionally well made, extremely accurate and they fit my larger mitt better than a K frame S&W.