Given it's popularity by collectors and shooters, and the price of centerfire ammo, it seems Colt could have a market, IF they mfg the high quality 22 Woodsman again.

Anyone know why it's not been done?

I think it would be a long shot, perhaps very, very long. What it would cost to bring the original back. Look at what is offered by others and the price range. Would you pay over $1K for new Woodsman? Great pistol, but I fear it's time is past. I would guess Colt has gotten rid of the machinery long ago as given it history it was used hard and long.

The Ruger .22 auto killed off the Woodsman 50 years ago.

I like the older ones with the smooth sights that don't snag pockets.

At an estimated price of $1200 to $1500 apiece, I doubt if Colt could sell enough New Woodsmans to make up the cost of new tooling and other costs necessary to put one of their finest products back into production.

If they made enough changes to the pistol to bring the price down to, say, that of a Buckmark, then it wouldn't be a Woodsman anymore. And if it wasn't substantially better than a Buckmark, what would be the point?

I am thinking the cream of the current crop that it would compete with would be the S&W 41. They still make 'em after 55 years or so. They must be selling the occasional unit and the dealer cost is a touch over a grand.

I have both of them and like my first-year-of-production 41 much better.

As long as Smith makes the model 41 who cares.

Dink

The S&W 41 can be sold at that price because it IS still in production, which also means they don't have to make very much on each pistol since all the equipment and tooling was paid for years ago.

When the tooling gets too old the 41 will be gone, too.

they half tried in the 90s with the "Cadet"
for some reason they couldn't call it Cadet so it is just a 'colt 22'


(not my pic)

they were short lived

The S&W Model 41 is iconic, as are a few of the High Standards. They are still in production but are not considered the same. The Model 41 is in limited production and very hard to find. Like the S&W 52 series, I do not think it will be long lived either. The Colt while a great 22LR pistol was never in the same league as the High Standards and the Model 41. They were/are the target bullseye pistol with a proven history and even Olympic history.

The 41 is not hard to come by... One phone call will get you one for current dealer price at any number of wholesalers. Not many shops will stock them, I'll give you that, but they are not limited in any way I see.

Plenty of Browning Challenger's and Challenger II's floating around out there - quite similar to the Woodsman, without the Colt charisma of course.

Had a Colt like above, there was a patent name dispute, believe the one I had was marked Cadet....another one I should have kept...

Had a 41, nice gun, 5.5, touch heavy for a carry all day field piece, the Woodsman's seem to fit my hand great and are not bulky or heavy, and certainly like the build quality over many of the current crop. No doubt the Ruger's are built like tanks and I have a few. Ashame Colt can't make the Woodsman at a decent price point.

There's a chance of anything but that one's unlikely.

The Colt Woodsmans, Browning's similar Challengers and the various High Standards were dropped because they were to expensive for the market to sustain in sufficent volume; that hasn't changed.

Two pistols I will never sell are my mo.41 and my Military Victor.My Uncle had a fine collection of Colt Woodsman`s that were stolen from his house the day of his Funeral.

I have two Woodsman's 2nd , 3rd issue and i also have the Model 41 , i had two Model 41's but gave my son one of them . I have three Barrels for my 41 , the 5.5 heavy , 5 inch Sporter with Red Insert ramp sight , and 7 inch Sporter . I love my Woodsman's but they aren't in the same league as the Smith 41 when it comes to accuracy . When packing in the woods all day it it is usually one of my Woodsman's instead of the heavier 41

The best looking pistol is the Colt Woodsman Bullseye Match Target.

Dear Lord, the model 41 is just a lump of metal and wood compared to that Colt.

Look at any pistol from that time period and compare it with a modern equivalent. FWIW the finish was much better. Did it work better? Who knows?

Colt Woodsmen came with a factory target in the box.

I don't think they'll make any more. Like the Savage 99, Winchester 88, classic S&W revolvers, and many others, it would be just too expensive to manufacture.

No doubt the quality of firearms of that era are w/o peer

Too bad USFA stopped production of all its Colt repros in order to produce the strange ZIP gun that takes 10/22 mags...

USFA stopped the woodsman? I don't think they ever got one out the door......

Funny this thread came up. My mom in law just pulled one out of a drawer in her house. It was in a leather holster. She hasn't seen the thing in decades she said. She wasn't even sure whose it was. I clean it up and shot it. Quite a nice pistol.

I knew USFA was slated, never seen any, but never desired a 'Colt copy' w/o it actually being a Colt. Not that another brand might not be as good or better quality, it would always be brand XYZ.

Kinda like their single actions?

Like lots of other things, people always say they will buy X if they make it and then about 1 out of 1000 who say that actually do (maybe even less). This is the exact reason they don't make X gun in Y caliber when lots of people say they would buy one right up if they did.

I think it is very unlikely, I would even say the model 41's days are numbered as when the existing tooling goes so goes the pistol. The real issue however is the demise of bulls eye target shooting by the masses. sure there may be a few sanctioned matches but the participants can be numbered in the dozens not hundreds or even thousands.
For those of us north of 50 years old the shooting sports we grew up with have all but been abandoned. Just this week my buddy was saying he had stopped by Friendship Indiana and it was all but vacant. Not many years ago you couldn't get into that tiny town because of the traffic but frankly we were the young turks 15 years ago and now that we are crowding 60 the real players that were there are all in their 70's and 80's and just dont or cant go. I'm afraid that the traditional shooting sports are going the way of the dodo and carrier pigeon and the fine target guns like the match targets and the model 41's are not far behind. I watch these young guys at the range and frankly they have little concern about accuracy or their ability to shoot. Today 90% of them just seem to want to make noise and see if they can shred something with their ak's , sks's and ar platform rifles. The only remainder of traditional local target shooting I see are sporting clays and truthfully it is a pretty expensive endeavor. I'm afraid in another 15 or 20 years it will all be about gone. Just my $.02.

I almost bought one of those Colt Cadets (before the Cadet name and the gun itself) were dropped. I've always been curious just how accurate they were. Anyone know?