Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Handguns Super Redhawk vs. Redhawk

Hey folks,

I just bought a Ruger Alaskan 454 which is built on the Super Redhawk platform. Another guy at our gun club at the same time bought a Ruger Redhawk in 45 Colt. We put them side by side. Mine has a 2.5" or 3" barrel, (can't remember) and he got the 4.25" barrel (or there abouts). The cylinders look exactly the same size except mine in unfluted.

So here's the question. If a guy wasn't going to shoot full house 454's all the time, could that Redhawk have the cylinder bored out further to hold a 454 cartridge and shoot it safely?

It is likely that heavy 45 Colt loads out the Redhawk come really close to 454 loads with the short barrel of the Alaskan.

I really like the Alaskan as far as looks and handling goes. It kind of goes hand in hand with my Number 1 458 WM. Not many guys at the club are willing to them. Kind of fun.

I'd do a five shot cylinder if putting a 454 Casull through the Redhawk is needed. The fact that Ruger did not just do this on a better platform screams "No".

With properly sized throats and cast bullets designed to seat out in the Redhawk cylinder you should be able to get the Colt to do interesting things without the rifle-like pressure.

The SRH uses a different grade of steel in its cylinder, IIRC.

Bingo. The steel and the heat treating is different.

The Super Redhawk is actually based on the GP100 and doesn't have much in common with the Redhawk. A nice conversion for the Alaskan is cutting off the frame extension (which is useless, btw) and installing a Redhawk barrel. The Alaskan is the best candidate for the conversion since it doesn't have the scallops in the top strap for scope mounts.

Oh ya, I never thought of different heat treating.

I'd say a five shot Alaskan would have been even a better margin of safety, but I won't be shooting thousands of full house 454's through it. I wanted to buy a Freedom Arms but I just couldn't find the $$, so I went with the Alaskan, granted it's not a hunting handgun, it's still fun.

Let me preface by saying that I have no gunsmithing or metallurgy experience. but I do have a lot of merchandising experience. I was selling for the largest distributor of firearms in the world when the Super RedHawk was first introduced.

The Ruger representatives. Including Bill himself told us why they came out with the Super RedHawk. First you need to remember the first chambering was the 44 magnum. Not a heavier cartridge.

Ruger told us the Super RedHawk was created for hunters to give them the capability to mount a scope on the "receiver" and not the barrel. They were having a lot of trouble with the mounting of scopes on the standard RedHawk. At the time the S&W mounting system was based on the receiver and the Ruger mounting system was based on the barrel. And the S&W system was better, and Bill did not like that. He wanted to have the hunting revolver edge. So they developed the mounting system the Super RedHawk has. And since the revolver was so massive it actually had the stability edge.

Then along came the heavier cartridges. And those heavier cartridges were a natural progression for the Super Red hawk.

As far as the actual RedHawk revolver. I have seen a lot of custom gunsmiths build some very powerful cartridges off of the RedHawk frame. Tom.

Hamilton Bowen and Gary Reeder customize some neat handguns. I am sure there are others. Take a look at the Ruger Redhawk model Bowen calls the "Alpine". When I retire I may have him make me one up with the 5 shot cylinder in .45 Colt. That and some full throttle 350 grain LBT"s are all I would ever want or need from a hand gun. Just thinking about owning one...

You can have all the fun you want with a regular 45 colt Redhawk & 330 to 350 gr bullets. They will introduce you to mind-numbing recoil, and torque beyond your wildest dreams. Good grips are a must!

I had a Redhawk turned into a 6 shot 454 by boring out the cylinders and rebarreling it. Worked fine for me