Any of you guys have a M15 2”? I have wanted one for some time for some reason. A buddy who has a gunshop got a nice one in the other day and I asked him to hold it for me. Not sure why I’ve been fascinated with the adjustable sighted 2” square butt since the first one I ever saw but I have.

I’ll put it in the rotation with my Chief special and 2” M10 and carry it some. I don’t worry much about the short ejector rod, most of my carry is for shooting pigs, snakes, and other varmints when I’m out hunting arrowheads and mushrooms or fishing not too many running gun battles with gangs of bandits around my rural area.

I've got one, a 15-3. I'd wanted one ever since reading about them in the Gun Digest Book of Combat Handgunnery, 4th Ed. by Chuck Taylor:



With the Pachmayr grip adapter, it becomes substantially easier for me to shoot:

My first introduction to handguns, back in 1980, was with a stainless two inch Combat Masterpiece that belonged to my NRA instructor, a retired Deputy Sheriff.

The one I’m looking at is just like Oregon45’s, I don’t care for the nickel front sight on the nickel guns. I bet I can bop some critters if it shoots as well as that one.

What load and distance was that target Oregon? Looks like it and you both are shooters.

The stainless version of the Mod 15 is the Mod 67. If you saw a 2" Model 67 you saw a one-of-a-kind.

Nickel, perhaps. Long time ago.

Gold star from teacher for you, though.

148gr HBWC over Trail Boss, 15 yards off-hand, single action.

Oregon45,
That looks to be a sweetheart you've got there.

I've got a 4" 15-4 Combat Masterpiece that is pristine.

Never seen a 2" Model 15 in the flesh that I can recall, although I've probably passed by a few at the gun shows buried in a case with 20 other guns.

Good luck wit yours, Kid!

I had an excellent condition 15 snubby in nickel . I sold it for $500 or $600 about 5 years ago during a sale. They are cool looking even in 4”.

That is a nice gun...

I've only had one...60s vintage that came with real stag grips... Put some proper stock grips back on and sold it only because the square butt with short barrel just didn't balance for me....one of those guns that should have been a Round Butt...

Bob

I agree wholeheartedly about the round-butt thing. My agency issued 2" K-frames to plainclothes personnel back in the day and the Square-Butt model was just an odd duck. It didn't conceal a bit better than a three or four inch gun and it certainly didn't shoot as well.

A few years ago the manager of my local gun store called me and said he had something he thought I'd be interested in, and that I should come over and take a look. He was right, but at that time I was short on funds, so had to leave it for another collector to pick up. It was a mint condition Model 15 with a 2" (pinned) barrel, wearing a beautiful set of Sambar stag grips in the Magna configuration. Nearly killed me to walk away from it, but did.

Have to agree on that. Why shorten a barrel to two inches and leave the butt frame square?

The Kid: I am a big fan of the Smith & Wesson Model 15's and have owned and shot many in the past - including one that was issued to me by my department once I "qualified" "Expert". I had been carrying the standard issue Model 10 up until attaining that, highest at the time, pistol proficiency rating.
Puzzling now, that department policy issuing Model 10's to everyone initially, instead of the more versatile (adjustable sights!) Model 15's.
I have 3 Model 15's in my collection now but they are all 4' Models.
I have been looking for a Model 15 with 2" barrel for MANY years - sadly unsuccessfully.
Enjoy that cool and kinda rare pistol once you get it home.
Good for you.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

Very cool pistol!!! Enjoy!!

Just to kick this thread back up a notch.

15-4 4"

It’s here! Went and picked it up this evening after work. Just enough holster wear on the sharp edges to make me not think twice about carrying and using it. Stocks are perfect, not a chip or scratch on them.

I had to run down to the dead end road and light a few off just to make sure it worked. Previous owner was left handed I’m guessing, rear sight was cranked over to the left and the first two rounds at 25 yards were about 8” left of center. Centered the blade up and had them landing right on top of the front site at 25. Put 8 in a row in a 1lb propane can that was laying down there offhand from 25 paces, think it’s a keeper. It does shoot a good bit higher with 173gr Keith bullets, probably 4” high, but stacked 6 125gr plated bullets right over the top edge of the blade. Have to load up some ammo and go shoot a pig with it.

Good onya kid. Shoot heck out of it.

I have owned several through the years. All were great revolvers.

I think mine is a 15-2 with 2" barrel. It was the first S&W I bought and I didn't even know they were so rare.....Craig Spegel cocobolo boot grips.
Had an oppty to pick up a pristine 15-3 4" and jumped on that as well.

Awesome, Kid. Looks and sounds like you found a nice one.

Nice collectable specimen, there.

Sweet classic piece you have there.

I've got a nice, four inch barrel, Model 15 with a pinned barrel. I have it's twin in stainless, but no pinned barrel (but having the firing pin on the hammer and, naturally, no key hole), and I've got a pinned barrel (four inch) Model 18, which is a Combat Masterpiece in .22 LR. All sweet shooters.

I wish now that I’d have bought up a shoebox full of 4” Combat Masterpieces 5-7 years ago when police trade ins were available for $250-300. I was more into 38-44s and 357s then and had little to no interest in a 4” K frame 38.
A well used 4” adjustable sight K makes a fine general purpose handgun around the area I live. Nothing bigger than a pig and nothing more dangerous than a rattlesnake around so a good shooting 150-170gr SWC load at 900fps will get a lot done out to the 75-100 yard line. Sometimes it’s nice not living in bear country.

I've owned one blue and one nickel 2" model 15. Both were very accurate and easy to shoot. I never could get over how much I wished they were both round butts and let them both slip away. If I had it to do over again, I'd have sent one off to get the round butt treatment and it would still be with me. I have other irons in the fire these days, but do miss those old K frames.

those 4 inch k frames seem to be perfect whether they're 22's, 38's or 357's. and the L frame 44 is pretty close

And I have and carry often a RB 2” M10-5. It’s a great little gun and I wouldn’t want to be in front of me with it but it doesn’t point nearly as well for me with Magnas as a square butt.

Try a set of these.

About 10 years ago I passed one of them up.
Local store had it back in the days you mention. Orange Co. Sheriffs stamps.
Anyway, they had been burgled, and lost this gun.
Fast forward to 2007, it was recovered in a Baltimore home invasion.
Returned to the shop with a few more bruises, it worked perfectly.

I had the $125 in my wallet, but got cheap at the wrong time.
Couple days later, I was back. But someone smarter hadn't hesitated.

Around 1970 in S.E Florida, a LEO (or recruit) could buy a brand new blued Model 15 at Jones Equipment for $80 OTD.

Eat your hearts out.

Do you still have it?

But wasn’t that recruit making like $175 a month? I almost bet they’re cheaper now than they were then

Winchestermodel70: I specifically recall buying a Smith& Wesson Model 60 (stainless five shot revolver) in 1969 for $90.00!
I do not believe I got a law enforcement discount on that one.
Times sure have changed (prices/values/availability).
If I only could have "seen" into the future back then.
I would have loaded up on Smith & Wesson Model 15's, 14's, 29's, 60's, 48's, 34's, 19's and 27's!
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

Didn't buy one as I already had a Model19.

Gross pay was $580 a month, which went to $607 after graduation.

I would love to find one of the USAF property Model 15s, it was the first centerfire revolver that I ever fired. Qualified with it prior to my initial overseas tour in Diyarbakir, Turkey in the late 80s.

i qualified with one of those before i went overseas too. it was a grey, old beater but i still shot expert with it. but i had an 586 no dash at the time so i knew my way around one.

I've always wondered why the USAF issued the M15 .38 Special instead of the 1911. The military .38 round was so anemic it sure wasn't doing the Air Force guys any favors.

We had Model 10/M&P's along with 1911A1's in the 3rd ID in 1985.
They would put lead where you intended.

Weight was the reason. They were planning to do all their business in air-transportable ways, and didn't want the extra weight. Yeah, it makes no sense, but that's the reason. Same thing with the M1 carbines they WERE using when they went to the AR-15s (and then M-16s), It was the Air Force that wanted the M-16s in the first place, then some SF guys got hold of some and decided they liked them.

I once shot a possum with some WCC '71 .38 Ball at contact distance, it took all six rounds to kill that danged thing.

A guy told me once that he’d chronographed some of that WCC ball and it was doing like 530fps out of a 4” barrel. Knockdown power!

friend of mine flew F4's out of thailand into vietnam and North Vietnam. AT the time he collected a couple of five gallon pails of spent
38special casings recovered from some of the ranges, still uses it to this day. When it cracks, it gets thrown out.
He did carry other sidearms other than the revolver issued, one was a revolver size .410 he had made in thailand, figured it would be better for shooting monkeys. The british WWI round for the S&W was a 200grain bullet at about the 600fps level. Not high velocity, but thumper bullet.
i acquired a victory revolver some years ago with the leather shoulder rig. The rig had provisions for carrying extra rounds, some of which were still on the rig. As the story went, the pilot fired six rounds off the back end of a carrier to make sure it worked, then never fired it again, but brought it home. I never opened up one of those rounds, but they weren't all that impressive to look at. that gun was carried all through the pacific. A pilot wasn't meant to go into combat with ground troops anyway. I believe belgian hi powers were well thought of at the time because of the capacity too.

one of the handguns you don't see mentioned very much was colts answer to the victory smith and wesson, the colt commando.

For crying out loud. I've got Co2 BB gun pistols that run 450 fps.

Yes, but they had to be weak enough for some of the airweights that Smith had built that had ALUMINUM cylinders (yeah, that went over like a lead balloon and didn't work worth a crap). Like I said, the Air Farce was all about the weight back then. Even if it wasn't enough to matter.

Geez,

And fast forward 40 years and they were doing the same thing over but better with the TI cylinder guns. And if you somehow find yourself in possession of one of the AL cylinder aircrewman revolvers you have a nice windfall should you decide to sell.
As a neat sidetrack/footnote pertaining to early alloy cylinder S&Ws, I have read that sometime in the 1950’s they built one or possibly two aluminum cylinder Heavy Duty revolvers. They were chambered for the 30 Carbine. I don’t recall if the frames were alloy as well and whether they were 6 or 8 shooters, but talk about a conversation piece if you had one.

I have an old set of Herrett's Jordan Troopers that were made for a square grip.I have used them on both square and round grip k frames. My 2 1/2" model 66 currently wears them and it feels great.

I saw a real clean 2 1/2" model 15 in a pawn shop a couple of days ago. Priced very reasonably but it was 2 states from home and i passed.

Guns in the safe don't eat anything, but my happiest days were those when I owned rifles in .22 and .243, and one 12 ga shotgun. I carried an issue revolver.
I'd give my largest investment account to feel like that again...

Combat Masterpiece to the rescue! Took the boy to the ranch yesterday to sit on the pond and shoot doves. Pulled up to the gate and hopped out to be greeted by this big guy. Grabbed my 2” M15 from between the seats of the truck and shot his head off with a SWC HP.


Of course after I had him good and dead my sidekick had to “BB” him a little bit.

Good shot. Nice gun.

Excellent shooting.

Nice work!

A 2" model 15 and 4" model 18 are both on my want list.

My 4" 15 is the nicest shooting revolver I've ever played with.

I wish I could have got one of the M-15s issued to our unit before the switch to M-9s. Those M-15's actions were smooooth!!!

Never understood the attraction of a 2" M15 with a 4" available, unless you're carrying in a purse. The extra 2" of barrel don't do squat for concealment but does add velocity and sight radius. M15 was my first centerfire revolver and there are many more under and not so many above IMHO.

Main attraction for me is that they aren’t a 4”. I enjoy revolvers that are somewhat scarce or unusual, and I like snubbies. I’m not very worried about concealment, if I need to be serious about having a concealed firearm that can’t print or show I have a J frame or an LCP.

It’s just something slightly out of the ordinary that I find attractive and enjoy shooting.

3" Combat Masterpiece my way

If anybody is looking for an excellent model 10 with the tapered Barrel, my LGS just got one in a couple days ago. Lockup and action are outoutstanding. I would have bought it, but I like the Bull Barrels better.

They also got in an excellent condition 3 inch Model 36.

Anyone interested can PM me and I will send them contact info for the LGS.