Another Uberti or Pietta thread

I know this has been asked MANY times but I’m looking for current, up to date info, not rehashed info people heard years ago.

I’m about to buy an 1860 army and I’ve read for days about the differences between the brands. The 2 I’m debating are within $10 of each other shipped so price isn’t a factor. It seems a lot of opinions and info are based on older years? I’ve read that Uberti looks better but Pietta works better, but then I’ve also read that Pietta looks as good and that new Uberti aren’t as high quality. Can anybody help with this? Do any of you have actual side by side experience with current models from each?

FYI the only experience I have is I own a Pietta/Cimarron 1873 that looks, feels, and works great. I had an old traditions 1851 years ago that was only ok, it was gritty and I never liked it much and ended up giving it away.

The internals of the Uberti, and the fitting are way better than Pietta

I own probably almost a dozen of each, honestly but to sum it up , my Ubertis feel like guns, and my Piettas feel like toys

With the hit and miss quality control issues that plague both makers these days it would best to find a shop like Dixie Gun Works where you can handle each and work the actions.

kingston73 said:

FYI the only experience I have is I own a Pietta/Cimarron 1873 that looks, feels, and works great. I had an old traditions 1851 years ago that was only ok, it was gritty and I never liked it much and ended up giving it away.

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I have one of those (45) chambers are irregular, never heard back from them. poor customer service from both of them.
Customer service is very important, perhaps check into that.

I've had an 1860 from each in the past year. I bought the Pietta first, good gun, needed a touch of polishing inside (I'm a bit fussy when it comes to that). It shot balls very good, but I bought it to hunt with and it didn't have room to load a conical on the gun. I wasn't grinding on such a fine gun, so down the road it went, and an Uberti moved in. It had room to load conicals on the gun and also slicked up nice.
My take? Pietta for ball shooting, Uberti for either balls or bullets. The Uberti grip frame is a tiny bit smaller, if that matters.
I put a taller front sight on both to bring them to point of aim. VTI part no. UB900015

Stantheman86 said:

The internals of the Uberti, and the fitting are way better than Pietta

I own probably almost a dozen of each, honestly but to sum it up , my Ubertis feel like guns, and my Piettas feel like toys

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2 dozen BP revolvers? You are my hero, and a fortunate man indeed. I'm worried sick about putting money out for one. I'd say your advice to Stan is sound. Maybe someday you might post a pic of all those revolvers if you happen to ever have them all together for some reason.

Pietta is the single greatest pistol ever made, riveling Colt, Remington, Spiller and Burr, Amri San Marco, Pedersoli and all other manner of six shooter.

That's not true.

Buy the Uberti.

TDM said:

With the hit and miss quality control issues that plague both makers these days it would best to find a shop like Dixie Gun Works where you can handle each and work the actions.

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Absolutely the best advice you are going to receive.

If you cannot do that, call Taylor's and ask for the Gunsmith.

Ask which is the better pistol and get an honest answer, they sell both brands.

I have a couple of Uberti’s and 4 Pietta’s. All needed some degree of fit and polish. Very happy with both makers. But I think it’s a roll of the dice now.

We have some Pietta haters here but I'm not one of them, I currently own over a dozen, including a few that have been permanently converted to metallic cartridges, and I've never had any major issues with any of them. Yes, they're typically rough internally as delivered, and a good tune up is an absolute must...And that's the case for Uberti's as well...Although they typically will do better straight out of the box. The Pietta is also not as finely finished as an Uberti is and have some rather unsightly markings, which you can either ignore or remove...I've done both. As far a loading conical bullets, Uberti's are normally good to go but I've encountered some that need slight modification to the loading window. Pietta's are designed only for round balls and WILL require a good amount of material to be removed around the loading window as well as either modification of the plunger, which as a professional machinist, takes me around 5 minutes in my lathe...Or you can go the easy route and simply replace the Pietta plunger with one made by Uberti, which are already contoured for loading conical bullets. All that being said, for your first 1860, I'd recommend just going with the Uberti, perhaps upgrading the nipples with some Slixshot's, and commence with making some wonderfully and highly addictive aromatic smoke.

Mike in FL said:

2 dozen BP revolvers? You are my hero, and a fortunate man indeed. I'm worried sick about putting money out for one. I'd say your advice to Stan is sound. Maybe someday you might post a pic of all those revolvers if you happen to ever have them all together for some reason.

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I can try to get them together for a group photo

I just this week +2'd my Piettas with a pair of .44 Colt-type brassers and added +1 Uberti with an 1858 (1866) Remington 18" carbine

Piettas do make fun range toys and I've done plenty of blasting with all of mine, the Dance Brothers in my profile pic is probably my favorite Pietta.

I actually have a pair of the Uberti full flute 1860's on backorder that I've been waiting for since forever, now that I think of it. There's no Pietta that will match the eye appeal of Uberti's full flute "McCollough" 1860's.

I got a 1862 pocket police last week. Its gorgeous and has alot of the issues that come with just a small revolver. However there are no machining marks at all. The bluing is perfect, fit and finish is near perfect except for the wooden grips, nothing a little hand sanding won't take care of. My only other revolver is also an uberti, 1858 and it had machining marks all on the inside. It was made in 2020 but it performs flawless after some slicking. Both shoot strait. Never had a failure to fire with either, but I always replace the nipples before I even fire it. I am pleased with both and kinda enjoy the tinkering and the satisfaction it brings when I get it "just right". If your gonna have to mess with both, might as well end up with one that looks better in the end and is closer to the originals. I've seen videos where "capandball" took a uberti cylinder and cycled it in an original colt.

Pete453 said:

I've had an 1860 from each in the past year. I bought the Pietta first, good gun, needed a touch of polishing inside (I'm a bit fussy when it comes to that). It shot balls very good, but I bought it to hunt with and it didn't have room to load a conical on the gun. I wasn't grinding on such a fine gun, so down the road it went, and an Uberti moved in. It had room to load conicals on the gun and also slicked up nice.
My take? Pietta for ball shooting, Uberti for either balls or bullets. The Uberti grip frame is a tiny bit smaller, if that matters.
I put a taller front sight on both to bring them to point of aim. VTI part no. UB900015

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Conicals load best with a bench loader.
Given range a ball will do more than you think.

Never had issues with either.

Six of one, half a dozen of the other. Both have drastically improved their products over the last 10-15yrs. Uberti's tend to have short arbors and Pietta's tend to have more offensive stuff stamped on their guns. One might be have a better representation of a certain model than the other. Generally, both are very good. Pietta's got a lot better around 2010 but they also changed some dimensions which made the unmentionable conversions fit less good. So I bought a couple more older guns. Not as refined as the new ones but still very good.

Got several more of each in the last couple years, so my experience is current. I've got 37 Uberti's going back to 1986 and 15 Pietta's going back to the early 2000's. Only reason there's more Uberti's is that they make more unmentionables.

These two are less than six months old and very good examples of Uberti's work.

If you are like myself and will shoot the thing occasionally either one will probably satisfy your needs. I have a Pietta 1861 .36 and a Uberti 1860 in .44 cal.. both are fine with me.

Only have one, a Pietta. Got it free, "tuned" it myself, works great.
New cones, jeweled every place I could.

Bang, my conicals have rebated bases, they're meant for revolvers and they load just fine in my revolvers. I don't and won't own a bench loader, the originals didn't need them and I won't own a gun that needs one. It's a matter of buying the correct mould. If you want to use bullets for the modern guns, that's a different story altogether.
I know balls will perform, I use them for the majority of my shooting, but my moulds are for flat point bullets. No round ball or round nose/pointed conicals can touch them for performance on meat.

BULL'S-EYE said:

All that being said, for your first 1860, I'd recommend just going with the Uberti, perhaps upgrading the nipples with some Slixshot's, and commence with making some wonderfully and highly

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I was trying to objectively answer Kingston's question, but if pressed really hard, this would be my answer also. My Uberti 60 with Slix runs like a well oiled sewing machine, as smooth as a couple fine modern pieces. It's my favorite revolver.

Pete453 said:

Bang, my conicals have rebated bases, they're meant for revolvers and they load just fine in my revolvers. I don't and won't own a bench loader, the originals didn't need them and I won't own a gun that needs one. It's a matter of buying the correct mould. If you want to use bullets for the modern guns, that's a different story altogether.
I know balls will perform, I use them for the majority of my shooting, but my moulds are for flat point bullets. No round ball or round nose/pointed conicals can touch them for performance on meat.

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Where can I get a flat nose mold that will work with paper cartridges