My 50+ year old brass 1860 Colt

This is the frame of my Italian repop 1860 Colt that I bought in 1973. It has been shot, always with light (15-18g loads) less than 100 times. I know that because I bought a bag of 100 round balls the same day I bought the gun and the bag is not empty yet. At my age, and because I have several other cap-n-ball revolvers to shoot, it will probably still be good when I leave it behind for one of my grandsons. My eyes can see no wear/damage to the brass frame, only the machining tool marks that were present when it was new. What say ye?


The complete pistol, polished for the first time in 20+ years. I cleaned and polished the frame so I could check out the back of it so then I felt like I should polish all the brass. Fifty years ago I used to polish it the hard way, now I have Dremel tools and it is much easier & faster.

It is much safer to do the polishing by hand. As a general rule, it is a good idea to keep a Dremel tool away from guns, with very few exceptions.

That is a nice-looking gun.

Nothing wrong with a Dremel and felt or cotton polishing/buffing wheels. Way easier than by hand!

I shared these pics on a Facebook group and someone said the frame is already damaged. He says this pic shows the damage.

tom in nc said:

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I shared these pics on a Facebook group and someone said the frame is already damaged. He says this pic shows the damage.

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Well, you have to know where to look. The recoil ring is what the percussion cylinder backs up against and that's where the indentation occurs. You can see it in your pic. As the indentation increases, your cylinder will scoot further and further back causing excessive endshake.

Mike

Will someone who knows where to look, and how to do it indicate on my pic what to look for to see the damage, please? Thanks.

tom in nc said:

Will someone who knows where to look, and how to do it indicate on my pic what to look for to see the damage, please? Thanks.

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Ok, notice the difference in the thickness of the ring on the right side (proper ( 8, 9, 10 o'clock)) vs the left side (1, 2, 3, 4 o'clock). This difference in sides is just "poor machining" ( not square) but more to the point, the compression is evident on the latter side.

Mike

Best of luck with it.