Lamatt

Has anyone ever fired a Lamatt? My son has one and it's his treasured pistol.

fun pistol but a royal pain in the butt to clean! the .44 loads usually caused the overshot wad to fall out, losing the 20 ga. load. still. a lot of fun.

One of our BP League members owns one and brought it to the range for show & tell, although I'm not sure if he even has fired it yet! It's not a .44 cal, I think that it's .42 or .40 and not just sure what size balls it shoots. Just too lazy to open up another action on the web tonight I guess!

For it's day, it WAS the NY RELOAD!

Dave

All of the modern reproduction LeMat's I found in my references were .44 caliber + 20 guage.

It could be that your friend had an original LeMat.
These were made in a 9 shot .42 + .63 caliber and a 9 shot .32 + .41 caliber.

If he has one of these originals, I doubt that he would shoot it. Back in 1994 they were valued at over $8,000. :grin:

Zonie,

I'd be willing to bet REAL MONEY that he has a reproduction! So it is a .44 after all. But wait a minute, maybe it's a .45 (.451, .454, .457) like the rest of the so-called .44's! No wonder folks wind-up shooting the wrong size balls! :haha:

Either way you look at it, it's still a handful!

Dave

:hmm: It's quite unfortunately made by Pietta and the truth is, it's not worth the bucks---unless you are a true collector and don't want to shoot it. It's quite a handful and is very tricky to disassemble just to clean it. I have often looked at one longingly but I just remember each time ---who made it. You can tell I don't think Pietta makes a very good gun, now if Uberti were to see the way and build one---then I just might weaken. Have heard too many disappointed and really upset owners complain about them on all web sites dealing with M/L'ers and/or Revolvers. :barf:

I agree in general to your take on Pietta however, I have had and shot two Lemats and both were very well made. they also do a good job on their Smith Carbines showing that they can make a good gun if motivated. The problem is, they are seldom motivated.

The Piettas have chambers of about .448 and are happy with .451 (and larger) balls. I found the shot barrel difficult to use because of the short hammer throw and failure to detonate caps. The revolver was well timed and accurate, handled spent caps very well.

The sideplate seems to be screwed on with an impact wrench and I had to make a special spanner to remove the sideplate nut. Usually, I simply cleaned after removing the barrel (s) and cylinder and flushed out the action with oil/soap/hotwater mixture.
The worst irritant was the loading lever and ramrod that fits in the hollow of the lever. Recoil would flip it upward and eject the shot barrel ramrod. Very likely, this was a result of the original design rather than pietta execution.
The Lemat is an interesting and expensive novelty and more fun is to be had with a colt or remington.

If you ever have the chance to READ "Cold Mountain", the main character in the book carries a Lamat.

I can't remember if that is so in the movie however.

I had one new in the box. The timing was manure! The cylinder wouldn't line up with the barrel. This gun would have been a danger to fire. I e-mailed the folks at pietta and they told me to go fly a kite. Got no service at all. I will never buy another pietta.
Old Charlie

One of my customers gave me one that is missing a few parts. It looks like it is unfired. Someday I will get around to finding the parts it needs.

you can probably get parts through VTI gunparts. If not on hand, they can order them from Italy. The lemat was briefly in cold mountain but I had to watch it twice to see it. It was also in last stand at snowy river. Mitchener mentioned it in "Colorado." There was a trail side grave marker that read something like:
"Here lies John Doe
Killed with a Bureaugard Lemat Revolver
Of such is the Kingdom of Heaven."

A couple of years ago, one of the pietta brothers was posting on one of the boards. Occasionally, he would answer email to the company too. Most of the answers he gave were inconsistent with reality and he apparently knew little about the companies' operations. They generally do not respond to email. they have or had a deal on their web site where you could request a list of gunsmiths who had worked on pietta guns. You could request it but they wouldn't send it.

Yeah, VTI has a 'Le Mat' page:[url] https://www.vtigunparts.com/a...roducts.asp?id=162&cat=Pietta+Le+Mat+Revolver[/url]

Lots of different spellings of that name...

It was also used by the Swedish gunfighter in the movie "The Quick and the Dead" starring Russel Crowe, Leonardo DiCapria, Sharon Stone

The Lemat from Pietta has the same defects as the original :

- the hammer travel time to strike the 0.44 chambers is very long hence the gun is difficult to keep stable at firing.
- On the contrary, the hammer travel time to strike the 20 gauge chamber is very short hence a lot of misfires.
- The loading lever is weak and unefficient : better use a load stand.
- The innards are much more complicated than the Rem or Colt and adjustments are more tricky.

For efficacy, better shoot a Colt or a Rem, but for the look nothing can replace the LeMat !!!

Regards