Spiller&Burr and Griswold&Gunnison

[casey4469]

Happy New Year All!!

I was wondering is there anyone out there that shoot these two BP revolvers? I love the way they look and just wanting to know how they shoot? I have the Remingtons and Colts, just looking at something a little different and style points at the SASS shoots.

 

[Colonial Boy]

I had a Griswold & Gunnison which shot alright but was not as accurate as my Remington . But then I never really perservered with it.

If you look at photos of original G&Gs you'll notice that the angle of the grip is different to the Colt. This was not done on the repros but is relatively easy to achieve by a little judicious bending of the grip frame...but requires the making of new wooden grips.

 

[Zonie]

My Griswold and Gunnison and Spiller and Burr shoot about the same as the other .36 caliber reproductions.

The Spiller and Burr pistol was a brass framed pistol very similar to the 1851 Colt Navy except for it's round barrel. Most folks don't notice it has a different barrel.

The Griswold and Gunnison was supposed to also be a brass framed gun similar to the 1851 Colt Navy but somehow it was copied from the .36 caliber Whitney. Most folks think it is a very poor attempt to make a brass framed Remington.

The only thing I don't like on my Griswold and Gunnison is the loading lever/cylinder pin retention system.
Like the Whitney, it consists of a thumbscrew which is retained by a small screw on the opposite side.
With the thumbscrew head in a horizontal position, the shank engages the cylinder pin to keep it in place. Rotated 180 degrees, the thumbscrews notch clears the cylinder pin to permit its removal. There is no way to determine which way the thumbscrew is installed without trying to remove the loading lever/cylinder pin.
If anything accedently rotates the thumbscrew, the loading lever/cylinder pin can fall out.
The loading levers attachment to the cylinder pin is IMO, rather weak although I haven't had any problems with mine.

If you get either of these guns, remember that most of the folks around you will be thinking "He's got one of those cheap brass framed Colts (or Remingtons in the case of the Spiller and Burr).
Very few people are familure with these guns.

Because they are brass framed, I would suggest a powder load of 12-15 grains of FFFg to keep the stresses from firing them low.

 

[Russ T Frizzen]

Zonie, I thought the Spiller and Burr was based on the Whitney? Anyway, what I do is put a small notch on the pin retainer. A quick look or feel tells me whether the pin is locked in place or not.

 

[Colonial Boy]

There is a photo of a G&G

This clearly shows the grip angle, and it's this angle that makes all the difference to the appearance. Link

 

[hawkeye2]

I have S & B #s 65 & 66 from the first run by Pietta. Years ago I tuned one and shot it in competition for a season or so. It shot fairly well but the grip is too close to the triger guard so that it deals your middle finger a smart blow even with a moderate load. I found this to be uncomfortable and distracting in a match so I moved on. BTW the Rogers & Spencer has a similar loading lever/base pin retaining system which gives even more trouble than the S & B, follow Russ T Frizzen's advise.

 

[hawkeye2]

Colonial Boy,
Not many seem to notice the different grip frame angle, have you actually changed one? It would seem that it might introduce a mainspring problem requiring shimming, modification of the atachment point, anealing, bending, and retempering, or all of the above. I never attemped the modification because I was scared off by this.

 

[Zonie]

Zonie, I thought the Spiller and Burr was based on the Whitney? (Russ)

Right you are. I somehow got things bass ackwards.

The Spiller and Burr was patterened after the Whitney. The Griswold and Gunnison is a round barreled copy of the Colt Navy.

 

[Colonial Boy]

Yes, I changed the angle on the pistol that I owned. It was the .44 version so not a true copy of the G&G which I believe was only made in .36.
I no longer have this pistol but as I remember all that I did was to bend the brass frame cold and then make a new grip.The spring remained the same. There is not much bend required.

There has been some suppossition that G&G copied a Navy that had been used to belt something hard and got bent.