A Pair of Snakes

[BrokenolMarine]

I headed down to the range today with a pair of snakes. What do you say, Shall We Play A Game? I thought we'd shoot some cards, just for the fun of it.

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I thought the Python deserved to come back down, and I'd bring his buddy, the Diamondback, a beautiful little 22.

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I have a second diamondback as well, a 4" blue that I have had since 1980, all the kids learned to shoot with it, and it's a tack driver. I'll bring it down later and shoot with it as well. But this pair I just acquired and they need some range time.

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First up was the Python, and I decided to shoot them both Single Action today. The back is still bothering me, but I wanted to shoot. First stage, six rounds, Single Action at Seven Yards. A pretty nice group, three rounds in the same oblong hole. She's a shooter. In the (Good) Old Days I'd have put all six in one hole. Old Eyes, Bad Back and arthritic hands. But... in a pinch, we don't need one hole groups, we need centered groups.

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I moved back to 15 yards and repeated the six shots single action. Still not a bad group. Another three rounds in an oblong group, but this one I pulled one high centered, I called it when it left the gun, knowing I had forced the shot. Pain was getting worse and I forced the shot trying to get it off, rather than lowering the gun, easing the back and letting everything settle before firing the last shot.

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I shot eighteen rounds at the "Iron" ah "Lady" from the Python, double action. I was about 25 yards away, shooting off hand, and Aimed Fire. (Not Slow, Not Rapid.) I shot six at the head and six center chest. All of the shots rang the steel. Done with the Python for the day.

Next up was the Diamondback. I loaded six and aimed in at Seven Yards and ... knew this wasn't going to go well. Can't see the front sight. It's going to get the orange treatment. I fired six, and the Diamondback has a GREAT trigger in Single Action. I darkened the sight with the black marker before I shot and it helped just a little, but still was a blur. I'm happy with the group. (Happy-ish.) But I'll shoot it again in the next couple days, after the sight gets color.

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On this target, the hole at Three O'clock on the line appears to be two rounds.


I'll check the rest of the guns for clarity before I bring them down. As Clint Says.

"A man's gotta know his limitations."

I'm wearing my shooting glasses, but I might need to get my eyes checked again.

ON the very large cardboard backer, there were NO unaccounted for holes, which reinforced my idea of the ragged hole groups.

[BrokenolMarine]

When I shoot the EDC SemiAutos, I'll be shooting "Tactical Pairs" and Body Armor Drills.
(Two to the center of mass, one to the head, two to the center of mass, one to the pelvic cradle.)
In those cases, I'll be looking for centered shots and hits and less at "groups."

I'll also set up double targets for multiple target drills. Fun, and practical in today's environ.
Moving away from small groups and shooting for tight accuracy, which has it's place in regaining skill.
Looking forward to those drills as well.

[BrokenolMarine]

Got to the armorer's bench and painted the first coat on the front sight on the Diamondback. It's looking pretty good. I'll see how it looks when it dries. Likely I'll put a clear coat, then a second coat on, then a final coat of clear and it should be good. Shoot again.

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[BrokenolMarine]

I'll clean the Python and put it away for now and see what will be next up and for a visit to the range to join the Diamondback for the trial. I'm thinking a pair of 45 autos.

[Vaquero]

A pair of deadly lookin snakes ya got there.
Beauts for sure.
Some fine shooting also, was this factory ammo or your loads?
Like someone said in your earlier your thread, I wouldn't want to be the bad guy facing you.
i have one snake gun, a King Cobra that I've had since the early 80's.

RP

[BrokenolMarine]

A pair of deadly lookin snakes ya got there.
Beauts for sure.
Some fine shooting also, was this factory ammo or your loads?
Like someone said in your earlier your thread, I wouldn't want to be the bad guy facing you.
i have one snake gun, a King Cobra that I've had since the early 80's.

RP

These are match wadcutters loaded by my Rabbi in bulk. He loaded them in exchange for something else, some woodwork I did for him I think. He has Four of the BIG Dillons set up with a couple dedicated to certain calibers. One is just for Match 45acp, another for Match 38 Wadcutter. The others are set up to load Handgun or Rifle, and his extensive Die Collection is lined up like Marines waiting to go into battle. He also has a shotshell loader and a couple Single Stage presses at the other end of the bench.

[Hatchdog]

Back pain or not I bet you had a smile on your face just to be back out on the range after all that indoor work (?) you’ve been accomplishing. Great shooting with a pair of great guns. Way back in the day my holy grail gun want was a 22lr Diamondback and a Python sitting in a case side by side. At the time I was working for a gun distributor and we were a Colt distributor. Closest I ever got was to open the boxes and place the revolvers side by side and drool. Glad you are “living my dream”.

[BrokenolMarine]

I bought a sequentially serialized pair of pythons and the diamondback when I reenlisted in the Corps the first time in the Early 80s. My MOS (Military Occupational Specialty) or JOB was considered critical at the time, and I received a bonus for reelistment. They paid a dollar amount per year, for a certain number of years based on the MOS value to the CORPS at the time. I was eligible for a four year incentive. When I reupped... The most critical MOS bonuses were Helo Crew Chiefs, eligible for six year incentives, as were NDI certified techs. Non-Destructive Inspections testing of metal such as engine parts, rotor head shafts, synch shafts... They x-ray'd high value items to check for integrity ... In the civilian world this would be turbine blades on commercial aircraft engines... Huge Demand. $30,000 bonus to stay... Them... Not me.

Anyway, I sold the two Pythons a year later for all the things babies have to have... And never looked back. I finally got the chance to replace them, but the pair this time was the 6" Python and Diamondback. Forty years later.

[BrokenolMarine]

Put the coat of clear on last night before bed, and after coffee this morning, I added a second coat of orange. I'll let that dry for a couple hours and then we'll insure it's smooth and add the cover coat of clear. Should be good to go to test the Diamondback this afternoon.

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[daytime dave]

What beautiful snakes Marine. Nice shooting.

[rickhem]

Some really nice revolvers there, and who doesn't like shooting the wadcutters? Little recoil, incredibly accurate (especially with the faster twist Colts), and the holes actually give you a little coaching if you know how to read them.
That little grey crescent smudge that shows up on the edge of the holes in the target means that the bullet was yawing as it went downrange. My mentors used to preach the steady hold, smooth trigger motion, and consistent follow-through, as the key to not have those smudges. They'd look at how bad the smudges were on my targets, and tell me how shakey I was as the bullet left the barrel. I almost never had one in slow fire, but the timed and rapid would always have a few.

I don't see any on your targets though BOM. Nice shooting!

[BrokenolMarine]

Thanks guys. It's been a good while since I was shooting on a regular basis due to the weather and my health. Miss T made the comment the other day that I hadn't been shooting, and why was I still reading about the guns all the time if I wasn't going to shoot. (Reverse Psychology at work.) "It's been 110 degrees plus for the last two months," I shook my head.

She grinned. "It's in the mid 80s today, get out there."

I realized she was right, and got up and got busy. Between the weather and my health, I hadn't been able to shoot and I had the range RIGHT THERE. Now, even if it's just a few rounds, I want to try and shoot a couple times a week. I remember telling my students, It doesn't take much to keep your skills up.

I moved the Iron Lady onto the range so even with really cold weather I could drive down and hop out and fire ten or twenty rounds and drive back to the house and warm up. Never have to open up the doors on the Range House.
I'm thinking seriously of putting the 8" plates out before the weather turns really cold, placing them around the edges of the berm for other targets to shoot at.

[BrokenolMarine]

Another look at my original four inch blue Diamondback. I bought this in the 80s, and I took it to a gunsmith and had him add a bright red insert to the front sight. Funny, all these years later, that bright red insert looks a bit pink.

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Those Colt Grips? They ARE Colt Diamondback Grips. They are Custom, hand fitted, Diamondback grips. The original grips were the fat bottomed, heavily checkered, grips. I didn't care for them and as a young Marine I didn't have the money for the ones I wanted, the STAG grips from "Eagle Grips." What I could afford, was a file and a package of assorted sandpaper from Lowes. (NO Home Depot back then, Sears, or Lowes.)

I sat in the shade of my front porch, with the grips OFF the gun and screwed onto a slat of wood from the bottom of a coke crate, (Remember the wooden crates that held 24 bottles, actual bottles, of coke?... ) and began to shape the grips to fit my hand. I filed the grips to the basic shape and tried them on the gun. Didn't quite point the way I wanted. Back on the Coke Slat, and back with the file. Back and forth until the gun naturally pointed.

Then I sanded up thru the misc grits until it was smooth, and stained it with pecan stain to bring out the grain, applying several coats to get the shade I wanted. I waxed it ten times to work the wax in, and then reinstalled the Colt Medallions. The grips still make the gun point where I want and the kids all learned to shoot WELL with this gun. They will all get to choose one gun from the safe when I pass, and have all put in their picks. My oldest daughter chose this gun a long time ago. Always was her favorite.

[North Country Gal]

Love the grips. Not many shooters can say they made their own grips. Very impressive.

[daytime dave]

Of all the Colt snake guns I passed on (I passed on them all so far), a diamondback was the one I shouldn't have. Just from handling some I really like them. That is a really nice on Marine. I too appreciate someone who can fashion their own grips.

[BrokenolMarine]

It's funny, the first set of grips I made, even impressed my stepfather at the time. I had traded something for a single shot 22 caliber CO2 pellet gun whose make I can no longer remember. It had very good target sights on it, and the CO2 cartridge was loaded into a tube that rode under the barrel. You rotated the cover for the chamber and pulled it to the rear, loading that single pellet. To fire you pulled a knurled knob at the rear to charge, and aimed in. Tack driver.

The grips were cracked, scarred, and dented from hard use. I worked at a grocery store as a bag boy, and one of my duties was keeping the returnable bottles neat and sorted until the drivers picked them up. The coke driver gave me a broken crate. One slat turned out to be cherry.

At thirteen, I removed the bad grips, traced them onto the slat, and cut out the rough shape with a borrowed jig saw. I used a file to get them close and strips of sandpaper to shape them back to the gun. They ended up thicker than the plastic grips had been, but looked very good, and filled the hand. From the bottom of that crate.

[fortyshooter]

Nice pair of snakes with a bite! I just sold my only snake the Anaconda.

[BrokenolMarine]

Nice pair of snakes with a bite! I just sold my only snake the Anaconda.

Sorry it had to go, never got it to where you wanted it?
They looked good.

[fortyshooter]

Nice pair of snakes with a bite! I just sold my only snake the Anaconda.

Sorry it had to go, never got it to where you wanted it?
They looked good.

Well it had to go back twice for repair in the year or so I owned it. It shot very well but it is one of those revolvers that you can't repair much yourself like Rugers and Uberti and old single action Colts. Have something coming to replace it though!

[North Country Gal]

Yeah, too bad about the new Colt, forty. Hate to say it, but I'm seeing a lot of folks on forums and YouTube having similar issues with the new Colt revolvers. Can't say new Rugers or Smiths have any fewer issues these days, though. Hope you do better with the next 44 mag.