Question 'bout Caliber sizes

[TheBlake]

The reason i ask is BC my mother-in-law bought a rossi .38 spcl for home defense (her first gun ever!). she did not have a clue as what to get for ammo so i bought her the only .38 spcl i could find, which i believe was hornady +P.

Saw an ad for the new Taurus .38 spcl +P pistol last night in a magazine and got a little curious as to why the barrel had the +P specification on it, as i was under the assumption that it was just a hotter round.

Should this ammo be fine for her gun or do i need to do an emergency swap for her?

[Rockrz]

Those dates are patent dates, the only way to determine the date of manufacture is to look it up by serial number.

Is it safe, or is it a good idea, to go ahead and post the serial
number so somebody can seee if they can tell what year it was made?

I'd be interested in knowing what year it was produced

[jimlongley]

Those dates are patent dates, the only way to determine the date of manufacture is to look it up by serial number.

Is it safe, or is it a good idea, to go ahead and post the serial
number so somebody can seee if they can tell what year it was made?

I'd be interested in knowing what year it was produced

I would not post the serial number, there are a couple of things you can do though. First, try to contact S&W and see if the historical department can help you. Failing that, you can contact a firearms assessor or dealer in older guns, and see if they can tell you. Or, you could do an internet search and see if anyone has posted a list of them by serial number and manufacture date. I know the approximate dates my M1 Carbine and M1 Garand were manufactured from online lists.

[Rockrz]

Too bad the serial numbers aren't like they are on tires where
the DOT number tells you the month and year of manufacture

I'll probably just wait until I take it to have it appraised
some day. Hopefully an appraiser will be able to tell about
when it was made since that should have some bearing
on trying to estimate it's value.

[TheBlake]

+p has more powder then the standard 38 increasing the pressure. It allows for more velocity but the increased pressures can be devastating to a gun not rated to handle +p loads.

The reason i ask is BC my mother-in-law bought a rossi .38 spcl for home defense (her first gun ever!). she did not have a clue as what to get for ammo so i bought her the only .38 spcl i could find, which i believe was hornady +P.

Saw an ad for the new Taurus .38 spcl +P pistol last night in a magazine and got a little curious as to why the barrel had the +P specification on it, as i was under the assumption that it was just a hotter round.

Should this ammo be fine for her gun or do i need to do an emergency swap for her?

Any thought plz... i find myself pondering a lot of what if's right now...

[fickman]

All of my revolvers that handle +P say so on the barrel. I would not personally put +P ammo through a firearm that doesn't specifically say on the barrel or in the manual that it is +P rated.

[joe817]

All of my revolvers that handle +P say so on the barrel. I would not personally put +P ammo through a firearm that doesn't specifically say on the barrel or in the manual that it is +P rated.

Better be safe than sorry.

[TheBlake]

I can only imagine what the Mother-in-law ( ) will have to say when i tell her, oops, the ammo i bought you could potentially be dangerous to fire out of your pistol...

[joe817]

Suggestion: why don't you call up Rossi USA and pose the question if the revolver she has can withstand the pressure of the +P ammo?

[lrb111]

As well as calling Rossi, you can look the pistol up online. http://www.rossiusa.com/gun-selector-re ... &toggle=rv" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
All these new one's are rated +P.

[flb_78]

According to Rossi's website, all of their 38 revolvers are rated for +p

How old is the revolver? What's the model number?

[joe817]

Sorry if this thread's been hijacked. Just one more statement:

I have an older Rossi Mod.68(5 shot, 38 spl) and the barrel is NOT marked +P. As I'm not up on the new model revolvers, I wouldn't even think about putting a +P round through it.

[Rockrz]

Better be safe than sorry.

Yep, I know the rounds I got for my old .38 fit physically...but me not sure
if they are the more modern high powered rounds that this gun cannot handle,
so I'm probably going to take it to a gunsmith and say "here, you shoot it" and
hopefully he'll know what he's doing...

If he doesn't, then I'll lose the pistol (since it'll probably blow up)
and I'll be sure and send flowers to his family.

Sorry if this thread's been hijacked. Just one more statement

No hi-jacking offense taken...happy to see meaningful conversation
that is very educational to me and I'm sure others as well.

[Mike1951]

Wow! Sounds like I need to ask somebody if the ammo I'm buying will work in my gun.

So, what's the deal with my old Smith & Wesson .38?

When I went to buy rounds for it, they gave me standard .38 rounds,
but when I got home to try 'em they were too long to fit in the revolver.

So, I took them back and they guy said, "oh, you must have that
really old .38 that takes the short rounds" and so I bought the
last box of that type of rounds that they had in stock.

The guy even told me he was glad to sell that last box because
they were not going to stock them anymore since nobody
buys .38 short rounds anymore.

Does this mean my little .38 is really old?

It says "Regulation Police - 38 S&W CTS" on
the side of the barrel

On top of the barrel after the usual S&W, Springfield MASS
is says: Patented Feb 6.08, Sept 14.09, Dec 29.14

Reckon this means the gun was made in 1914?

And the reason you haven't looked this up in your brand new S&W book is.......??????????????

Yessir...got this book in today and it has everything one could want to know 'bout both Smith & Wesson!

Thanks for the tip on this.

BTW, I do have a couple of boxes of Magtech .38 S&W ammo.

[Rockrz]

And the reason you haven't looked this up in your brand new S&W book is.......??????????????

Man, I knew I was gonna get busted on this deal...

I did find the section that talks about this particular gun, but haven't taken
the time to sit down and really read everything in this section.

I will get to it, I promise!