Antique MAS 1873 revolver (from 1875) with light load smokeless 45ACP

[u/Vintage_Pieces_20]

For anyone thinking of an antique revolver to add to their collection, the French MAS 1873 might be my favourite (over my Webley and my Swiss 1882. Half price of those ones too!).

Using light smokeless handloads which often spews incompletely burned powder, I find due to the amount of moving parts with the Webley, it gums up quick and performance suffers. And over the Swiss, 45ACP is way easier to reload, both light loads or full loads in general. Since the MAS has few moving parts, it will rip through tons of light smokeless reloads in 1 sitting and performance is barely hindered.

Load that I’m using is a home-brew: 3.5grains of win 231 powder, CCI large pistol primer, starline and range pickup 45ACP brass, 230g LRN bullet from Rusty Wood, 1.22-1.26OAL (this load works identically with a 200g LSWC as well, and also works for Webley revolvers in 45ACP)

Happy shooting friends!

[u/Agonizing-Stroke1812]

what 0 gun rights does to a mf

[u/Vintage_Pieces_20 → u/Agonizing-Stroke1812]

Pretty much lmao. At least the gun bans are going to the Supreme Court case to argue the way they were banned was government overreach, so it’s a very small glimmer of hope

[u/Ok-Raise-5115 → u/Vintage_Pieces_20]

Unfortunately I don’t think handguns will be affected by this :(

[u/zporb → u/Ok-Raise-5115]

I just want an AR man

[u/Ok-Raise-5115 → u/zporb]

Bruh same, I just want a semi automatic centre fire that wasn’t designed in the 1940s :(

[u/yummybunnybear → u/Ok-Raise-5115]

You still have the Makasi and Carmel. We all came to this community after something was banned (fullauto ban in the 70's, massive bans in the 90's, 2020, 2024...). You gotta get what you can right now and a few years later a bunch of newcomers will look at you in envy just like you are right now.

[u/Elbro_16]

I prefer webley mkll brass as it’s rimmed and doesn’t rely on sitting against the shoulder of the case. I load 200gr 452 bullets with 3.6gr hp38 which gets around 600+ fps

[u/under_hunter82376]

thats a very nice gun .

[u/dutchm0on]

What needs to be done to get it to accept 455 webley / 45acp cartridges?

[u/ManWithAChainsaw → u/dutchm0on]

Very little honestly.

NERD SHIT: They were originally 11mm French. 11mm French brass is only slightly smaller than 45ACP/455 webley. In WW2, French resistance relied on these revolvers. The nazis saw the revolvers as obsolete (to be fair, they were) and useless since 11mm french was hardly made anymore (even in 1939-1945 it was obsolete). THE ANSWER: The resistance discovered that 455 webley bullets were nearly identical and that 45ACP was only a few thousandths smaller. To accommodate the thicker brass (11mm French was blackpowder, lower pressure means thinner brass), bicycle mechanics reamed out the cylinders until they were approximately the correct size. NERD SHIT CONTINUES: These wartime modifications were often pretty rough and the high pressure loads meant that you only had about 5-50 shots before the revolver failed. 11mm French black powder is about 11,000 PSI. 45ACP can easily go over 22,000 PSI. The idea was that you reamed out the cylinder, loaded 6 shots, killed a nazi and took his gun to continue the fight. Those revolvers were never designed to handle those higher pressures. Even one shot of regular 45ACP makes these guns unsafe to ever use again.

After the war and as France began eliminating handgun ownership (I think around the 70s-80s), many unmodified revolvers were purchased by Americans. The Americans had professional gunsmiths ream out the cylinders and then sold them off to other collectors who then shot them with either light smokeless handloads or black powder loads.

Fast forward to today. You're an American with one of these unmodified revolvers. You can: A: sell it to another American for maybe 200. B: bring it to a gunsmith for 100 bucks and then sell it to a Canadian distributor for 1800.

The Canadian guy then sells it on gunpost for 2500.

And here we are.

[u/hockeyfanatic777 → u/ManWithAChainsaw]

This is awesome info. I love the nerd shit. I have two of these revolvers that I haven’t fired yet (I missed out on handguns due to the freeze)

[u/ManWithAChainsaw → u/hockeyfanatic777]

They are excellent firearms.

I can give you tips on reloading if you'd like, however, I must inform you that I am not an expert and any advice is strictly my opinion. Whatever I say must be verified by yourself or a competent person who is educated in it.

[u/hockeyfanatic777 → u/ManWithAChainsaw]

I’ll take all the info I can get, I would appreciate a DM with your tips!

[u/Vintage_Pieces_20 → u/hockeyfanatic777]

I have a few 45ACP handload recipes that work great for this revolver too if you wish.

[u/hockeyfanatic777 → u/Vintage_Pieces_20]

I won’t say no! Shoot me a DM, I would appreciate that

[u/Vintage_Pieces_20 → u/hockeyfanatic777]

Will do!

[u/theborealethos]

Very nice

[u/Otherwise_Rub_9515]

I swear this sub has the worst trigger finger discipline I've ever seen.

Take your finger off and out of the trigger guard in between shots while you're manually operating the action.

Basic firearms handling 

[u/ManWithAChainsaw → u/Otherwise_Rub_9515]

Hey, the trigger gaurd on this thing is massive to accommodate soldiers wearing thick wool gloves. Pretty hard to not have your finger in it.

Also, have you ever owned an old double action revolver? The trigger pull is insane. Even when used in single action, it's stiff. This isn't some modern semi auto that the gentle fluttering of a butterfly could set off.

Not to mention that he keeps the firearm pointed down range the entire time.

*Edited to be more respectful

[u/mwmwmwmwmmdw → u/Otherwise_Rub_9515]

when you are literally holding the gun downrange actively shooting through the magazine/cylinder is the one time its not the end of the world to leave your finger in the trigger guard.