Smith & Wesson’s Mountain Gun
series of revolvers has been one of their most popular with
those shooters and hunters who pack a handgun into the
wilderness. The Mountain Gun is also in demand among those
who choose to carry a concealed handgun for social purposes,
and prefer a sixgun over an autoloader. The Mountain Gun has
been offered chambered for a few powerful centerfire
cartridges in the past, and most have been built from
stainless steel. They are about as light and handy as a big
bore double action sixgun can practically be.
Now, S&W is building the Mountain Gun
chambered for the legendary .45 Colt cartridge, and making
it out of real honest-to-goodness blued carbon steel. This
might prove to be the best Mountain Gun to date. They
produced an earlier limited run of .45 Colt chambered
Mountain Guns in stainless. Whether you like your sixguns
built of carbon or stainless steel is a personal preference,
but chambering it for the .45 Colt cartridge is the best
idea yet in a Mountain Gun.
The .45 Colt Mountain Gun provides the
hunter, backpacker, hiker, or camper with a light, handy,
and easily packable sixgun that has plenty of power for most
any situation. While some prefer the .44 Magnum, I think
that the .45 Colt is a much better cartridge for the
Mountain Gun. The big .45 throws a heavy bullet at moderate
speeds, providing power and controllability, without
excessive muzzle blast and recoil. One of my favorite loads
for the .45 Colt sends a 250 grain hard cast lead Keith
style bullet downrange at about 975 feet per second, and is
a very accurate utility load, that while not really exciting
on paper, will always get the job done.
The legendary gun writer John Taffin
once stated about the .45 Colt cartridge: "There is an
old Indian legend that says when all else is gone, still
will remain the coyote. I would expand upon that and say
still will remain the coyote and the .45 Colt. No other
sixgun cartridge has ever been pronounced dead so many
times. No other sixgun cartridge has so many devoted
followers."
When I learned that S&W was bringing out
a blued .45 Colt Mountain, I had to get my hands on one. I
immediately placed an order. Opening up the blue plastic
hard case, I was not disappointed. The .45 Mountain Gun has
the look of Smith & Wesson revolvers of a few decades
ago, with a couple of changes. The gun has the polished deep
bluing that I have always loved on Smith sixguns. It is not
as highly polished or as deeply blued as were the guns of a
half-century ago, but the finish on this new Smith is better
than any that I have seen produced for many years. The gun
incorporates S&W’s keyed internal lock system. While
many shooters do not like this feature, there are many that
do, and it is here to stay. It can be used to render the
firearm inoperable for safe storage, or it can be simply
ignored if the owner so chooses. Another change from earlier
large-frame S&W revolvers is the use of a frame-mounted
firing pin. The .45 Mountain Gun wears a set of finger
groove Cocobolo grips that are both good looking and
comfortable. The grips do not cover the backstrap, and the
flat-bottomed finger grooves help greatly in properly
aligning the weapon with the shooter’s arm. While the grip
profile is squared at the bottom, the grip frame is of
round-butt configuration, to accommodate a wide variety of
other grip styles. The trigger is wide and smooth, and the
hammer spur is checkered. The .45 Colt Mountain gun weighs
39.2 ounces, and the one tested had a uniform
barrel/cylinder gap measuring just four one-thousandths of
an inch (.004). The double action trigger pull measured a
smooth ten pounds and three ounces, and the single action
pull was a crisp four and one half pounds, but felt even
lighter due to the wide trigger. The four inch barrel
quickly tapers from three-quarters of an inch at the frame
to six tenths of an inch at the muzzle, resulting in a
quick-handling feel that balances exactly at the trigger.
The Mountain Gun wears adjustable S&W sights, and is
also drilled and tapped for a scope mount, if one so
desires. The six-shot cylinder is slightly chamfered at the
front, and measures 1.714 inches in diameter and 1.667
inches in length, which is plenty long enough to easily
accommodate my favorite Keith load. The ejector stroke
measures almost a full inch, and the ejector rod is
protected from damage by a shroud that is integral with the
barrel.
For accuracy and function testing, I
gathered a variety of ammunition, both factory and
handloads. All group testing was done at a range of
twenty-five yards. The Mountain Gun proved capable of five
shot groups of just under two inches. For all-around general
use, I really like a good hard cast bullet of Keith design
at a velocity of 950 to 1050 feet per second. For a good
hollowpoint load to use on whitetail deer or for social
work, the Cor-Bon 200 grain JHP should serve very
well. The Mountain Gun functioned perfectly, and case
extraction and ejection was easy with all loads tested.
Plinking at targets of opportunity out to one hundred yards
provided satisfying results, and the big Smith was
comfortable to shoot.
Aside from the accuracy and function
testing, I carried the Mountain Gun around a lot. After all,
one of the main attributes of this gun is its easy
packability. It is relatively light and compact for a double
action .45 Colt. I carried the Mountain Gun in a simple but
rugged and very practical holster built by custom holster
maker Rob Leahy. It is of a pancake design, and is
built of quality hand-boned leather with expert
craftsmanship. As can be seen in the photos, the holster
offers excellent protection for the firearm, while allowing
for quick accessibility if needed. Rob makes these holsters
for most large framed sixguns at the very affordable price
of only $40, shipped to anywhere in the first forty-eight
states. He makes a version for smaller handguns for only 25
bucks. These holsters are a real bargain, and I suggest that
you get you one or several before his price goes up, and he
has a year-long waiting list.
The Smith & Wesson model 25 Mountain Gun
is another fine sixgun in a long successful line of S&W
revolvers. I think that it is the most useful and practical
yet of the Mountain Gun series. It offers handiness, power,
concealability, and good workmanship. It is also chambered
for one of the best handgun cartridges ever invented; the
legendary .45 Colt.
Check out the full line of Smith &
Wesson handguns online at: www.smith-wesson.com
Check out Rob Leahy's line of holsters
online at: www.simplyrugged.com.
