The 2020 Python is more one stage than two in its DA pull. In serious shooting as perceived today, which goes much faster, trigger-cocking just doesn’t cut it: The revolver shooter really needs the straight-through double-action pull. ![]() NRA’s definition of rapid fire in bullseye, the only competition shooting game in town when the Python first came out, was five shots in 10 seconds starting with gun already on target and finger already on trigger. However, the S&W was uniform in resistance to the trigger finger from the beginning of the pull to the break of the double-action shot - “single-stage,” as it were - while the Colt was “two-stage.” As its V-shaped mainspring closed its lines at the bottom of the “V,” there would be added pressure at the very end of the Colt’s stroke, known as “stacking.” The two-stage pull, “trigger-cocking” in its truest sense, allowed the shooter to bring the hammer back almost to break-point, and then apply the last bit of pressure like a single-action pull. ![]() This gave it more mechanical advantage, with a relatively lighter pull. The DA trigger stroke was longer than its arch-competitor, Smith & Wesson. The original Python had a very light trigger pull, both single- and double-action. Then … and now.īut with Python fans, “then and now” is a discussion with different dimensions. Try one at the gun shop, with the dealer’s permission: Triple check it’s empty, dry-fire it and hold the trigger back, and check the cylinder for movement. Both of those elements remain in place in the 2020 Pythons. The double-lock mechanism secured the cylinder absolutely motionless in line with the barrel before the firing pin hit the primer, and 1:14″ rifling versus the standard 1:18.75″ sealed the deal, making the Colt just a tad more accurate than its counterparts. The solid balance of the weighted underlug barrel and the full-length ventilated rib made the gun hang steadier, and except for the venting in the rib, was copied by Smith & Wesson in the L-Frame and by Ruger in the GP100, both hugely successful in their markets. 357 Magnum a score of years before the Python came out, and maintained it with the Model 27. It wasn’t just the beautiful high-polish finish that sold the Python Smith & Wesson had the equivalent with the Bright Blue of their original 1935. I remember talking with Colt’s Justin Baldini after the 2020 Python came out and telling him that if they made one in 3″, I’d buy it. MSRP for the 3″ is $1,499, a fraction of what originals the same length sell for to Colt collectors at auction today. Colt is selling 2020 Pythons as fast as they can send them out of the shipping room. The “Rolls Royce” element of being literally hand-built was gone … but with a highly polished finish and a wise retention of most of “the old ways,” the “Cadillac” element remains. In 2020, Colt re-introduced the Python with a re-designed mechanism: Modern CNC machining allowed the sort of smoothness-friendly tolerances that required highly skilled hand labor in days of old. Too expensive in terms of specially skilled labor to manufacture in modern times, the Python was sadly discontinued, at which time prices of existing samples soared to Rolls Royce levels - and the 3″ versions simply went out of sight. Some surplus barrels were sold to a parts distributor, resulting in “fake” Pythons that had been so re-barreled. 41-frame all-steel gun with a heavy barrel, it wasn’t popular for concealment but the rarity of the 3″ sent collectors on a hunt for this variation. ![]() A 2.5″ barrel came later, by limited if not popular demand.Īnd, along the way, Colt produced a relatively small run of 3″ barrel models for one distributor, Lew Horton. It became a prestige gun in the law enforcement community as well, and accordingly Colt produced a 4″ version they originally called the Police Python. It began as a 6″ barrel target gun, sort of an über-Officers Model Match. Introduced in 1955 and advertised as the Cadillac of revolvers, the Colt Python became something of a cult gun to my generation of handgunners.
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