A.45 Long Colt bullet is nominally.455 inches in diameter. A.410 is.41 caliber. The cartridge will fit because of the extra chamber diameter to accommodate the thick body of the shotgun shell, but attempting to fire a revolver cartridge will result in overpressure, a burst barrel, and likely injury. Apr 20, 2009 The recoil of the.45 Colt ammunition varied from mild to heavy, depending of course upon the load chosen. However, while shooting.45 Colt ammo from the Snake Slayer is a good option, I prefer to think of this thing as close range protection from poisonous snakes and two-legged vipers, and in that capacity, the.410 birdshot and buckshot excels. The idea is that you can, but it's not safe, especially if the shotgun has any form of choke in it, farmers used to load a 45 colt in a.410 to put down cattle and horses, but that's a while ago and it's not safe to do, especially with the new loads and bullets they're coming out with in.45 caliber, they do make special rifle/shotguns and handguns that can handle.45 colt ammo and.410 shells. May 20, 2009 The 45 Colt bullet is a true 45,.451 inch bullet. The.410 barrel is much too small to safely fire a 45 bullet through. Serious damage to the firearm and injury or death to the shooter are likely. Weapons, like the Taurus Judge, that fire both are built to 45 barrel specs, with lengthened chambers to accommodate the 410 shell.

1. Can You Shoot 410 Out Of 45 Long Colt Barrel 357
2. Can You Shoot 410 Out Of 45 Long Colt Barrel Review

Taurus .410 3-inch/.45 LC Caliber Revolver: Judge or Joke?

By Randy Wakeman

Perhaps you have seen the ads touting the Taurus Judge asthe “ultimate” automobile gun and self-defense weapon? Well, there have beenmore requests for a candid Judge review lately than for most revolvers, so here we go.

Can You Shoot 410 Out Of 45 Long Colt Barrel 357

The tested article is the three inch stainless steel“magnum” version of the Taurus 5 shot .45 Colt revolver which offers thenovelty of being able to chamber and shoot three inch unfolded length .410 boreshotshells as well. The revolver itself is far from a flyweight: it weighs inat approximately 2.7 pounds. The cylinder, as you might imagine, is garishlylong. In this case, the cylinder of this wheelgun is actually a bit longer thanits three inch barrel.

The inherent problem with this approach is two-fold. We havea horribly heavy cylinder to begin with, with grossly excessive freebore. We initiallytested some Winchester 255 grain .45 Colt ammo (X45CP2) that is rated at 860fps out of the muzzle by Olin with a 5.5 inch barrel. The combination of thelong cylinder and the short barrel made for some drastic velocity lossexceeding 30% from the Winchester specification. Our Judge shot this ammo atbelow 600 fps, making an already low-powered handgun round even more so.

Can You Shoot 410 Out Of 45 Long Colt Barrel Review

There are acceptable 45 Colt self-defense roundsavailable, to be sure. For example, the 225 grain Corbon DPX ammo produced1100 fps and penetrated 15 inches into 10% ballistic gelatin after going through four layers of denim when fired froma conventional .45 Colt revolvers with a standard length cylinder and a 4 inch barrel. When you have a revolver as long, bulky, and heavy as the Judge it doesn’t make much sense to settle for underpowered, gimpy ballistics. It isa compromise no one needs if the issue is serious self-defense. As you mightimagine, though, with such very anemic velocities the heavy Judge is a verysoft shooter with the tested 255 Winchester loads.

There have been other .410 shotshell revolvers in timespast, such as the “Thunder Five.” What allows the use of shotshells in arevolver today is typically the presence of a rifled barrel. Twist rifling in abarrel destroys shotshell patterns. I had no idea how badly untilshooting the Judge at a patterning board at just 10 feet with 3 inch WinchesterAA #7-1/2 shotshells, a 15/16 oz. payload. At this range, just over threeyards, despite the comparatively tiny birdshot, the pattern was alreadyunacceptably large and chaotic.

You might think that #7-1/2 shot would be good forsomething. After all, 15/16 oz. of #7-1/2 shot equates to roughly 325 pellets.I pasted an 8 inch circular Shoot N*C target to a piece of 22 in. x 28in. posterboard and fired at a laser verified 25 yards. Only 8 out of those 325pellets managed to make it to the paper. Only three pellets touched the eightinch Shoot N*C disc. Worse yet, the three pellets that actually hit the ShootN*C target didn’t even penetrate through it. Two bounced off of it leaving justscuff marks and one was left sticking to it. To phrase this a bit moredifferently, you could empty your Judge with 3 inch magnum .410 shotshells at apatient dove sitting in a tree at 25 yards, if you were able to find a dove ofthat radically diminished capacity. Your chances of hitting that dove would beremote, and even if you did the likelihood of dropping it would be slim. Itdoesn’t take much to kill a dove, but the Judge produces far less than what isneeded. Any number of air rifles would be far more effective than the Judge for dropping groundsquirrels, rabbits, or small pests at 25 yards. Inthe future, I will chronograph shotshells and add the results to the end ofthis review. I was hesitant to do so with my best gear, as the pattern opens sofast and erratically I didn’t want to destroy my skyscreens by shooting though them with this little gem. Suffice to saythat the Judge proved to be ineffectual against the “imminent threat” of paper.

Leave it to Chuck Hawks to give me the “opportunity” to review a product such as this. I don’t really know howto thank him. The Judge is a sad commentary on a triumph of marketing over common sense.

What the Judge really is more gimmick and conversation piecethan a reasonable self-defense revolver. It is both nose-heavy, heavy ingeneral, bulky, poor-handling and generally unsightly. The “feature” of beingable to fire .410 shotshells with poor patterning and ridiculously low velocityis no feature worth having that I can see. Though some of the ads for the Judgeportray its use as shooting out of the passenger side of a car window withshotshells, some might be more concerned about peppering themselves with theshot that didn’t make it through the car’s window.

The Taurus promo video shows that the Judge is an effectiveweapon against close-range fruit. If you are one of the rare individualscontinually harassed by inanimate, close-range melons, perhaps the Judge mightbe of interest to you. For all other applications, you could do a lot better.As for the story that judges in courtrooms choose to arm themselves with .410revolvers, that seems more than a bit fruity.

Specifications:

Here Come da Judge: Taurus .45 Colt/.410 Bore Revolvers

By Chuck Hawks

I have been asked to do a full reviewof Taurus .45/.410 revolvers for Guns andShooting Online, but declined. I simply refuse to waste that much of mytime and effort on a product that I already know is inherently incapable ofdelivering acceptable results. However, in response to popular demand, I agreedto do this abbreviated article.

At present, Taurus is offering six models of .45 Colt/.410 boreshotshell combination revolvers, if you count different finishes (blue orstainless) as separate models as Taurus does. Note that these are not 'convertible'revolvers supplied with two cylinders; these Taurus revolvers fire both .45 Coltcartridges and .410 shotshells from the same cylinder. The variations include'Tracker' models with 6' barrels in blue and stainless steel,similar models with 3' barrels in blue or stainless steel and an'ultra-light' version (at 22 ounces empty, not really) with a 3'barrel built on an aluminum alloy frame. These five models are all chamberedfor 2-1/2', .410 shotshells.

The sixth model, named the 'Judge,' seems to havegenerated the most interest. It is a stainless steel version with a 3'barrel and a cylinder lengthened to accept 3' .410 shotshells. Taurusincorrectly identifies the 3', .410 shotgun shell as a 'Magnum'on their web site, but in reality it is simply a 'high brass,' not amagnum, load. Here are some basic specifications for the 3' chamber Judge:

• Model - 4510TKR-3SSMAG
• Caliber - .45 Colt and .410/3' shotshell
• Capacity - 5
• Frame size - Medium
• Barrel length - 3'
• Finish - Matte stainless steel
• Weight - 36.8 ounces
• Length - 9.5'
• 2008 MSRP - $608

All of these Taurus revolvers are supplied with a fiberoptic front sight and a rudimentary fixed rear sight consisting of a squaregroove cut into the top of the frame. The rubber handgrips are Taurus'Ribber' type to help moderate the considerable recoil, especially ofthe Ultra-Light version.

Taurus double action revolvers have traditionally been builton what is essentially a copy of S&W lock work, which is faint praise atbest. The cylinder swings out to the left for loading/unloading in the usualmanner and rotates counter-clockwise (out of the frame) when operated. Their DAtrigger pulls average an unacceptable 12 pounds or so, but their SA triggerpulls are usually quite good at about three pounds. Unfortunately, a good SA trigger pullachieves little in a revolver that is inherently inaccurate.

These are basically five-shot, double action revolverschambered for the venerable .45 Long Colt (LC) cartridge. However, thecylinders of the five standard models have been lengthened to also accommodate2-1/2' .410 bore shotshells. This results in a cylinder that measures2.690' in length and a frame window to match. The cylinder of the 'Magnum'.410 Judge has been lengthened to an incredible 3.190' in order to accept3' long .410 shotshells. Because of their dual-purpose mission, the sixgroove, right hand twist rifling in Taurus .45/.410 revolvers' barrels isintentionally cut shallow to minimize the inevitable disruption of .410shot loads, which does not bode well for accuracy with conventional bullets.

The cylinder in a .45 Colt Peacemaker revolver, which is properlysized to the cartridge, measures 1.609' long. That means that a .45 Coltbullet fired in a 2-1/2' chamber Taurus has to jump over an inch of additional free space just toreach the forcing cone. Fired in a 3' chamber Judge, that same bullet hasto jump an additional 1.5' of space to reach the revolver's forcing cone! Expect the 3'-chambered Judge to be even less accurate than the model with the 2-1/2' chamber owned by W.W. Stowe.

The bottom line is that, while Taurus revolvers in generalhave earned a reputation for mediocre accuracy, these .45/.410 revolvers havelowered the bar. One author, writing for a respected gun magazine,praised the Judge to the skies (naturally, since print magazines never publish an unfavorable review of anadvertiser's product), but admitted that it would barelykeep its bullets on a humanoid silhouette target at 25 yards! Considering thatpractically any Colt or Ruger .45 LC revolver will average 2-3' groups atthat range with factory loaded ammo and no tuning whatsoever, the Judge'saccuracy as a .45 LC revolver is simply unacceptable.

Naturally, firing a .410 shotshell in a revolver with a 3'rifled barrel is not likely to produce very satisfactory results. Thesame writer mentioned in the paragraph above patterned the 3' Judge with 11/16ounce, #4 and #6 .410 shot loads and reported very few pellets outside of an18' circle--at five yards! Pardon me, but .410 shotshells are customarily patterned at 30 yards. These arethe kind of deceptive shenanigans required to produce a favorable review of theJudge revolver. Here at Guns and Shooting Online, we try toavoid such deceptions, which is why I declined to do a full review of the Taurus Judge revolver.

Guns and Shooting Online reader W.W. Stowe kindly wrote to me to pass along his test results shooting his 3' barrel, 2-1/2' chamber, Judge revolver. At 25 yards, shooting a four 000 buckshot .410 shell, it will keep all four buckshot somewhere on an 18'x24' target board. At 16.6 yards (50 feet) it will keep a cylinder load of .45 Colt bullets on a paper plate (a 9' circle). Needless to say, the latter is totally unacceptable accuracy for a revolver. I want my revolvers, even snubbies, to (at least) put five bullet holes in a 4' circle at our standard test distance of 25 yards.

My advice to anyone looking for a .45 LC revolver is tobuy a Colt or a Ruger. If you want a .410, a number of good shotguns are sochambered. The Taurus Judge is a 'one size fits all' approach tobeing both and, consequently, is unsatisfactory as either.