pietta 1873 gunfighter 357mag. $540

There might be no handgun more gorgeous than the Colt 1873 SAA and the quality clones produced over the decades. In that light, Pietta is a leading contender with a range of iterations on the theme and - in my opinion - excelling with the 1873 Gunfighter 357MAG/38SPL pictured above. (It also comes in 45LC for those who prefer that caliber.) Based in Gussago, Italy, Pietta has been a family-owned and operated company for more than 50 years. Italy's interest in firearms of the wild west was spawned by Sergio Leone's A Fistful of Dollars starring Clint Eastwood, and the company made replicas for that franchise and the subsequent years of spagetti westerns spawning the genre. They are revered for producing the finest in western replica pistols, shotguns and single-action rifles, a variety of black powder firearms, and now modern-day firearms. With it's 4" barrel, glistening blued finish and black rubber checked grips (better than wood), the Pietta 1873 Gunfighter is one handsome iron. Pietta's rate among the favorites for those in the Cowboy shooting sports because of their proximity to the original yet with the added safety of a transfer bar which allows you to load a full cylinder and prevents fatalities if you drop your revolver. A local man here died a few years back after dropping his Colt SAA clone: the revolver fell on it's hammer and he was shot in the head, killing him instantly. This could not happen with the Pietta clones thanks to that transfer bar safety which is in my opinion the only worthy update of this outstanding design by Sam Colt. If you haven't browsed the Pietta website, or didn't know they had a USA based facility, they are well worth looking at. The MSRP for this pistol is $540 but you can find them on Gunbroker for as low as $465 - that is a fraction of what an original Colt would cost and less than half the cost of Ruger's Vaquero which is not an 1873 clone at all. Drool over the WEBSITE here.