That is one beautiful Python!
My roommate in college (80-84) had one, a Trooper, and a .41 Magnum Ruger.
Here is mine from 1970… Beautiful revolver!
isnt that sad ? Colt is sitting on a gold mine but cant capitalize…
Yet another reason to hate the unions…
My first revolver when I was 18 was a 2 1/2" Colt Python that had been built in 1970.
My second was a Colt Detective Special, nickel, from 1969 or so. It was a trade in from the Richmond Sheriff’s Dept.
I’ve always liked the 1/2 moon checkering around the prancing pony on those pic’d pythons compared to the straight line.
The full checkered grips on earliest are really really cool.
My understanding is all the colt tooling for the da wheel guns is gone & there will never be any more. No way would they retool.
I bought a Colt Grizzly s/n 500 from an LEO in OK a few years ago & was stolen by a UPS employee on dec 23rd…i cry myself to sleep some nights still.
Where can i find the year it was made?
5 second search on Google brought up ProofHouse, which goes up to 1978.
I’m sure there are others.
Proofhouse is very reliable.
I wonder if Colt’s patents are up on some of these old Colt DA revolvers. Couldn’t someone like US Firearms or Uberti make replicas? Maybe the market just isn’t there.
To make a real Python requires machinery and skilled hands that are difficult to come by.
Here in Norcal, they’re running about $1200-1500.00 for a 90%
used condition. Good luck.
If someone today can pull it off it will be either US Firearms Company or Connecticut Shotgun Manufacturing Company.
Both are a stone’s throw away from Colt’s in distance but light years ahead in the marriage of ultra high precision machining and old school craftsmanship.
The harder thing to find these days is the old time smiths who still know how to keep them in time and work on them when needed…
IMHO the finest action on a factory tuned revolver ever produced…
I miss those cool guns. I wonder what it would cost to build and sell them today. Just think of the stuff you see from the S&W Performance Center.