LATEST FROM SMITH & WESSON

Industry wide, a lot of the new guns introduced and promised at the SHOT Show the first of the year have been held up. The reason is that demand for certain current-line models has been so great that to keep up with it, the newer entries had to be pushed to the back burner. It’s true of many companies, and it is certainly true of Smith & Wesson.

I’m presently at a gun writers’ seminar in Tulsa, on the splendid USSA (United States Shooting Academy) range. We’re getting to play with some of the cool new rifles and handguns from this maker that should have been available to the consumers by now…and would have been, if the post-election gun buying frenzy natinwide hadn’t thrown production schedules into a cocked hat.

As nature gave us a panoply of its broad range of Oklahoma weather through the day — by turns windy and still, pouring rain and unremitting sun — we got briefed by S&W executives and engineers, and got to put lots of rounds downrange.

Star of the show, I think, was the coolest little .22 rifle to come along in a while. It’s the .22 Long Rifle version of their M&P 15, which in turn is Smith & Wesson’s take on what has truly become “America’s Rifle,” the AR15. Rendered with lots of polymer, including even the accessory rail, it weighs only about five pounds or so. More than a dozen of us poured 25-round magazines of CCI ammo through it, and I didn’t see a single malfunction. Accuracy was good on the “practical range,” shooting all sorts of steel knockdowns and silhouettes. We will be taking it to the longer rifle ranges tomorrow and hope to be able to bench test it for accuracy. It will sell for $499.95 suggested retail, and I predict it will definitely be a hit.

We plan to work with a precision rifle from Thompson/Center, now of course a Smith & Wesson subsidiary, tomorrow.

On the handgun side, the adjustable sight version of the 1964 Model 57 in .41 Magnum proved eminently “shootable.” Something of a “niche cartridge” these days, the .41 Mag has always had a strong following among those who really knew their guns and appreciated a heavy-duty outdoorsman’s revolver. We also got to shoot the new iterations of the great old K-22, in both 6″ barrel Model 17 and 4″ barrel Model 18 configurations. These are recent additions to S&W’s successful “retro” line they call the Classic Series.

There are also new variations in their super-popular Military & Police semiautomatic service pistol line, and their 1911 series semiautomatic pistols, and more.

I’ll get back to you after tomorrow’s shooting session, with more info, and should have some pix for you by the end of this week.