Eight-Round Tuff Strips

Bianchi Speed Strips and their near-clones, the Tuff Products Quickstrips are a popular option for people who CCW a revolver to carry reloads. Being flat, they are easier to carry concealed than a speed loader.

Quickstrips are available for a variety of calibers and also in versions that carry 8 rounds. These have an advantage even if you're carrying a 6 shot revolver. This is my S&W 632 Airweight in .32 H&R Magnum.

As you can see, this allows you to space out the rounds in the strip to make loading 2 rounds at a time easier.

Incidentally, I don't carry a reload with the expectation I'd ever need it during a fight. Rather, it means that if I do have to defend myself with the gun and survive, I can remain armed afterwards.

The ammo is .32 H&R Magnum 98 grain powder coated wadcutters loaded by High Desert Cartridge. HDC says it's specced for the new S&W Ultra Carry revolvers in .32 H&R with a 1-7/8" barrel, which is the same as my older gun. I put just shy of a 50 round box through the gun yesterday and while I didn't chronograph it, I found it very clean shooting and accurate. It's my new carry load for this piece.

Roscoes at the Range

Yesterday I got out to do some shooting with a friend.

Top to bottom:

• 1974 Colt Detective Special in .38 Special I picked up about a week and a half ago.
• Early/mid-1990s S&W 632 Airweight in .32 H&R Magnum that was a gift from my dad several years ago.
• My friend's Charter Arms Professional in .32 H&R Mag.

I ran a couple different handloads through the Colt. Both were loaded with Lee TL358-158 cast semiwadcutters in mixed brass. The first batch were over 3.8 grains of HP-38 while the second batch were over 3.5 grains of Titegroup. In a medium frame gun like a S&W Model 10 these are very mild. They jump a bit more in a compact snub but remained controllable, especially the Titegroup loads.

First 18 shots with the Colt, with the HP-38 ammo, fired 2 hands, double action, from about 10 yards:

This is a great little gun. Colt should reintroduce it now that they've got back into wheelguns.

Next up was the Airweight. The last time I had it out I had several light strikes due to a reduced power hammer spring I'd installed. Before trying it again I put a 9.5 lb. Wolff hammer spring in it, which is actually a pound heavier than stock. This time it ran flawlessly

18 rounds from 10 yards, shooting .32 H&R Magnum 98 grain wadcutter rounds from High Desert Cartridge, which will be my new carry load. HDC uses powder coated bullets in this load and it burned very cleanly.

The Charter Arms Professional was bought by my friend around 2019. It was an inexpensive revolver but we've been impressed with it for the cost (about $300 at the time). It's a 7 shooter comparable in size to a Colt D-Frame (e.g., the Detective Special). He spent a lot of time working on the action and it's extremely smooth.

Another gun I brought out was my S&W Model 28-2 Highway Patrolman. This is an N-Frame .357 Magnum. I've owned it since the late 90s, when I traded an Astra A-75 towards it. If I remember correctly, the big Smith was priced at $250.

It's been ages since I've fired full house .357s from a revolver so we put 20 rounds of Federal American Eagle .357 158 grain JSPs through it. This is a screen cap from a video showing the gun in full recoil. In contrast, shooting the .38 Specials I had with me was a very mild experience due to the gun's 41 oz. weight.

The Model 28 is fitted with Thai Magnas and a grip adapter from BK Grips.

Aside from the wheelguns I also ran some rounds through my 2nd generation Keltec P32. I found that it dislikes the Fiocchi and Aguila FMJ I had on hand, giving me at least one failure to eject per magazine. My friend gave me some PPU .32 ACP FMJ with which it functioned 100% through two mags. The PPU also functions 100% in his Gen 1 P32, so we're going to split a case.