Charter Arms Tune Up

I have respected the Charter Arms revolver line for a variety of reasons for some twenty years. The company has been around for some time under a variety of names and today MKS Supply handles distribution. These revolvers have offered an honest value, often at a time when good handguns were difficult to obtain. Charter Arms was founded in Stratford Connecticut in 1964. The Undercover, the first product, was a small frame .38 caliber revolver. Innovations were incorporated that are still considered state of the art.

The transfer bar ignition and modular frame design were adopted to one extent or the other by Ruger and Dan Wesson in their later double action revolvers. Charter Arms revolvers use a steel frame that is removable from the main receiver. The firing pin is of beryllium copper and the transfer bar system offered a unprecedented degree of safety when first introduced.

The hammer cannot contact the firing pin until the trigger is fully pressed to the rear, at which time the transfer bar rises and allows the hammer to contact the firing pin. Other than the transfer bar system, I have examined a few Spanish revolvers with similar features, including one with a Dan Wesson type cylinder lock, but none that come together in the fashion of the Charter Arms. For ease of manufacture and simplicity the design is very good.

Throughout bankruptcy and a number of sales and reorganizations the company has remained a fixture on the firearms scene. As may be expected production quality and attention to detail have sometimes suffered. For some reason most of the trouble prone specimens are .44 Special Bulldog revolvers. The Bulldog is similar to the .38 but with a deeper frame and appropriately larger cylinder and barrel. I have examined quite a few Bulldogs over the years and carried them professionally as backup revolvers.

Some examples are better than others but 500 rounds will always produce wear and rattles on the .44 Special Charter Arms revolver. This is simply the price we must pay for a nineteen ounce .44. Few handgunners will fi rea handgun such as this that much, but some 32 caliber revolver with barrel underlug, a typical and well used early model .38 caliber Undercover, and a Bulldog Pug.. The operating principles are sound. will fi re it extensively and experiment with handloads.

Sometime around 1993 I examined anew stainless Bulldog Pug that exhibited the roughest action I have seen in a production Charter. Not only was it rough, if you stopped pulling the trigger in mid stroke the hammer would simply stay in the midway position and not fall! The problem of hammer binding on the frame was obvious. These problems seem to be pretty well absent from Charter 2000 production but just the same there are areas that may be improved.

I have some experience with the type and recently I have been able to examine several examples of the most recent production. Each seemed typical of the breed. If you are used to other makes, when first attempting to work with the Charter Arms revolver you really have to don your thinking cap as the design is so different. Disassembly is considerably more different than the Smith and Wesson, for example. I have examined Charter Arms revolvers in .22, .32 Smith and Wesson

38 caliber Undercover has seen yeoman service in a tackle box for some time. It still functions but needs refinishing. Remove the grips and then capture the mainspring. Note the small hole at the bottom of the spring housing. This is designed for easy disassembly. Long, .38 Special, .357 Magnum, and .44 Special. Among the revolvers currently on hand the first I examined is a modern .32 Magnum Undercoverette. Small bores remain popular for many reasons.

As an example, the owner obtained this revolver for his teenage daughter for protection in the home. The action was very smooth, the smoothest I have tested in any Charter. Recoil was mild and the revolver is accurate enough to serve as afisherman or outdoorsman’s tool for popping snakes or perhaps finishing off downed game. My examination revealed the smoothest and best finished Charter type revolver I have ever examined.

There were simply no rub marks on the hammer as is common with the type and the revolver is overall comparable to practically any on the market. The second Charter Arms revolver examined was a Bulldog Pug. The Pug features a two and a half-inch shrouded barrel in comparison to the earlier three-inch barrel Bulldog with exposed ejector rod. As a result weight is up to 21 ounces. The Charter Arms Pug .44 Special worked OK but with a well defined hard spot in the action just before the trigger fell.

The action definitely could have been improved. The lockup was good but the cylinder displayed typical play when open. I felt there was more room for improvement with this handgun and it would be a better test case. I elected to work over the .44 first while ad- It seems long lived. mitting it was questionable if any worthwhile improvement could be done with the .32. Disassembly As always, check to be certain the handgun is unloaded by inspecting the cylinder.

To disassemble the revolver, first bring the hammer to full cock. Insert a paper clip or similar tool into the hole at the bottom of the mainspring guide and then gently lower the hammer, allowing the spring and spring guide to be removed. The mainspring seat

is a small square piece that is the number one part often lost on this revolver. I have two spares at the moment for obvious reasons as they will take flight if a home enthusiast attempts disassembly without the proper steps. Even an experienced individual may lose such a small part. All frame screws differ, so it is a good idea to carefully lay them out and memorize their location. The revolver is held together by a combination of screws and pins.

First, the screw near the back of the grip frame, the frame assembly screw, is removed. Then tap out the frame assembly pin near the bottom rear of the frame. The forward pin must also be drifted out. This is the cylinder stop pin and we will address a common problem with this pin in a few paragraphs. The butt section or handle section can now be removed from the frame or receiver. Next, unscrew the hammer screw and lift the hammer from the frame.

At the forward section of the frame is the cylinder retaining screw that may be removed to release the cylinder. You may draw the crane forward to address cleaning the integral bushing on the frame as this bushing sometimes becomes caked with dried powder, unburned ash or even congealed lubricant. Obviously something is binding. As it turned out the hammer had well defined wear marks indicating drag. The hammer pawl also demonstrated rough areas. I carefully studied these parts under magnifi cation.

The roughness in the action seemed to correspond with safety bar movement during the lock cycle but I felt comfortable with only a minimal polish of the pawl and the hammer on the bearing surfaces The hammer sides area different matter.

While not as serious as seen with some revolvers of the type, this binding resulted in a rough action. The cylinder retaining screw is at the front of the frame. I did lightly stone the hand on the surface. The hammer pawl features a rather simple radius that is easily addressed. The hammer has a more severe angle but may be polished with care. These parts were stoned carefully and this improved the smoothness of the action. The sides of the hammer may be polished to a greater extent.

The hammer showed several drag lines common to some Charter revolvers, and the obvious interpretation is that the hammer is dragging. I stoned these marks away leaving a smooth surface when done, leading to a smoother operation when the piece was reassembled. Coupled with the action surfaces smoothing the overall effect was more than the sum of the work would have indicated. Next I addressed the shaky cylinder.

This Bulldog Pug cylinder definitely displayed more play than the .32 Magnum Undercoverette but seemed typical of Charter production. The cylinder screw seemed to have a removable bushing in the take down illustration but in this case the bushing was not removable, at least not easily. I considered adding a shim to address cylinder play and shake but the revolver locked up tight during firing so the fi nal verdict was to leave the revolver as is.

I did peen the assembly pin that rides just under the cylinder near the front of the frame. I have never seen a .44 Special fi red often that did not suffer some loosening of this pin. The pin will even walk out the right side for about half its length if not tightened. I have never seen one continue all of the way out but it will certainly work loose. By peening and roughing this pin up to an extent this walking is curtailed. This is a simple operation that saves lots of trouble later.

The next step helps alleviate some of the problems encountered in matching a light revolver to a heavy caliber. The cylinder release latch of the Charter .44 is often a source of discomfort. Even when firing the standard Winchester 246 grain round nose bullet loads, which exits the Charter’s 2.5 inch barrel at a meager 650 fps, recoil is noticeable. After all, this is a 21 ounce revolver firing a big bore cartridge and the cylinder latch often bites the thumb.

In early production the ejector rod was unshrouded, allowing shooters to pull the ejector rod forward to release the cylinder. Many simply removed the cylinder latch for comfort and relied upon the cylinder ejector rod to open the cylinder. The shrouded barrel Pug does not allow the use of the cylinder pin to open the cylinder. A better operation is to remove the latch and then carefully polish and radius the bottom of the cylinder release into a smooth shape.

The original is pretty sharp and while it gives a good surface for manipulation when firing the geometry of the revolver practically demands two locked thumbs and these thumbs often are rapped hard by the sharp cylinder latch. Many of you have seen the modern design offered by SDM Fabricating for the Smith and Wesson revolver. This is a good design and you should carefully consider the shape and configuration of the SDM piece when working the Charter Arms latch.

I found the modern Charter revolvers as offered by MKS Supply as one of the better revolvers available on the modern market. It is affordable and reliable. We left the .32 Undercoverette as is. The others, earlier revolvers and the Bulldog and Bulldog Pug types, certainly may be improved. The rougher versions still found on the used market often need the attention of a gunsmith to perform at acceptable levels. AG