Tag Archives: .45 colt

Big Iron! A Review of the Taurus Deputy Single Action Revolver in 45 Colt

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Taurus has been well-known worldwide for its double-action revolvers since 1941, but only got into the more retro single-action wheel gun market more recently.

The company’s first single-action offering, the Taurus Gaucho, popped up briefly in 2005, then faded back into gun lore.

Since then, Taurus acquired Heritage Manufacturing in 2012, which makes a tremendous amount of single-action rimfire caliber revolvers every year, like 187,000 guns a year kind of production.

With the company owning such a huge slice of the rimfire single gun market, as well as the double-action centerfire market, it’s only natural that Taurus would make a traditional “four click” revolver.

In late 2024, it debuted the Deputy. A SAA-based revolver offered in two barrel lengths, a 4.75-inch “gunfighter” style, and a longer 5.5-inch, as well as in the iconic .45 Colt or .357 Magnum calibers, the Deputy is ready to ride.

Taurus Deputy 5.5-inch format in .45 Colt
We’ve been testing and evaluating the Taurus Deputy 5.5-inch format in .45 Colt for the past four months. (All photos: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
Taurus Deputy 5.5-inch format in .45 Colt
The 5.5-inch barrel gives the Deputy an overall length of 11 inches. Weight is 38 ounces. 

Quick summary: We reviewed the 5.5-inch barreled .45 Colt variant of this classic six-shooter with modern safety features and found it to be a good, if beefy, “smoke wagon” at an affordable price.

For the full review, head on over to my column at Guns.com. 

146 Years of Peacemaking

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Samuel Colt’s iconic revolver works peaked during the Civil War while the inventor and founder himself passed away in 1862. This left his company behind to try and compete against other revolver makers (looking at you, Smith & Wesson) who were using Rollin White’s breech-loading cartridge wheel gun patents. Once White’s patent tanked in 1870, William Mason and Charles Brinckerhoff Richards at Colt filed patents for their own Model 1871-72 Open Top revolver.

This six-shot single action, chambered in the same .44 Rimfire cartridge used by the Henry lever-action rifles of the day, soon morphed into a chambering in Colt’s new centerfire black powder .45 cartridge and submitted for a new U.S. Army handgun contract to replace older cap-and-ball revolvers.

And the rest was history.

More in my column at Guns.com