May be an old question ,but what would be the ideal length barrel for a 44 mag? The gun will be used for hunting,and will be scoped and or used with a red dot.My main question is what length is better,7 1/2 or 8 3/8? Any input greatly appreciated.

No real difference in my opinion.

Ditto on that. Mine had an 8-3/8" and the recoil wasn't bad. I am not so sure it would be any better than the 7-1/2.

X2. I think the difference would be marginal. I prefer 14in., and I think it's a world of difference. As a beginner in handgun hunting, I feel more comfortable with the T/C.

My mod 29 is 8&3/8 & I really enjoy it.
That said, if I were building a gun it would probably be a 7.5". I honestly like the looks a little better & I feel it's usually (there are other factors involved too) the best compromise of looks, feel, & performance.

I'm no help as I think 6" is a real nice compromise of performance vs handling, although I do have a 9-1/2" SRH 480 that I really love. There won't be much performance gap in the two you mention so get the best handling one that you shoot well ;-)

X2 on the marginal. Particularly with the heavier bullets.

When shooting a 300gr projectile there is 50fps difference between a 20in and a 10in barrel.

Think handgun, Al! LOL!

Barrel length all boils down to preference. I have one hunting revolver with a 7.5-inch barrel that I really like, but generally like a shorter barrel.

Still like driving a Ford Whitworth? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

For those out of the loop, the joke is that if we were all made from the same cookie cutter we would all be driving the same make, model, and color Ford truck.

We were talking HANDguns, weren't we?? 14-inches!!!!!!!! I have rifles with shorter barrels -- LOL!

Nope, I drive a GMC!

LOL!

Good form Whit!!!! LOL

You say that like it's a BAD thing!!! The one company that didn't need bailing out!
By the way, they don't all have to be the same color... Unless I get to pick it.

LOL, Vance!!

Whit, I knew someone would say something like that.

I know some feel that a T/C hogleg is not a real handgun, but I really disliked the SBHBH that I bought. It was a great gun, and accurate, but it was me that was the problem with that gun. It shot Waaay better than I could shoot it, because it bit me every time. That being said, a SRH is on my list of to buys. I used to have one that was a pleasure to shoot.

Thanks guys for the comments. My origanl intention was to see if a certain length gave any real advantage over an other. I want to use a 44 mag to hunt deer and hog with. I was looking at single and double actions, and you can get a wide range of lengths. I am leaning towards a SBH. The hunter has always caught my eye but there is also the bull barreled 10 1/2" SBH.I considered it also, and was going to send it to mag-na-port to have it trimed to 8 3/8" like in there Stalker package. That gun also caught my eye yeats ago when I first saw it.Thats where the 2 lengths came from. I have a 7 1/2" SBH that I had cut to 4 5/8" and it is a great packer but I would not consider it a dedicated hunter.

I have a RH with a 7 1/2" barrel which I feel is pretty comfortable when deer hunting.

Anything 6" or over is fine. My SBH is 10-1/2", left over from IHMSA. Deadly accurate.
Going shorter then 6" and you might have trouble making heavy boolits stable because of velocity loss. Sure some say it is little but a little goes a long way when trying to spin up boolits. I would say 7-1/2" to 10" would be my choice.
Henry Ford said you could buy a car in any color---as long as it was BLACK!

I owned a lot of Fords and back then "found on road dead" or "fix or repair daily" was 100% correct. Had a lot of trouble with GM's too. I worked for a Desoto, Plymouth dealership and would never buy one either. Power up the ying yang but a steady line into maintenance. I would spend all day on the road starting the dumb things when it was cold out.
I remember the push button shift, step on the gas and WOW, 100 mph right now. Then the 57 Chevy with fuel injection--a rocket!

Yup, I am with the majority of the group on this one, 7.5". I can shoot that pretty well off hand and it settles quite nicely on my bench bags. I don't know if it is just balance or the few oz's of extra weight, but I don't notice the recoil as much with the 7.5" SBH v/s a 6" bbl?

But I think that the original question was "what is the optimum barrel length". If you are talking about vel or accuracy and carry isn't a factor my guess is that you wouldn't get a lot more speed (at least with factory loads)or much more bang for your buck with anything over 14" (unless you reload and can tailor your powders).

Bill in OR

huntking, your reply was more in line with my question. I know that carbines seem to increase velocity by 300 to 500 fps I think. Might be off on those figures,but you see where I'm going. I guess the real question;is where is the best bang so to speak for your buck in length? It seems that 7 1/2 might be the sweet spot without going custom or getting to long with out a significant incress. Does this make sense to anyone but me?I know for each inch in length there is an increase but I would think at some point it tapers off or is not worth the extra length. Any help or am I being to critical.Thanks for the help.

A 44 shooting a 300gr projectile will average less than 50fps from long rifle to shortgun. A 22-250 shooting a 55gr projectile averages about 400+ fps. Basically, it is about 300fps difference from rifle to 14-15in handgun. These are just my experiences and findings so take them for what they are worth. There will always be exceptions to the rules so it is hard to state scientific “laws.” LOL

That really depends on bore size and case capacity. The larger bores are more efficient than smaller bores so you won't see that much deviation with a .44

Six inch for good compromise betw. carry and sight radius on the .44 mag revolver, assuming iron sights..

If scoped, doesn't matter for carry; already compromised that part, so the longer the better IMO

430man said that you may have trouble with heavy bullets in shorter barrels. more info please, all ive ever used is 240 hardcast, was thinking of trying some 300s for kicks. some states have a min. barrel length, 6.5 is the longest i think.

OH yeah, even a 320 or my 330 gr .44 boolit will be fine in a 6" barrel. But when you think of 2" to 4" you ask for problems.
The longer the case, the longer the barrel needs to be but that also depends on caliber so even a .500 JRH works in 6".
Just don't think a 45-70 will work in a 4" barrel! That thing really needs 10" and even then you need the right powder. The .500 S&W should have a longer barrel because of case length so cutting one to 4" is just plain crazy.
Now ALL of them will go bang and you can kill an animal at close range.
What I am talking about is accuracy and accuracy at all ranges, not 7 yards. Even 25 yards is plain silly with a hunting revolver or accuracy testing.
I limit hunting to around 100 yards. But if I know where to aim, I can kill a deer at 500 meters with my revolvers but boolit drop is the main reason to use reason. So even with a .460 or .500 S&W, I doubt I would ever shoot more then 100 yards without a bench and actual aiming points.
Anyway, you need a certain velocity and twist rate for your boolit to maintain long range accuracy. That is easier from 6" up in barrel length. You are not hurting yourself with a longer barrel.

Don't count on your bullets going that much faster just because you have a longer barrel. I have two FA's in 454,one is 6" the other is 10" at most i might get the 10" to run 50fps faster than the 6" with the same load.

I believe the cylinder gap is more critical than barrel length when it comes to velocity. And some guns just shoot faster for what ever reason.

As far as a barrel length, i don't think there's any magical number. My preference is like what most of guys are saying,6 to 10" with 7 1/2 probably being the most common.

Cylinder gap has been proven to mean nothing with a single shot getting lower velocity then a revolver with the same barrel length. Every gun is different and even bore dimensions will change velocity.
Sure, maybe a short barrel can shoot almost as fast as a longer barrel but it will be something else, not length.
But 50 to 100 fps can have a large result with stability.

Good stuff guys,I think a 7 1/2" SBH hunter would be a good choice. The 10 1/2" would be nice but would need more work thrown in to scope or put a dot on. I would love the mag-na-port stalker just more money. Guess I cant go wrong either way. As far as the heavy weight bullets go I do not see using them to much. The 270-300 sould be way over kill for most my hunting in south texas 240 will be plenty of umph. Plus I believe with some of those heavy weights you get into length issues. Any one run into issues with the new SBH hunter models?