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1973 s&w 19-3 ammo
- Thread starter Shelby61
- Start date
redlevel42
New member
Very safe to use any kind of .38 Special ammo in your 19-3. Recommendations would be depending on the use. For general self or home defense, any +p .38 special ammo is fine. For range/practice, cheaper rounds would be fine. I load a 158 grain semi-wadcutter in .357 cases for general use in my 19-3. The load is a little hotter than recommended for .38 Special guns, but much lower than full-house .357 loads.
carguychris
New member
If this question is taken at face value, it raises the question, which .38?Is it safe to use 38 ammo in my 1973 S&W 19-3 357 4" barrel revolver?
There is no problem with using any commercial .38 Special or .38 Long Colt load in a Model 19, including +P and +P+ flavors of the former. (+P+ is rare on today's gun shop shelves, but is safe in a .357.)
.38 S&W, aka ".38 Short", uses a slightly larger-caliber bullet and larger-diameter case; its nominal caliber is 0.361" vs. 0.357", although some modern .38 S&W ammo uses 0.357-0.358" hollow-base bullets because some revolvers in this caliber were produced with 0.357"-caliber barrels. As a consequence of the varying caliber, SOME .38 S&W ammo will chamber in SOME (but not all!) .38Spl/.357Mag revolvers. IF the ammo will chamber, you should be able to safely fire it; however, .38 S&W ammo is generally uncommon and expensive, so there's little reason to use it unless you absolutely can't find anything else.