Magnaport good or bad?

M

mac57t

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Magnaport good or bad on a hunting handgun?

What is your experience with ported revolvers?The gun will be used for deer hunting.
 
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My experience is that it reduces muzzle jump more on long barrels than on short barrels. It makes my 300 Weatherby much louder but haven't noticed much change in noise of magnum handgun.
 
It weakens the barrel by removing material, it increases your cleaning demands, it is loud, it is blinding at night, it reduces recoil barely enough to justify the expense and in my experience reduces the value/resale on many models. The good? Cool factor, maybe.
 
I pretty much agree with Sir William on most of his points. I think on a carry type weapon it does increase value, but not on a collectable type of weapon. On the lightweight magnums (read S&W scandiums) it really helps recoil. The cleaning is'nt much of an issue unless lead bullets are used. It certainly does light up the night as well. I personally don't prefer it but have some that came that way.
 
I am talking about porting a hunting revolver with a 6-8.375" barrel.It will not be used at night and is way too big to carry.My buddy has a 7.5" SRH 44 Mag. and it is Manaported.I swear it is milder than my 66 shooting .357's.
 
Porting = MINUS $100 or more in value to me at least. I HATE ported handguns, and know lots of others who feel the same way. You will never recoup the cost of porting when selling a gun, and lots of times you will lose the cost of porting plus some if you sell.

If this is a gun you plan to keep and/or aren't worried about resale maybe porting is for you. If the gun is hard to manage without porting then maybe porting will make it more agreeable. A better avenue to me would be to tailor loads to where they will get the job done but keep the gun reasonable to shoot, if you don't reload and can't find a factory load you like this may not be feasible. One thing porting will definately add is noise, noise to the point that you need to wear hearing protection while hunting also.

Most of the big revolvers are pussycats anyway, your buddies gun without porting wouldn't slap your hand the way the 66 does so that really isn't a good comparison. See if you can find a rental SRH to shoot for an apples-to-apples comparison.
 
If you haven't bought the revolver yet, I would consider a caliber change. The 45 Long Colt in a S&W N frame would be a better choice. The recoil issue is mild in a 45 Long Colt heavy frame revolver.
 
I've shot 44mags of the same make in both unported and magnaported and the MP'd were much more managable.

Now... I've been waiting almost 2 months to get my 44 back from them... grrr
 
Rather than letting the termites get at my barrel I would back down the power of the loads or go to a different chambering.
 
I'm amazed at the people that say a ported handgun barrel will blind you at night and will be much louder. Every 357 Mag, 41 Mag and 44 Mag revolver I own will put out tremendous fireballs at night ported or not. As for making the gun louder in a revolver I've never really noticed much difference. Full power loads are pretty noisy from anything with a hand gun length barrel.
 
I would avoid ported handguns (and rifles) like plague. Unless I just had to have some handcannon for hunting buffalo I can live without it.

In a defensive handgun it is folly IMO. Apart from shooting positions like the "speedrock", your firing position may dictate having your face somewhere in the line of that upward blast of gas and crud.
 
I used to mag-na-port everything in the 70,s and early 80's! It is real good on hunting handguns; decreases 2nd shot time. You don't usually hunt at night, so lets not go into THAT issue. Actually magnaport works VERY well on short barrel MAGNUM guns! But the flash and blast is too distracting! Magnaport works best IMHO on .44 mag or .454 mag guns, really not necessary on .357. I have a 5 3/4 pound Scout rfle in .308 that has dual magnaport, it was crappy to shoot before I had it done in 83! :cool:
 
Magnaport does an excellent job reducing recoil with their porting system and Magnabrake. It's something you don't do unless it's absolutely needed.
 
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