The Good The Bad and The Ugly

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smokepole14

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I was just courious in the scene where Tuco was in the bathtub and the one armed bounty hunter tries to kill him. Tuco has his 1851 colt tied to a string around his neck and the gun is in the water. He shoots the bounty hunter while his gun is still in the water in the bathtub. Then Tuco gives his famous line "When you have to shoot shoot don't talk". Would this even be possible with a cap and ball revolver or would you have to use a cartridge conversion. More than likely tuco was using a cartridge conversion since you couldnt see the movie if they were using black powder with all the smoke. Also couldn't this be dangerous or has anyone shot a pistol under water.
 
I've never seen it, but there are ways to waterproof a C&B pistol to a certain extent. You can grease that ball and melt wax over it as well as over the precussion cap. This works great against rain, but i don't know how well it works against being fully submerged.
 
It was a conversion. There was also a lot of bubbles on top of the water. Might be wrong but he may have had the barrel out of the water.
 
Even if it was a cap 'n ball, the Tuco character would not have immersed his gun but lowered it just enough to conceal it among the bubbles.
 
One of the gun magazines built a water tank and used a Ransom Rest to shoot a .357 Magnum and a .45 Colt Automatic underwater to see what would happened. The back glass of the water tank was broken in both tests and the .45 jammed.

There are several videos of Glocks being fired underwater, as long as the barrel has water inside it to equal out the pressure, everything's okay. A cartridge revolver would be even better, since there's the gap between the cylinder and barrel.

I've read that Sam Colt guaranteed that his pistols could fire if they were submerged. Didn't they made caps different back then, they were waterproofed for the soldiers?
 
Don't know about Tuco's, but I would assume that it was cartridge...being that the man with no name's gun was. Remember the scene where he is cleaning his gun and then quickly loading it when he hears the spurs of the assassins after the soldiers outside pause their march?

Actually, remember when Tuco assembles his gun that he steals from the store after his walk in the desert? Definitely "cartridges".
 
Even with blanks, if you're shooting a pistol with a barrel full of water out of the water, the water becomes the projectile and ramps up the pressure.

If the pistol is completely submerged and the barrel is completely full of water, you're good to go. It's the same as if you had an air pocket between your blackpowder charge and your bullet. The hydraulic force increases the chamber pressure if there's something unbalanced in the system.
 
When Tuco assembled that gun in the gun shop (impossible how he did that in my opinion), he demanded "cartridges" before he went out to test the gun out back of the shop (another impossible scenario, but entertaining for sure). He could have had that gun under water for a bit and it would still shoot, but would he risk it? Doubt it, but it makes for a good fictional scene.
 
Tuco may have had the gun in the bubbles only

Tuco might have had his gun hid in the bubbles above the water. Tuco was taking some kind of bubble bath, wasnt he?

In the movie, Tuco robs a gun shop. While in the shop, Tuco takes a BP revolver apart. Then he removes parts from another gun and assembles himself a cartridge piece. He takes it out back and shoots the range to pieces.

Was this the gun he had in the bath tub scene?
 
Pretty sure he used that gun through the rest of the movie. One thing I found funny is when he's turning the cylinder of the piece parts gun he put together in the old man's gun shop. I makes a nice click,click,click, and Tuco nods with satisfaction. Looking closely at the cylinder, it looks C&B. Then he asks for cartridges..:eek:

Another funny note is at the last scene when Tuco, Blondie, and Angel Eyes are in that awesome shootout. When the camera goes closeup on Angel Eyes gun and belt, you can see the percussion caps on the cylinder of his remmie, but has a belt full of cartridges :rolleyes:, and they look like FMJ... :confused:
 
Angel Eyes was able to tell it was Tuco doing the shooting by the perfect timing of his hand-assembled Colt-Army-Remington-Navy-conversion revolver :rolleyes:

At least they weren't packin' Colt SAA and 1892/'94 Winchesters like in most generic westerns..
 
AFAIK all the weapons used in Sergio Leone's spaghetti western were Italian replicas, like the Uberti...

... we ended up making more Colts and Remingtons around Brescia than those actually made during the Civil War.....


K. from Italy

(nice post to start....)
 
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