or probably any revolver mechanic really. Can a bent crane be straightened?

Ended up with an early Police Positive Special because the price was right and it had some vintage stags but the crane is mo' definitely cocked relative to the frame. Probably makes the most sense to pull the stags and sell it for parts but I was curious if it could be corrected.

Thanks!

S&W revolver alignment can be tweaked (bent) to achieve perfect alignment. I don't see why a Colt would be any different. Finding someone with the skill to do it may be another matter though........

Shop Manual by Jerry Kuhnhausen. His entire series of books are very thorough and recommended.

The process uses a gauge thimble to define the bend and a triangular wedge made from wood to tweak it back into position until the gauge thimble drops in place.

some research the most certain choice to me was to send it to Cylinder and Slide (mine is a Police Positive .32 New Police (S&W). To do this you call, give your CC and charge $50 to be put in line. You will be told it is about a ___ month wait. They told me 6-8 months. Then you wait. They send you information on exactly how to ship it when they do let you know your turn has come up.

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Sincerely,

Hobie

Absolutely, they can be aligned, but make sure it is done by a reputable person who will take the time to do it correctly and stand behind their work. It is not technically challenging but it does take a careful, patient hand.

Hoot, sorry to say there are most likely other things wrong with that gun as well. I did the same thing a few years ago - bought a well-worn PPS for next to nothing. Crane was OK, but it was out of time due to wear on several action parts. Long story short, it is now mechanically like new, but it took over a year's worth of parts hunting, the talents of an incredibly patient and dedicated old-time gunsmith, and enough money to have bought a pretty good PPS that didn't have to be rebuilt.

The project turned out to be more trouble than it was worth. I am proud of that gun, but mainly just because it brought me the acquaintance of a very fine man in the twilight of his career.

about $150 to this point.

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Sincerely,

Hobie

It definitely pays to evaluate the whole gun before undertaking repairs. A worn out gun can be far more costly to repair than it would ever be worth, but one that has little wrong, even if it is something major like a bent crane, can often be well worth repairing. It used to be very common to see revolvers with bent cranes, often because of people imitating their favorite cop show actors who would open the cylinders one handed by pushing the lever and giving the gun a quick flip of their wrist. This would cause the cylinder to come flying out and frequently bend when they came to an abrupt stop. These guns were frequently shot very little as they were owned by people who were not shooters and did not understand the damage they were doing.

than to be a skilled and talented gunsmith. All the good ones have a long backlog.

I don't even hand one of my revolvers to anyone any more unless I really know they know what they are doing. In the case of my kids, I instructed first and they all learned how to treat a firearm, or any other tool, with respect.

Thanks for the input guys. For whatever lame reason, I read all replies and then went on about my way without acknowledging them. My mother's gonna slap me....

Anyway, I have an elder 'smith who loves challenges. I'll see what he has to say. If he tells me it ain't worth the effort, I'll pull the grips and part out the rest.

Thanks again!

That was the deal with my PPS. Ben Schade, an old gunsmith who worked part-time at a local shop, took it on as a challenge. Took him over a year to find all the parts and in one case figure out how to do a tiny but extremely critical modification to a part to make the whole thing work.

There aren't many people left who can work on the old Colt actions. Ben did a masterful job on this one, and then he up and retired on me!