FA 97 grip frame modification

[PotatoJudge]

Like a lot of people, I love the Ruger Bisley grip frame. And like a lot of other people, I struggle with the Freedom Arms 97 grip frame. It crowds my pinky up into my other fingers and just never feels comfortable. I picked up a duplicate to my FA 97, 44 special, 5.5 inch octagon barrel, factory laminate and black micarta grips fitted, OT stop, action job (giving me an action still not as pleasant as a stock Ruger :? ). Had I not gotten such a good deal on a duplicate of a gun I already own I probably wouldn't have had the guts to try this.

I started by tracing the frontstrap from Ruger Bisley grips onto the FA laminates, sanded them to profile, mounted them on the gun, and got to work on grinding the metal down. After profiling there was still quite a bit of shaping needed on the grips. Surprisingly, there was still crowding of the pinky finger when the grips were left too fat after altering the frontstrap. Once slimmed down with a slight taper to the front the crowding went away.

So there is a scaled down Ruger Bisley grip in there, and that's just what it feels like. Still a bit rough and needs some clean up and refinishing. I'll shoot it as-is before doing any final work in case it needs tweaking.

Assuming it feels as good shooting as it does handling it around the house, I think it's worth sending to somebody like Huntington to alter the frame and grips of my other 97 using this as a template, and maybe have a set of his nice walnut stocks fitted. I just don't feel like doing this again! Took a few hours and is kinda stressful working on such an expensive gun.

I love how well made the 97 is and how you can get huge amounts of power from essentially a Single Six sized gun. My only complaint with them, like a lot of other people, is the grip frame. Hopefully this'll help and maybe give others a chance to make these nice little guns work for them.

 

[gunman42782]

Your braver than I am! Looks like a good job though.

 

[PotatoJudge]

I cleaned the gun up and took it shooting yesterday. I shot it side-by-side with an identical mod 97 using hot handloads of H110 under a 240 grain XTP.

The modified grip rolls more like a Ruger Bisley, but putting about 20 rounds through each gun swapping back and forth I didn't notice a huge difference in how it handles recoil. These are pretty snappy loads, almost as hot as a 44 mag in a Single Six sized gun, so I wouldn't say either grip is particularly easy to shoot and you've gotta hold on either way. The modified grip was more pinky friendly compared to the standard which has always pushed my pinky up into my ring finger under recoil.

The modified grip is still more comfortable in the hand. If I had to do it over again I might leave a little more of a forward sweep to the front strap, but not much more.

Here's a pic of an unmodified FA on top, modified FA in the middle, and a Ruger Bisley on bottom for comparison.



P.S. Taking apart and cleaning the FA 97 is actually easier than the Ruger action, but there's a trick to reinstalling the two wire springs that control the trigger and bolt. The amount of Dykem on the internal parts is a testament to the hand-fitting that goes into these guns and makes me want to know why certain areas warrant hand fitting.

Also, the pics in the first post are HUGE now and weren't when I posted them. Anybody know what's up with that?