If I can add a couple of comments on Jeff's posts...I wasn't an early adopter of the .327 like Jeff was. It wasn't until I had the chance to spend a day at GUNSITE last year shooting a wide selection of personal protection loads side-by-side in a .327 and a .357 SP-101 snub. The recoil was appreciably less on the .327s, even the hot ones. I do not subscribe to the myth of "stopping power" in a personal protection handgun. Rather, I am of the school of "many holes, quickly punched." For the recoil shy — and after decades as an instructor there are many many people who fall into that category — anything I can do to facilitate their punching those holes is a good thing.
I have done off-hand shooting with the .327 Blackhawk with a number of .32 H&R loads and my dwindling collection of 85-grain .327 Federal Hydro-Shocks, and have found it to be extremely accurate...as accurate as my CAS competition guns, custom Blackhawks from Cylinder & Slide and about as good as the breed gets.
For my upcoming handgun hunting series — and Jeff, we'll talk more about that at SHOT — I'm planning 2 hunts with the Blackhawk, coyotes and spring turkeys. I usually carry one of my dozen or so Blackhawks when I'm in the woods, which since I live in rural Colorado is a lot, and I'm thinking this ,327 might become the new packing pistol...I'm usually worried about feral dogs, big cats and people.
Weight-wise, Blackhawks weigh what they weigh...I suspect that since I'm constitutionally incapable of leaving well enough alone, the .327 will probably end up with an XR3 gripframe, Bowen sights and a 4 5/8-inch barrel, which'll shave off a little weight, but that's just me...
And while I didn't have a decibel meter, I shot the .327 alongside my short-barrel .30 Carbine Blackhawk...gives one a different appreciation of LOUD...
Michael B