Pietta quality (edit) I now own both pietta and uberti

[Kelsey Cooter]

I'm looking to get a pair of 7.5" 45colts.

Tossing up between the pietta 1873 and the uberti cattleman II.

I've not seen a pietta, and find it hard to find info on them so wondering if anyone on here has one and your opinions on them?

[wolfthomas]

I have 2 Pietta 357mag 1873s. As far as I can tell from inpsecting other guns they're pretty much indistinguishable from Ubertis (almost like they're made on the same line).

They've worked well and I have no complaints. They look great especially the wood grips.

[Kelsey Cooter]

I have 2 Pietta 357mag 1873s. As far as I can tell from inpsecting other guns they're pretty much indistinguishable from Ubertis (almost like they're made on the same line).

They've worked well and I have no complaints. They look great especially the wood grips.

Cheers wolfthomas, I have 2 uberti cattleman II, I didn't realise before buying that the new cattleman has a retracting firing pin and 3 click hammer (missing the 1st click as the retracting pin acts as the safety)

Do your piettas have the 4 click hammer still, with firing pin mounted in the hammer?

What made you go for the pietta over the uberti?

[wolfthomas]

Mine have 4 click and the firing pin in the hammer.

I went for them because I read some really good reviews for traditions (the us version). At the time they were a great price and I really liked the look of the wood grips.

I couldn't make my mind up about ruger or yberti so I took a third option.

[Kelsey Cooter]

Mine have 4 click and the firing pin in the hammer.

I went for them because I read some really good reviews for traditions (the us version). At the time they were a great price and I really liked the look of the wood grips.

I couldn't make my mind up about ruger or yberti so I took a third option.

Sounds good thanks mate, how long have ypu owned yours?

[No1Mk3]

G'day Kelsey Cooter,
15 years ago Pietta were considered to be poor cousins to the Uberti, as Uberti were to Pedersoli (cap and ball days) but since then both companies have lifted their quality and Pedersoli stayed away from the repro cartridge market (generally speaking, they now make a S.A revolver with a birds head grip). Today I can see no quality difference between either of the main manufacturers of single action cartridge revolvers and the choice will be that you identify between the supposedly safer Uberti (for 6 loaded chambers) and the more historically accurate Pietta. Personally I would go Pietta for that reason. For C&B, I have 1858's from all 3 as well as Armi San Paolo and Palmetto, the Pedersoli looks the best but the Palmetto shoots the best. I also have an 1873 in 45LC by Armi San Marco, these shoot very well but do NOT like modification, we have seen 2 slicked up Marco's explode from not locking up properly, best left as made, Cheers.

[Kelsey Cooter]

Thanks for the info No1, thats good to know.

I'm deffinately going to go with the piettas now as I've been reading the yanks say much the same thing on the net. I do really like my 357 ubertis, but since I'm going for 7.5" 45colts next, I'd like them to be as close as possible to the original colts.
Its been hard finding info on piettas as I couldn't find anyone here in north qld who knew anything about them

[wolfthomas]

Sounds good thanks mate, how long have ypu owned yours?

About 3 years.

[Kelsey Cooter]

Hey blokes i bought the pair of piettas. So I thought I'd share a few photos and thoughts on pietta 1873 saa vs uberti cattleman II since I found it so hard to find peoples opinions on pietta when I was seeking info.

When I 1st got my hands on the piettas I thought, oh god I should of bought ubertis, but now I've got to say I'm a big fan. (I think that 1st thought was because of the timber)

The timber on the piettas are not as nice in my opinion. They are oiled instead of varnished, but its not very nice timber so it looks cheap. It feels kind of cheap and nasty to hold compared to uberti, but that could just be because I'm so used to the feel of the uberti timber.

Both piettas are much lighter to cock and the triggers much nicer, but feels kind of tinny (like the parts are made of tin) compared to cocking the ubertis (none of the actions have been worked on). I much prefer the traditional 4 click hammer on the piettas though.

The Pietta ejectors feel way better then the ubertis. I've never liked the ejectors on my ubertis. I went from a ruger blackhawk to the uberti's and have always thought the uberti ejectors feel like they should be on toys.

The base pins that came on the Piettas are the absolute sh#ttest. The are deadset awful to deal with. They don't have a grove all the way around, just a notch that has to be perfectly lined up or they won't say in. I have actually swapped the pins with the uberti pins and have ordered 2 more uberti pins. (I planned on doing this anyway because of the safety notch on the pietta pins)

The ubertis have removable cylinder bushings that feel well made, the piettas do not have removable bushings and the front edge of the bushing is so sharp I can cut my finger on it.

The bluing is pretty much identical on all 4. Maybe the piettas are a touch more glossy but I was really looking hard to try and find a difference.

The case hardening on the pietta is much darker then the uberti. Both are nice. would be interesting to compare in 10 years time.

On paper, both Piettas shot point of aim at 10m with my super light cowboy loads.

Both ubertis shot about 2 inchs low and maybe 2 inches to the right at 10m with my super light cowboy loads.

Overall I've got to say I'm very happy with all of them and at the moment I think they much of a muchness when deciding what to go for. I've owned the uberti's for 6 months and maybe put 600 rounds through them (300 each). And I've had the piettas for a week and put 130 rounds through them on the weekend.

[Kelsey Cooter]

Pietta 1873 saa 7.5" 45colt

Uberti cattleman II 5.5" 357

[Kelsey Cooter]

Closer look

[wolfthomas]

Glad you enjoyed them. Shame about the wood. Mine had a much darker color that I really liked.