Do you know anything about this little revolver:

AMADEO ROSSI S.A.
BAD LEOPOLDO R.S.
MADE IN BRAZIL
INTERARMS
ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIA
.38 SPECIAL

The gun is all stainless.

There is one little annoying "feature" I just discovered, there is a little square pad of steel integral to the lower frame behind the trigger guard, who's purpose appears to prevent the cylinder from sliding off the pin when you turn the gun over to dump the emties.

So for this gun, it doesn't appear to be reliably reloadable in an emergency, since when you turn it over, if the edge of a cartridge is lined up with the tab, the extraction rod is blocked.

Interesting design, obviously this is the classic New Youk Reload roscoe - you pull it out of your other pocket when you run out of boolits in your first gun.

The gun looks exactly like a S&W, some kind of clone probably. It looks like it's pretty well made for what it is.

Do you guys know anything about this little guy ?

This message has been edited. Last edited by: wrightd,

There was a recall because of a drop safety issue.

https://rossisafetynotice.com/

.

Thanks very much for that, I passed (whew).

Anyway does anyone know about this apparent S&W Clone ?

WYSIWYG

Ir looks like a S&W clone because it IS a S&W copy made in Brazil, as marked.

Rossi and Taurus are owned by the same holding company but have separate product lines. It looks like Rossi is concentrating on rifles and leaving the pistols to Taurus.

The recall was good info, but the only Rossi I own is likely from the 70's. I bought it as junk at a garage sale, and had to use brake cleaner several times to get the old crappy lube out. Shoots fine now, though.

I think I recall reading something about these Rossi clones that at one point during their history, that they were actually pretty decent little revolvers, relatively speaking, sometime before or after they were crap, or something along those lines. Could make a cheap but functional bug or snake-shot gun while fishing or hiking in places where venomous snakes hang out.

That Rossi is NOT one that is affected by the recall.

It was an Interarms import- so it was imported before their collapse, which was around 1998/99, IIRC. The listed recall is for the ones made in the 21st century.

I have a blued model 953, with a vent rib barrel, and it shoots very well. I did run into something odd though- if you point the barrel up and dry-fire [I ONLY use snapcaps to dry fire], the blast/recoil shield at the rear of the frame has a divot for the ejector rod tip and the shells will bind on that divit.

I did some work with tools I had to smoothen and adjust the angle of the edges of that indent and now mine no longer binds.

I never know when I'll need to hit a target 8 floors above me as I hide under a lifted truck.

It is an odd hodgepodge of influences. S&W Model k-frame size, with J-series coil hammer spring, and a Colt Diamondback inspired barrel.

I replaced my spring with a WOlff Gunsprings J-Series spring in a lighter weight and it works perfectly.

To be honest, it is reliable, smoother than my GP100s, about as smooth as my S&W revolvers, more accurate than I am, and has been very reliable.

From sources in Brazil, the police gunsmiths were told by Rossi [in the 1980s and 1990s] that any Rossi .38special revolver made after 1982 could fire +P ammo, as long as it was a minority of the time, but it was probably best to use lead rounds and not FMJ ammo [more the lede/angle of the forcing cone than the rifling and damage, as I understand it.]

I know this arrived too late, but thought it was interesting.

Similar in concept to the pad you mentioned S&W’s have a stop built into the frame ( in older guns it is actually a pressfit part separate from the frame) to keep the cylinder from sliding off the back.
It aligned just right it too can bind on a cartridge rim and botch up ejection.