The new Taurus M380 is a 380 revolver. Â Yes, that’s right a wheel gun chambered for the rimless .380 ACP cartridge.
IÂ love the panache of Taurus. Â They aren’t afraid to try new things, and they can often start a little stir in the industry. Â Who would have thought the original Judge would sell well, much less spawn specialty ammo and a whole series of revolvers based on the idea.
“It’s the neatest little gun you’ve seen in a long time,” said Bob Morrison of Taurus USA. Â Morrison appeared on the May 30, 2010 broadcast of Tom Gresham’s GunTalk radio program.
Since then, the revolver has been released and we have all of the specifications on the new handgun.
The Taurus 380 revolver is in the company’s Ultra-Lite line of handguns, and it comes in two finishes: Â stainless steel and black. Â Otherwise, the two guns appear to be identical.
The guns have bobbed hammers and are double action only. Â The hammer is not shrouded. Â So, the gun is less likely to hang up on some piece of clothing when being drawn from concealment, but it may not reliably fire from inside a jacket pocket as a concealed hammer gun would.
The revolvers use “stellar clips” according to Morrison. Â These work like moon clips used with other rimless cartridges. Â Revolvers are generally designed to work with cartridges that have a protruding rim. Â Semi-auto cartridges frequently do not have protruding rims, and are called “rimless.” Â This is not technically accurate, but it gives one a reference on how to distinguish one from the other. Â To fire a rimless cartridge like the .380 ACP in a revolver, one can use a thin piece of metal, called a clip, to act as a rim in the revolver’s cylinder.
The Taurus M380 has a 1.75″ barrel that is topped with a fixed ramp front sight. Â The rear sight notch is also fixed.
The unloaded weight of the gun is 15.5 ounces, which places it into the same general range as other compact revolvers, such as the J-frame Smith & Wesson handguns. Â The grips are made of soft, black rubber and have the Taurus emblem embedded into them. Â At the time of this writing, MSRP is $443 for the black finish and $475 for the stainless steel finish. Â I would expect to see a 380 revolver for sale (street prices) at about $400-425 depending on finish.
Does a Taurus M380 make sense to you? Â What advantages do you think it holds when compared to a .38 Special revolver? Â Let us know what you think in the comments below.
15 replies on “Taurus 380 Revolver”
While I’m not a fan of Taurus, a smaller-framed would be interesting. Unfortunately Taurus has a record of announcing things that never appear. I’ll be more excited when they reach dealers.
Held a Taurus 380 revolver at my local gunshop today. Hammerless with a sub 2 inch barrel. Guess they made at least one appear.
More vaporware? I’m still waiting to see a production model of Charter’s rimless revolver.
Yeah, the Rimless Revolver is still MIA. When I spoke with Charter in April, they were still insisting the CARR would be ready this month (June). We’ll see…
–Richard
.380 revolver? Lessee, about every revolver manufacturer made one 100-20 years ago. They were all low-power versions of the 38 S&W. Most were top-breaks, very handy little revolvers. I’ve owned two as curios, but they have little value for defense as the round is barely a man-stopper.
The .380, when shot out of a revolver, is going to lose enough of it’s speed jumping the gap that it will be no better than those old .38 rimmed cartridges.
Plus, the .380 is expensive to practice with, currently commanding almost $30/box for the ammo.
Defense guns are all about projecting as much stopping power as possible out of a small gun. A .380 in a 4″ semi-auto pistol is on the very low edge of having requisite stopping power. Out of a snubby revolver, it will not have enough.
Hmmm. Manstopper? Yeah i always walk away after being shot with a 380.
I grow weary of hearing everyone say you have to own a 44 just to have defense.
Any gun even a 22 will do the job for defense because 85% of offenders are detered just by the site of a weapon and im pretty sure the other 15% will haul rear after the first shot of even a bb gun.
You said it all. I`ve stopped them with a 22 long. One of my former staff killed a man with a 22. The initial hit was in the buttocks. The guy was beating a woman with a 2X4. Many PIs and undercover folks carry smaller caliber weapons.
Oh God, here we go again with the “if it’s not a atomic bomb” it’s no good for defense autists. It’s you idiots that destroy gun forums for rational people. I doubt very serious many people will be moving after getting hit with a .380acp. And we certainly never see any of the it’s not good enough for defense autists ever volunteering to test their theory.
Shoot them in the face/neck/groin then. JHPs work wonders on soft tissue.
My wife has a Colt Mustang and bought one of these as an alternative. Two guns. One ammo.
She loves it and thats all I want.