She´s a Navy serial 897. Iow a real early gun.
Long story short, i was hellbent for a Beals and i wanted a Beals that´d look like new, work like new and shoot like new. Sry to say the Beals guns i ran into were either like this, run into the ground, or real nice guns - out of my price range.
The one i found, in Holland, was in a really bad state. About relic condition really, pitted to the letter all over. To the point where there was blobs of steel missing from the barrel and frame both. Spent hrs at end welding the thing up with the TIG welder and blending that crap in. Then 4,3 zillion hrs later i was at a point where the gun was up reliably and running again, just sans any rifling at all really - it had been worn down. Completely and to the letter.
As such, invested a little time setting the trigger setup up to be completely adjustable, she got on the backburner. Really a competion grade trigger though TBH.
Worth noting is that these Beals guns to not share ONE yota within with the later guns. ALL of it is "Beals only".
As you know i hot tank blue my guns "the old way" (salts only) and have refrained from sending this unit through the tank as she was up for a liner. Well. Found one and plan to drill the barrel out to 13,5mm and install it first chance i get. Then she needs to have smaller things adressed before it´s hot tank time, and hopefully a Beals in as new condition comes out the other end.
These original Navys are like 7/8 size of the Army guns making them rather neat guns to work and shoot. I often bring Navys to the range for the leddies around to use, as wimmins most often have smaller hands than we do and.. they enjoy the Navy guns even more..
What can be said for these Navys is that in contrast to the Colts, Whitneys and what not is that the chambers are way more roomy. Shoving an easy 30 grains of powder beneath a boolit is nothing.
Hence, the shooting experience in itself is very very similar to an Army style revolver.
