Marble grips, S&W M&P 1905

[Gargoyle]

Well, it's not engraving, I hope you don't mind.
I came across a nice 100 year old (1923 production) S&W 1905 M&P 4th Change with a very attractive price. Nickel with vintage after-market mother of pearl grips. The grips had some chips and looked too fragile, so I wanted something more durable so I could shoot it.

I've made wood grips before, now it was time to try marble.

 

[Gargoyle]

I made paper templates and glued them to a piece of marble tile. Just Elmers glue thinned with water. This was the first attempt, a piece of Greek Tinos marble, but it proved too brittle and crumbly. I started over with a nice piece of Northern Italian Verde Alpi marble. I epoxied fiberglass mesh to the back for reinforcement, and cut them to the profile and drilled the screw hole, making sure the fit was right.

 

[Gargoyle]

A chip did come off the bottom of the right grip as I started cutting, but that area all going to be removed during the shaping, so I didn't worry about it.

 

[Gargoyle]

I then started rounding and shaping them. Once I had the basic curve, I marked around my fingers to make grooves, ensuring it will lock into my hand for shooting.

 

[Gargoyle]

Prior to polishing the stone is rather dull. Here I've started sanding it, probably up to about a 400 grit in this photo. I took it up to a 2000 grit and used some polishing powder.
At this stage I had some blued steel grip screws from Numrich. They served for fitting, but the threads weren't cut well and the blue steel didn't look good. I then ordered a nickle screw and escutcheon from gungrip dot com, which works much better.

 

[Gargoyle]

Took it to the range today. It really fits my hand nicely, very easy to shoot. I was getting better groups with lead round nose than with wadcutters. The grip did start to loosen a bit; I haven't yet put blue loctite, I wanted to test it out first.

 

[Gargoyle]

BTW, if you're interested, these are the grips that came with it. Beautiful, but I don't think they'd hold up to shooting.

 

[ByrnBucks]

Well done there sir, Imagine many people would be proud to have a set of those on they’re favorite piece.

 

[KevinCunningham]

Nice! I think you’ll find dyed wooly mammoth tooth (not tusk, much harder tooth) is similar and there’s decent demand for it!

 

[monk]

a beautiful way to honor a vintage revolver. yer shootin skills aint bad neither. tyvm 4 showing.

 

[monk]

Took it to the range today. It really fits my hand nicely, very easy to shoot. I was getting better groups with lead round nose than with wadcutters. The grip did start to loosen a bit; I haven't yet put blue loctite, I wanted to test it out first.

View attachment 51164

i shot competitive as well as combat pistol for almost 50 years. i found by making the left grip about 1/8" thicker than the right allowed me to get right on target without canting my wrist. my scores/groups improved a good bit.a serious shooter will do better with customizing to suit the hand.

 

[Leland Davis]

The grips look very nice. How heavy are they?

 

[Gargoyle]

The grips look very nice. How heavy are they?

They add maybe 3 oz total to the gun.