Pistol Grips

[tim walker]

A friend of mine has a Ruger Super Blackhawk but he wants larger handles for is hands, so he asked me if could make some. CNC sure would be handy but alas I do not own one. Has anyone made handles for this particular gun or similar? It doesn't look too difficult but looking for any nuances there may be. I have tried to find a set of plans but no luck. TIA.

506875

[Tom M King]

There are so many choices off the shelf that some looking may fill the need.

[tim walker]

He claims he has looked. He needs about 1/8" or 1/4" wider on each side of the handle.

[Andrew Hughes]

I made new grips for my Ruger Bisley.
I don’t have a cnc it’s not hard at all I used the Oem grips for a templet.
I used claro walnut, bandsaw and files and a drill for the screw that holds them together.
Good Luck

[Jim Becker]

If I understand things correctly, your friend wants the grip to be thicker to better accommodate their larger hands. I know nothing about these firearms, but if there's a metal tang down through the grip and the two faces come off, it should be similar to re-handling a knife. Use the existing as a template to create the blanks and then cut our of thicker material followed by carving and abrading them to shape.

[Tom M King]

If this is something you would enjoy, I'd say go for it. For me, so many have already experimented with this that I would buy some, at least to start with, to see if he would want anything done differently. I googled "larger ruger blackhawk grips" and there are Many choices.

This was the first that came up: https://texasgrips.com/product/ruger-xr3-red-blackhawk-extended-laminate-wood/

[John Kananis]

1/4" (or even an eighth) on each side sounds like a lot. How about just adding that much material the the existing handle (on the backside) and letting him feel it out for a bit first before committing. You'll likely need a longer screw and use some type of temporary adhesive so you can use the backers as templates later on.

[Scott Winners]

I have done it. It is a pain in the neck. You can use the factory ones as a template on the bandsaw but you got days and days of rasp work ahead of you. I don't actually have a Super Blackhawk (nice gun), but all the revolvers I have owned the metal part of the handle is parallel sided so you can start making grips with a flat board.

The biggest grip I know of for my Redhawk is pachymar, with the finger grooves in it, like this one (no affiliation):

https://www.bbqguys.com/pachmayr/gripper-grips-ruger-redhawk

Notice the grip also covers the backstrap. This is a honking big grip. When my arthritis is acting up and I really need to carry my Redhawk into the backcountry this is the grip I put on.

For $30-40, I strongly encourage your friend to try one of these before investing a bunch of time, talent and treasure in something full custom. If nothing else he will be able to say "the groove for my ring finger is too deep" or similar.

[Ole Anderson]

No shame in saying that is just not in my skill set.

[George Yetka]

If I understand things correctly, your friend wants the grip to be thicker to better accommodate their larger hands. I know nothing about these firearms, but if there's a metal tang down through the grip and the two faces come off, it should be similar to re-handling a knife. Use the existing as a template to create the blanks and then cut our of thicker material followed by carving and abrading them to shape.

This is exactly how it is.

My first thought would be the hogue overmold grips. Basically just a rubber grip that goes right over the existing grip. They are super comfy. If he wants it to still look nice then I would wrap factory grip with tape till he gets to the point where he is comfortable and take measurements there. I have large hands so I understand his issues but 1/4" each side is most likely too much. I would basic shape it and remove material on bandsaw, drop to rasp, followed by sandpaper.

[Tom M King]

Seems like a situation where the customer will say, " I don't know what I want, but that's not it". Those are absolutely near the top of the list to avoid.

[Michael Burnside]

If he just wants wider, one option is to thin rip some stock and glue them to the exiting grips and trim them flush, thereby widening them by whatever dimension you want. You could lightly sand the joint but of course you would have a seam. You could lean into that by using phenolic or a contrasty wood I suppose.

That said, the man hours involved shaping a custom set of grips would be way more than you could purchase them from any number of places. Unless he has a disability or some other unique circumstance, I say go with an existing aftermarket solution.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

When I was shooting a 44mag, I found some over the counter that fit my large hands. I wear an XXL glove.