Twenty four inches of twenty-two! This latest small-bore duo from Taurus takes "extreme" performance to new lengths - Taffin Tests

American Handgunner, Sept-Oct, 2002 by John Taffin

A lot of wonderful .22 handguns have come and gone in my lifetime but I always seem to manage to hold on to those particularly good shooting specimens. From Smith & Wesson, the Kit Gun and the K-22; from Colt, the Officer's Model Special that is still one of the most accurate sixguns I have ever experienced; from Ruger, the Single-Six, the Bisley Model .22, and of course, the Mark II. The Browning Buckmark and the little Bersa fit right here also. To this long list we can now add two excellent shooting, long-barreled .22s. When we say "long-barreled" we really mean L-O-N-G, as both of these rimfire revolvers carry 12" barrels.

The lure of the .22 is a strong one and for good reason. The first gun I ever fired was a Harrington & Richardson .22 revolver. My first personally purchased firearm was a .22 rifle; Marlin's exquisite little Model 39 Mountie I bought in 1956. It was quickly followed by my first sixgun, another .22, Ruger's flat-gate Single-Six. My Saturdays were populated with the names of Marlin and Ruger, the smell of fired .22s, and of course, Hoppe's #9. Bless those wonderful Happy Days of the 1950s.

Even though most of my writing has been on the subject of big bore sixguns, .22s have always played an important part in both my life and my family's life, and continue to do so today. Taurus's newest offerings hint at future good times indeed, and these extra-long barrels are real attention-getters. And that's a fact.

The Model 980.22 Long Rifle and 981 .22 Winchester Magnum are a real pair of winners. Except for chambering and the accompanying caliber markings on the barrels, these two .22 Rimfires are virtually identical. The Model 480 is marked ".22 LR" on the left side of its barrel, while the Model 981 is marked ".22 MAGNUM" in the same spot on its Buntline barrel. A minor difference can also be seen on the knurled ends of the ejector rods. This knurling controls the length of travel of the rods and the one designed for ejecting the longer .22 Magnum brass allows a longer length of travel.

These are medium-sized, seven shot, double action revolvers with many excellent features. The triggers are the same width as the trigger guard and are made the way triggers are supposed to be -- smooth. For ease of cocking while single action shooting, the hammers have user-friendly checkering as do the cylinder release latches. Cylinders are locked at the rear and also at the crane. Short of three locking points, with one at the end of the extractor rod, this is the best set up for locking the cylinder in place. The ejector rods on both models are protected by shrouds.

The 12" barrel on both versions has a wide, smooth solid rib running from the rear sight all the way to the end of the muzzle. Sights are excellent for my eyes, with a pinned-in front sight blade of the Patridge, or post, style matched up with a fully adjustable rear sigh. The rear blade is slanted a bit to reduce glare. The sights are big, bold and black. With such long barrels and a weight of 3 1/2 pounds, one might expect the .22 sixguns to have a poor balance, but such is not the case. They feel lighter than they are and that long barrel just seems to hang on target.

Much of this feeling of both security and balance comes from the rubber stocks, which are pebble-grained and finger-grooved and, most fortunately for me, just the right size for my hands. They aren't the most attractive stocks in existence but they are certainly quite functional. The rubber stocks and stainless steel construction result in a varmint hunting pistol that should take a lot of hard use and be virtually impervious to bad weather.

As with all Taurus revolvers, both of these long-barreled rimfires have the built-in Taurus Security System safety locking device at the back of the hammer. Operated by a small key, once locked in place the revolvers cannot be operated or fired. All in all, these are good-looking, excellent shooting, easy handling sixguns with my only complaint being the trigger pulls. They are way too heavy. The Magnum Model measures in at an even 6 pounds in single action mode and the Long Rifle even worse at 8 pounds.

Even with these two handicaps, both revolvers proved to be excellent shooters and perhaps would be even better with 3 pound trigger pulls. This, of course, can be easily remedied by any competent gunsmith. Just make sure you don't over-do it.

Twenty different .22 Long Rifle loads from five different manufacturers were fired in the Taurus Model 980. Only one of these gave poor results in this .22 Long Rifle Model; that being CCI's Stingers. This should come as no surprise to anyone who has spent much time with .22's as this hypervelocity version does not always shoot well in every .22 sixgun, semiauto pistol or rifle. It's very picky about which guns it likes and there seems to be no in-between, as they either shoot superbly or poorly.

What is really strange about this particular .22 sixgun is it shot all other CCI versions extremely well. The SGBs turned in the smallest group of 1 1/8" for seven shots at 25 yards. One might surmise from the 6" group the Stingers delivered that this .22 simply did not like the lighter weight, high velocity loads. This proved not to be the case, and switching to Remington's hypervelocity, lightweight-bulleted loads resulted in another group of 1 1/8" for seven shots at 25 yards.