I done a little research while in the market for a 6" .357 Mag. and came to my own conclusion that the Rossi was the best bang for the buck so I started searching around several gunshops for a Rossi 972. Most places were out of them along with their distributors. Finally found one out of state and had it shipped in state. The price was $319 and I'm super satisfied with mine. I make my way over to a friend's place every couple of months and we shoot several different types of pistols, revolvers, rifles, etc. He's a big Winchester (Pre '64 style) rifle man and a big Smith & Wesson revolver man. He's also a tool and die man and a very fine one at that. He's 60 years old and has done some beautiful work on almost all of his firearms. I showed him my Rossi and we were both impressed with it's accuracy. There was three of us shooting each others revolvers and all of us shot the Rossi and the Smiths. I actually had the best group of the day with my Rossi. We got back to his house and he asked if I wanted to do a little trigger work on it and I have been in the machining trade for twenty or so years and messed around with some tool and die. (I worked alongside this old man for just over three years in an aluminum die casting tool room.) He proved to me he was knowledgable when it came to mechanics. Anyhoo, we tore into this revolver and he said that I got myself a good buy. He said there were some areas that were of lesser fit and finish than his newer Smiths but by a small margin. There was only one thing he said he disliked about it and it had something to do with a pocket where a spring for the double action seated and that it would fall out if the gun was turned up when disassembled and the spring would not fall out on a Smith. He said that that was no big deal and you just had to be more careful. He also stated that the fit and finish of newer Smiths did not compare to the older Smiths and that the whole gun industry was getting greedy and sloppy among other fine choice of words. Our joint conclusion was, accuracy was on par with Smiths, fit was slightly worse than Smiths, finish was on par, Rossi was a bit too light for his liking and the factory grips were too small for him. We broke out his bunch of Brownell's springs along with some EDM stones of different hardnesses, jewelers files, etc. and I now have a trigger pull worthy to shoot and the factory trigger pull was not that bad to me to begin with but noticeably more than Smith. There were even one or two areas that he liked better than the Smith and one was the hammer spring which was a coil spring rather than a flat spring and I can't remember what he liked better about it but in the end and what I'm getting at is I'm thoroughy convinced that from the revolvers he and I have been associated with this Rossi is one of the, if not the, best bang for your buck. I'm sure that if you ask 50 different people you will get 50 different opinions. Hope this helps though.
