I've noticed that on this forum there seems to be a trend towards multiple cartridge guns. I've seen the .45/.410 combos, the .22/410 combos, and several others. I found one that I like alot although it doesn't shoot shotgun rounds, it will shoot the more popular pistol rounds. The Medusa will chamber and fire .38, 9mm, and .357 all in the same cylinder. I think this is a nice gun just due to the variety of rounds it will chamber and the fact that they are all readily availbable. This gun allows a person to target shoot with cheaper ammo, then swap over to a more powerful round with no modification. Just chamber whatever round suits your fancy. For small game it would be a good choice although the range is more limited than a rifle. I think the compact size would make it more packable thus more handy to have. Also it might be a handy thing to keep on hand in bear country. Take a rabbit for lunch, then, just cycling the next round, fend off a small bear or some other smaller predator. I don't know how effective it would be on a bear, but I know it will stop a wolf or coyote. So what is the consensus on this one? I've always been partial to wheel guns myself since they don't fail as often as semi-autos do. Maybe I am just biased. I forgot to post a link to it.
http://www.kitsune.addr.com/Firearms/Revolvers/Medusa_Model_47.htm

This has always been an attractive idea with some rather unattractive consequences. I owned a Astra pistol. The piece was dual chambered for the proprietory Bayard 9MM and could shoot .380 as a substitute standard. The trouble began when people discovered they could get away with shooting 9mm parabellums, several equally obsolescent 9mms best left in collections and even .38 supers. Only problem was the firearm itself took a battering and you wound up with some very hard to find broken parts if not a disintegrating firearm and body parts when somebody 'shot just one' hot super load. You will also get some forward cylinider erosion not unlike shooting lots of .38s in a .357 without carefull cleaning. Remember too, a 9mm is .355 and the .38 family .357, This may, or may not cause some concerns with accuracy depending on the load and configuration. And here is the main failure. All firearms seem to have their own peculiar favourite load. You can take two rifles, say Ruger 7x57 off the assembly line with sequential serial numbers. It's not that unlikely to find A is a tackdriver with 139 grain bullets and B only shoots 154s well. Ruger has a similar combination with their two cylinder series. Again, it works, but you have to know your sight adjustments for every load. The 25 cartridge boast is just that! Like my Astra, I doubt you'll find yourself grabbing some .38 Smith and Wesson shorts or 200 grain super police to shoot Spetsnaz paratroopers while yelling WOLVERINES! And thats where this idea came from and should remain. Theres a WW2 resistance fighter's kit displayed in an older book on that effort. It's a older french .38 revolver using captured german 9MMs. The user PEENED makeshift rims with a hammer and punch <img src="/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" /> And I thought ocassionally detonating primers with the Lee Loader was exciting <img src="/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> The desgnger of this piece may have overcome most of these problems with metallurgy. But as a consumer, A. given the firearms business and many failures, will you have factory service in 10 years, and B. Wouldn't a few cases of cartridges be a far cheaper and practical solution? You'd have enough bullets for you and those big bad coyotes and wolves.Makefrineds, and the coyote will lead you to the local garbage dump- civilization and your rescue <img src="/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

One of my pet nightmares is being chased by "goblins" at night, breaking into a gunstore, discovering that they have every calibre of ammo going bar the one for the pistol in my hand and further discovering that the law abiding owner has taken steps to ensure that the weapons on display are unusable. As a firearm for a worse nightmare/emergency use, that revolver has a lot to recommend it.
I note that it's construction is substantially stronger than the norm.

I mostly just thought it was a neat gun. I myself prefer blackpowder. Blackpowder has the unique disadvantage of every round being different at least to some extent. If the ramrod isn't centered just so, the round can be deformed, the powder grains are often larger and therefore difficult to get the exact same amount in each shot, humid weather can cause them not to fire, so on and so forth. I think I mentioned earlier that I don't hunt unless I have to, and I don't really have to worry about predators too much so most of my shooting is target. I think one thing that people rely on for accuracy too much is the equipment. True it's nice to have great equipment but the equipment isn't the be all end all of shooting. I strive for accuracy with whatever equipment I have so I use small targets. Pennies, keys, bottle tops, and other small items are what I shoot at. This makes me rely less on the equipment and more on my own skill. I have never owned a gun with a scope (although I don't think that's too far off as my eyesight ain't what it used to be) mostly due to cost. I could get the same gun without one cheaper and I have never really needed one. The majority of my shots are 100 yards or less and I find that to be about all I need. Around here there is no way to find a place that's clear of debris any farther than that, so I laugh at the guys at work that spend tons of money on fancy scopes then sight them in at 200 or 300 yards. They won't find a place clear enough to make that shot! One problem I've run into in the past few years is where to shoot. Public ranges used to be everywhere but they are dwindling rapidly. Right now the closest range I can get to is about 2 hours away. Luckily I have places to shoot near here but they are not marked off and usually a target is wedged into tree bark. I can certainly see where wear and tear would affect such a gun. I read somewhere how they claim to have overcome that problem but I couldn't seem to find it again. It went into a lot more technical detail and it seems to me it claimed that the gun would chamber more rounds than what that article claimed. At any rate, I won't ever own one anyway so it really doesn't matter to me. I tend to stick with the lower priced guns and if given a choice I end up with blackpowder anyway. Are their any other blackpowder enthusiasts on here? I'm kind of new to pistols but I have had long guns in the past and enjoyed them immensly. By the way, I think I have heard of that Astra gun you mentioned but I didn't know anything about it. I assume it's a revolver since I can't imagine a way to put different calibers into a clip and not have a regular brass jam. You certainly do know your guns. I found myself asking alot of the same questions when my friend showed me that gun (accuracy and wear and tear) but it seems they had some kind of reasonable answer to those problems. I can't really remember. It seemed to me that there was mention of spring loaded tensioners in the cylinders to accomodate the various cartridges and the barrel was tapered somehow to accept the various projectiles. That made me question a larger caliber getting stck in the barrell and blowing the gases back out into the shooters face. Not sure about that. Anyway, great information you have provided and has certainly given me food for thought. Thanks for the reply.

Well with all them combos I guess I wont have to get my
454 Casull LOL

If they have worked out a lot of the problems of using diffrent rounds then I could see the advantage. But I think I will give it a few years and see if it is still around..

Boa, if you can do the job with out a scope dont bother, all the guys I shoot with have them and I can shoot just as good as they can with out one

I've had reservations about the cylinder design- too many things that could go wrong, IMO. And with the historical price, most reviewers have been unwilling (or not allowed) to take one and play rough with it, but this has a lower price than I've seen in the past, so maybe someone will finally beat on one. Plenty of people have shot it, but I want to see how it works after being dragged through mud, frozen, or dunked in sea water and fired four hours later. All of these are real world tests of durability.

I like wheelguns for one reason- they go bang reliably. The spring clips in the chambers make me nervous, they look like dirt and rust magnets. They are going to be the weak point of this thing. A revolver that is that forgiving about what it will digest might be great, but it doesn't mean much if you can't successfully eject six empties after you been rolling in the dirt. And my concerns are entirely about reloading the cylinder when time is the critical factor.

Personally, in the woods I'd rather have a nice, light weight carbine with 16" barrels, .22LR over .30-30 or .308, about the same size as the the M-6, and a good .357.

I initially liked the idea of combinations. I first got a Henry AR-7 just to have a minimal weapon for camping, etc. I then got interested in the M6 because of versatility. (mine was a .22 Hornet/.410) I found myself with two guns and three kinds of ammo. And there was nothing there for a personal protection weapon.

I then researched and decided that personal protection was first, and game gathering second. Accordingly I went with a 1911 in .45 ACP. For that gun, I also bought a .22 conversion kit and a carbine conversion kit. And being a bit compulsive, a second 1911 for backup and to ride in the carbine conversion semi-permanently if need be.

The 1911's


The carbine conversion


And the 1911 with the .22 conversion installed


Plenty of personal protection, small game with the .22 and larger game with the carbine if I'm patient enough to wait for the shot.

Oh. And for further info the carbine converstion is from MechTech Systems, the pistols are both Kimbers and the .22 conversion is a Kimber.

The MechTech is as accurate as it needs to be. This target is from my first session with the gun. It represents 24 rounds fired off of a bag at 25 yards as fast as I could place the red dot, shoot and reacquire the target.

I've seen some very good points made on this gun. I hadn't really put much thought into it since I knew I would never get one, but this gun combines the good looks of a revolver and the failure factor of a semi-auto. I really don't know if they've worked out the kinks oe not. The only indo I hhave on this is what I've been able to gather from the net. Upon reflection, I think I will stick with the ones I've used before. I've found that if you stick with what you know works, you seldom are disappointed.

Note that the Medusa pistol is no longer made. In fact, there was a lot of talk about Taurus making a revolver that could chamber .357, .38 special, and 9mm luger all at the same time. However, about a year ago this model went from "coming soon" on their web site to being removed entirely.

I don't know why, but no revolvers like this have ever been commercially successful. And the best design in the world means nothing if you can't actually get your hands on one.