folks, I'm looking at geting a 4" .357 for backpacking. I want somthing that will hold up to real .357's, like say Corbons. I'll probalby only shoot about a box a year, and then I'll shoot a bunch of wimp load .357's and .38's through it.

Does anybody know how strong a Taurus 66 is when compared to a Ruger or L-frame S&W.

I've got a 4 inch stainless Tracker in 41 magnum which weighs in a around 35 oz. It seems to be able to digest anything I put thru it. When carried as a defense gun it gets factory jacketed hollow points and when plinking gets my hard cast lead bullets at around 1000 fps.

I've got three boxes of factory hot loads thru it and probably 600 rounds of cast with no problems. I know one thing for sure the ports really help with recoil.

I believe both the Ruger sp101 and the L frame smith are heavier (meaning less packable) guns and probably will take more full bore loads, but I'm shooting this Taurus in 41 mag and it's holding up well.

These are the two revolvers I shoot and carry now. I used to carry a 5.5 inch Redhawk in 44 mag, but the little 41 will do everything it would and is as nice to carry as the little 22 Rossi.

My impression is that the Taurus .357s are basically copies of the k-frame Smith & Wesson, size-wise, with different lockwork & coil springs.

I've had a Taurus .357, 6" barrel, full underlug, for ... well.... a heck of a long time. Maybe close to 20 years, think I bought it in the late 1980s. No problems, but I don't shoot anything too wild in it. It has has a few boxes of factory .357 ammo through it, as well as some of my reloads. I think the model # is 669 but not 100% sure on that. It's gun I let new shooters start out with.

Both of my newer Tauri (not sure how to refer to them in plural) are snubbie .357s, one stainless, one titanium. They'll both handle Cor-Bon 125s .357 loads just fine.

The Ti does have a bit of drag on the extraction when you dump 7 empty .357 cases, but titanium is pretty elastic and I don't worry too much about it.

Can't speak to durability with the new ones, because they are not a lot of fun to shoot and I sure don't plan on trying to wear them out. But they function just fine.

Hope that helps.