Japanese prop maker Ryosuke Takagi, the guy behind Elfin Knights created the first replica I know of to use a Charter Arms Bulldog as the base gun. He made one in 1989, and it was Phil that pointed me to his article in a Hobby Japan 1993 special edition. Not sure if Phil knew this before he talked with you about it or not. The one Ryo used was a Kanamaru air soft 38 replica.
Andy
I'm a little late to this post, but here we go. I think some of what I'm going to share here hasn't been shared before:
I may have seen the Japanese article first or later. I don't recall. But when I briefly looked at the write-up, which was in Japanese, I don't remember seeing a reference to the Charter Arms Bulldog. It was only later, after I'd made the match myself, and I'd found the magazine in which the Japanese article appeared and bought it, that I felt certain I had the right gun.
Here’s the exact page I used from a Guns & Ammo 1990 Annual in my personal library to identify the Bulldog, which I shared with Richard at the time:
Art Shippee somewhat confirmed it, but Robbie Knott confirmed it once and for all.
Rich and I later spoke with Jay Abramson who worked at B & B Sales (a large gun shop in North Hollywood, CA). Here’s how he described the compiling of the Steyr and the Charter Arms Bulldog:
“I was directed to help Robbie Knott of Knott Limited Special Effects when he came looking for some kind of weapon to use for Blade Runner. With what limited info as he could give, we quickly decided to give up on the single shot airpistols which had a "spacey" look to them. We were one of the few and possibly ONLY shops to have available Steyr Mannlicher actions available to the public.
It's been a long time since then, but if memory serves, I believe the action was an SL, with double set triggers, the rear trigger being a "set" trigger, to pre-load the release trigger to fire with only ounces of pressure. I don't believe there were any worn or poor markings, as Steyr QC simply wouldn't allow such shoddy work to be released, even as an action only. In fact Steyr was so particular about details that the filler screws for the scope mount on top of the receiver (action) were aligned so the slots on all 4 were "north-south", from the rear of the action to barrel mount.
We worked on trying to brainstorm how to make a firing weapon out of this piece, and came up with this:
A Charter Arms cal. 5-shot 44 Special 3" Bbl Bulldog
A pair of Bianchi Lightning rubber grips (a one-piece design made under contract by Pachmayr)
The afore-mentioned SM medium length action, model SL
The concept as I recall was going to be to cast a mold of the action, and then somehow mate it to the Bulldog, giving the ability to fire 5 rounds before having to reload. Simple concept. Obviously from all reports and photos, something else occurred. The lightning grips disappeared, and the original action was somehow mated to the 'dog.’"
Here’s the Japanese article:
Phil
