Diamondback Sidekick
Hi-Standard Double Nine
Posted on 03/09/2024 4:44:13 AM PST by marktwain
At the 2024 SHOT Show industry day at the range, this correspondent stopped at the Diamondback Firearms booth. Unfortunately, they did not have any examples of their new .22 revolver, the Sidekick, available. This lead to a discussion of how the Sidekick, which strongly resembles the old Hi-Standard Double Nine revolver, was brought into production.
Jimmy Stroda was the director of product development at Diamondback Firearms. He related the story to this correspondent. Diamondback had been looking at product sales in the United States. It is clear that .22 caliber single-action revolvers have a very large market share, as seen by the number of Heritage arms revolvers that are sold every year. Diamondback management believed they could capture part of this market. They started to make plans to produce a .22 single-action revolver. Then Ruger entered the inexpensive end of the market with the Wrangler series of revolvers. Diamondback was reconsidering its options.
Jimmy had a legacy Hi-Standard Double Nine revolver he inherited from his grandfather. He thought highly of the handgun. The Double Nine is a nine-shot, double-action revolver styled to look and handle much like a Colt single-action revolver. It fires both double and single action. It has a side swing out cylinder and ejects all nine cartridges at once. It has the advantages of a single-action style with double-action mechanics and ease of loading and unloading. It can be supplied with a magnum cylinder to give more versatility to the handgun. The owner of Diamondback was considering the idea of manufacturing a double-action .22 revolver. Jimmy put forward the idea of re-creating a modern version of the Hi-Standard Double Nine. Another member of the management team piped up. He had one of the legacy Double Nine revolvers and thought it was a great gun.
(Excerpt) Read more at ammoland.com ...
Diamondback Sidekick
Hi-Standard Double Nine
I want one.
Astonishing how reliable the originals were, and I’ve handled hundreds.
Target practice done on the cheap.
I have never owned with a Zink frame. How are they for durability?
My best friend and neighbor had one of the Double Nines when we were just kids.
I had a Ruger Mk1 and he had the Double Nine. We were raised in a rural area, and both of us were taught how to shoot and hunt at an early age.
We would spend all our doing chores/allowance money, lawn mowing money, picking up redeemable bottle money, etc. on ammo in order spend hours out in the woods shooting those things...lol...we literally had a blast. We’d swap guns and shoot some more.
FWIW, we always stayed within the bounds that our dads laid out for us, especially regarding guns. We wanted to avoid a good, old-fashion arse-whooping and losing our privileges...we knew better. We respected private property, never robbed a gas station, never shot anyone or hurt anything. We were just a couple of young fellas that had fun shooting the daylights out of a bunch of used-up tin cans and paper targets.
Wow...now thinking back on all that compared to the way things are now: how times have changed.
Bursa uses zinc casting which is why they’re crap.
Bought a High Standard ‘High Sierra’ from the manufacturer in Hamden, CT back in 1976. Still have it ...
I liked them because they were light, and held nine shots. I noticed one of them had a chamber which would shoot slightly off of where the rest of the chambers shot, about an inch and a half at 50 feet.
Most revolvers are inherently accurate because of the fixed barrel, with no movement between the barrel and sights.
I still have some of the old Sentinels, but the new crop of semi-autos, such as the Kel-Tec P17, the Taurus TX22, the Sig P322, and the FN502, with 15+ magazine capacity, combined with good triggers and light weight, have the edge.
I’ve got a Hi Standard revolver in .22. 1-1/2 barrel. Not sure if the model, thought. It’s a nine shot. Lives in my Get Home Bag.
L
You might want to measure yours. Measure from the forcing cone inside the frame, to the muzzle.
A 1 1/2 inch barrel would be pretty rare, but it might have been cut back as well.
Thanks. I’ll do that.
Best.
L
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