Big, stinky, miss-shaped, painful, failure.

Perhaps the only that is unfairly listed above is stinky. The Smith & Wesson Model 296, Airlite titanium .44 revolver doesn't actually offend the olfactory senses. However, I do stand-by the other adjectives. 

As an enthusiastic revolver collector, shooter, and carrier; I tend to like them all, especially the products of Smith & Wesson. However,, with all things there are exceptions. The S7W 296 represents such an exception.

Firstly, about the Model 296; 5 shot, .44 Special, double action only (DAO) revolver with a completely enclosed hammer, the barrel is 2.5" long, it is a round-butt, L-frame firearm, and has a two-piece barrel with a steel barrel and an alloy shroud. Said shroud politely informs the operator,  "44 S&W SPECIAL CTG. MAX BULLET 200 GRAIN" (reportedly due to billets jumping their crimp during the significant recoil). All this is topped off with a set of black Uncle Mike's rubber grips. It was produced from 1999 to 2001. And, it is very, very light. 

Were you to purchase a new in box Model 296, you would be rewarded with an attractive gray, lockable, soft sided case with the S&W logo and the words, "Airlite-Ti" in silver.

Ohhh, fancy ... 

Upon opening the case you would find the directions, a trigger lock, blue felt lining, and in my case, a nice little blurb from the Attorney general of the Commonwealth of Massachusettsw giving you some useless info that they require for pistols with a barrel shorter than 3" to be sold in that state. 

All this finery for what I consider one of the ugliest pistols produced. Sure, there are uglier pistols out there, but this one is a standout in the ugly department. It's miss-shaped, has humps and lumps in places one does not expect in a revolver. It has lightening-cuts along the grip and beneath the ejector shroud. The cylinder is in part titanium, and thus gray, while the rest of the pistol is a flat solver. It even has a pinned lanyard ring (my lanyard pin went on walkabout long before I acquired the pistol). And to stress the point, it is vary, very light. 

While very, very light, it's also big. It's a chunky gun with a rotund nature. If you are the sort to pocket carry your pistol, wear something with big pockets. If you're the sort to carry inside the waste band (IWB) or outside the waste band (OWB), shoulder holster, or some other variety of carry, start calling the custom holster guys. Not too much suppoer for this pistol which is fair, it hasn't been produced for over 16 years. I'm sure there are holsters that you can cram this into ... I'm sure any L-frame holster would be a good start. If you intend to carry the 296, it's time to get creative. 

Took me awhile to fins ammunition but I did. Thusly, I set my target out at a whopping seven yards, which seemed reasonable for this particular revolver. I loaded-up 185 grain (again, noting the warning on the barrel) Hornaday XTP rounds, and started plugging away.

Shooting it is ... unpleasant. Want to develop a flinch quickly? Then this is the pistol for you. A friend of mine who knows about such things once asked me, "What's the most important shot in a gunfight?" the answer to which is, "the first." This is true and particularly so with the 296 as follow-up shots are time consuming.

After my first shot I thought, "not that bad after all," at my second shot I thought, "ugh, that was bad," after my third shot, I wished I had stopped at my second shot. By shots four and five I just wanted to be done. With just five shots, the web of my hand was very unhappy ... no, downright hurting. Additionally, I noticed my shots were walking away from the center with each subsequent shot. What a pain. On the plus side, the double-action trigger was very nice. 

So, know I've shot my ugly pistol and hurt my hand. What's next ... time to clean the sucker. Well, there is another issue. The people at S&W themselves recommend treating the titanium cylinder on this pistol with kid-gloves. Apparently, while light and able to withstand the firing pressure of .44 special ammunition, if you clean the face of the cylinder with anything other than a silk hankie or baby's diaper, the finish will degrade and subsequent firing of the revolver will erode the cylinder face and/or the cylinder charge-holes. Not that I think many of us will shoot one enough to really have to give it a thorough cleaning. Add to that the persnickety clear-coat finish that is applied to the silver parts and you have something fragile. Fragile: as in a Millennial's understanding of Economics 101. Who wants something this fragile? That being said, .44 special should get the job done should it be needed.

So, in conclusion, the S&W 296 is unpleasant to shoot, hard to effectively clean, and unpleasant to shoot. I could see its place in a heavy winter coat, or perhaps someone with a build like Andre the Giant would find this just the thing for summertime carry. But alas, most fold didn't care for it. It had a very short production run. And it had what I consider the death knell for firearms:  Inclusion in the CDNN clearance advertisements that run in Shotgun News. I can't swear to it, but I seem to recall they were asking a whopping $339.99 each. Like many things that failed, they are considered by some to be a collectible oddity with prices ranging from the low $700s on up. Proving you don't have to be pretty, or particularly useful, to be valuable.