Hi again Quentin (Bob)!! The first serial number "1" (for Military Mauser Lugers) occurred in Jan. 1934, the next in late 1937 (about Nov.), the next in early 1940 (about Jan.) and the last in late 1941 (about Nov.) So Mauser went through the alphabet about 3.5 times!! :)

Well that gives me a good feel for numbering, thanks again Frank!

Now I've got to take a stab at some math! If #260,000 or 10000z occurred sometime in November 1941 and Mauser went back to #1, then in that series my 41 byf, SN 7345u (or #207,345) may have been made about August 1941, assuming 160,000 actually were made in 1941?

I know it can't be pinned down that close but I'm just playing with numbers trying to learn!

Bob

Found more info in Fred Datig's The Luger Pistol. On page 166 he breaks down P.08 monthly acceptance during WWII. Also I read somewhere that two other letters besides "j" were not used for military numbering. So 9999z probably equals less than 260,000, maybe 240,000.

Subtracting the 41 byf SN# 7345u (207,345) from 240,000 leaves about 32,655 pistols made until the rough date of November when the "odometer" flipped over again. Assuming that date was Nov 15th maybe 6,500 pistols were accepted in Nov. plus 12,230 in Oct. and 13,250 in Sept which makes up 32,000 pretty quick. Of course some of those may have been made by Krieghoff but even so August looks good for that SN, maybe September.

Ok I'll shut up and go back to my corner. You guys can quit laughing! Newbies can get over exuberant...

But am I close? :D

Bob,

Datig's data is more than 50 years old. If you are serious about following this up I recommend that you get ahold of Jan Still's Third Reich Lugers (1988). It has the most current information available in published form.

--Dwight

Thanks, Dwight. Yeah, I was just brainstorming, not really that important and it got confusing talking about two pistols.

I've learned about all I can for now on the pictured Luger so probably best to let this thread die. You guys are the best and it was a real bonus learning more about the military numbering schema.