Four Major Swiss Luger Variations
 

Here is a picture of the four Swiss Lugers I have collected. They represent the four major variations of Swiss Lugers including the DWM M1900, the DWM M1900/06, the W+F Bern 1906 and the W+F Bern 06/29.

The M1900 is from the second batch delivered by DWM in 1904 to the Swiss assembled, and in the white. Mine has been rebarreled and has the upgraded W+F extractor. The rear sight has not been filed to a "U". It is the fourth variation, with narrow trigger and the ribbed safety lever. It is marked with the Swiss Cross in Sunburst, current at the time of delivery in 1904. It includes the lanyard strap.

The M1900/06 is from a 1909 delivery to the Swiss. It is from the second batch delivered. It is marked with the Swiss Cross in Shield which was current at the time of delivery. This Luger has the "U" shaped rear sight.

The M1906 manufactured by W+F at Bern It has the "U" shaped rear sight. This Luger was delivered in 1923. There is no Swiss cross on this variation, but it is marked WaffenFabrik Bern on the forward toggle.

The 06/29 was manufactured by W+F at Bern, one of 750 made in 1938. It has a partially marked "P" privatization stamp on the receiver left side, and a full one above the trigger guard. It is marked with the Swiss Cross within the Shield on the forward toggle. This Luger is remarkably tight, and probably has been fired very little.

The M1900 has a complete holster rig including the tool kit. It is a commercial unmarked holster. All of the tools are in the toolkit, and the grease pot is still full of grease in good condition.

The Swiss Lugers are remarkable in their precision, and in the maintenance they received over the years.

Hi Marc, Nice collection, thanks for the presentation.
Regards, Norm

Swiss Lugers
 

Beautiful Collection ....where did you get the Great wooden stand..?.....I only have 3 Lugers....and would like to get a stand like that for them..........have a 41 BYF 1916 DWM and 1918 DWM....if you will.....let me know where to look for the wooden stand .....Regards....Hans Fischer

Hans,

One of my friends at the Raleigh gun show made the 3 Luger stand on the left. I made the oak single Luger stand myself.

I don't think that he ships his stands. Only sells them at the local show...

Marc

Marc,
Beautiful guns! I obviously share your enthusiasm for Swiss and posted a similar photo some years ago.

P.S. Every chance I get I repeat...there ain't no such thing as a "M1906/24 Swiss"...they started making them in 1918!:) I hope someday to get folks to call them "M1906 Waffenfabrik Bern" or "1906 W+F" or just about anything that drops the "24"!

OK.. fixed it!

Marc.

Congratulations indeed for your beautiful collection!

Ron,
congratulations for the guns but also for the wooden stand!

Sergio

Hans, here is the link to a company that makes a wide variety of stands and I believe will also make one to whatever design you request;
www.gunstands@aol.com

Lon

Ron,

Are the Swiss Lugers made after 1918 also "reproductions"?


Sieger

Well, sort of. The Swiss didn't start making their own until 1918 but I guess that lets them squeeze in under the wire. So with that in mind, all the Lugers they produced after that time still came from the same manufacturer and that would make them non-repros. But I will say that they tried awfully hard to make them look like repros with the M06/29.:evilgrin:

Ron , I have just purchased my first swiss, sold to me as a 06/24 but I will take your advise and refer to it as a 06 WFB. will post up some pics when it arrives. question on the 06/29 which I'm sure you have addressed many times. I agree it barely passes muster as a Luger, not a pretty gun , none the less has its place. What was the purpose of the redesign, I'm led to believe it was to reduce the cost of manufacture ? what were the most significant changes apart from the obvious apearance?

regards
Chris

Chris,
Congratulations on the acquisition of your “first” Swiss (I suspect it won’t be your last:))…they are beautiful pieces of machinery.

The information you have about the 06/29 is correct, all of the changes were largely cosmetic and designed to reduce cost of manufacture. Functionally, there is no significant mechanical difference in design. Nearly all of the changes can be observed just by looking at the gun: completely rounded forward receiver; straight grip eliminating the swell or “Schnabel” at the bottom; grip safety that wraps completely around the grip strap (ostensibly this was to preclude objects from getting under the grip safety and rendering it inoperable) and the "tab" at the top of the safety that blocks the sear bar is simply rounded over rather than the more complex backward-slanting tab of the former design; and the elimination of the checkering on the metal parts. The non-visible change was the internal machining of the side plate which significantly simplified its production but did not alter how it functions.

The production cost was the only reason for the new design of the pistol. When the Waffenfabrik Bern (W+F) started to produce their Model 1900/06 the price per pistol was up the 400 Swiss Francs. During the years they brought down the price to 225 Swiss Francs, which was still very expensive.

Therefore studies have been conducted at the end of the 1920s, how the Model 1900/06 could be produced cheaper. Four main points have been proposed by the W+F:
1. omit the grip safety
2. delivery of 2 instead of 3 magazines per pistol
3. omit the lanyard ring
4. plastic grips instead of wood grips.

It was decided to implement all these points with the exception of point 1. Together with the other well-known external simplifications the W+F could bring down the price to 160 Swiss Francs per pistol.

The responsible engineer for the redesign of the pistol was Adolf Furrer, the acting Director of the W+F.

Alexander

I think that the "M1906 Waffenfabrik Bern" design changes also had another effect, and a very positive one.

The precision that the Swiss achieved in this design and manufacturing is nothing short of remarkable. While saving money on building these Lugers, and simplifying the manufacturing process, I think that they achieved a remarkable standard - something like a "spec" auto engine versus a normal manufacture effort.

We know that the drawings, gauges and some tooling made it to Oberndorf in the 1960s for Mauser's late Luger effort, but do we know much about the actual machine tools used to make the Swiss Lugers in Waffenfabrik Bern?

Don't get me wrong, the designers and workers at DWM, Mauser, and Simson have my greatest respect for their work, but these Swiss made Lugers are something very special.

Marc

Man, now I'm envy.
Congratulations, nice display!

by the way: An interesting detail of the Model 06/29 is the U-shaped rear sight. After many officers changed the V-shaped rear sight of their Lugers to a U-shaped type (by their own or by a private gunmaker), because this was more suitable for target shooting, the Army took this as a requirement for the new Model 06/29.

Alexander

Marc,
Very cool. Nice collection.

Thanks for that Ron. yes Marc they are beautifull made guns . I also have two of their model K31 rifles which are also finely made works of art in both form and function. apparently they preferred the .30 luger cartridge over the 9mm due to its inherent accuracy. they still highly prize marksmanship over volume of fire. Hard to disagree , if you can't hit your target there is not much point shooting in the first place ! I wonder what happened to the machinery they used to produce their lugers , hopefully put to other good uses.

Mauro and Gerben studied the relationship between post war Mauser and Waffenfabrik Bern. They know that the drawings and gauges were supplied to Mauser, but I'm not sure of what happened to the machine tools. It's very possible that they stayed in Bern and were re-purposed to other projects.

Marc