C96 Conundrum?
 

Here's a deep philosophical question for you guys....when is a pistol a matching numbers pistol? This gorgeous C96 just sold on Simpsons for 5K, with different serial numbers on the frame and barreled receiver, which appear to be a factory stamping mistake. So, it sold at a matching numbers price, for an unmatched gun that was supposed to be a matching gun so maybe its worth more than a mixed gun but its not a matching gun ...my head hurts!:banghead:

http://www.simpsonltd.com/product_in...ducts_id=34029

That one puzzled me as well that it sold for what it did, aside from the serial number issue, it's an early small hammer, but the supposedly matching stock has non-loop hinge of the later military contract type along with looking like it was sanded and refinished??

I know so little about C96's.

A friend of mine has a commercial that was a bring back, but its hard for me to know what is rare or not. I would think a mismatch like this seems to be a bit higher priced

They are not known for low prices, but this seems pretty high.

Alvin knows a good deal about C96 Mausers, but he hasn't posted in a while... :(

Neither has padredan or chris in minneapolis...All three still have frequent Random Album Pics show up...

They are gorgeous collectibles always on the expensive side, probably this one being a "factory stamping mistake" is rarer still which would somehow explain such a high price.

Sergio

Number mix-ups are not uncommon on early C96 pistols. But these mix-ups are usually restricted to swapping numbers, like 96 instead of 69, as a result of the use of unskilled (read: illiterate) work forces in the early days. With the improvement of the education system and internal quality control, this problem gradually went away and I would be very weary of a later C96 with more elaborate mismatched numbers :)

Mauser never really bothered to keep track of serial numbers anyway. They just numbered batches for contracts or commercial sales and moved on to the next batch, without keeping track of serial numbers they had already used. The sales books only recorded the quantities, never the serial numbers of the C96 pistols.

So anomalies can be expected.

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