Thread: Who?
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Unread 01-20-2008, 11:49 AM   #4
Dwight Gruber
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No, it doesn't. This is the stamp of the army depot itself. The depots are called Heers Zeugamt (Army Weapons Depot) and they are identified by city and depot number. When a depot replaced a part during maintenance, they stamped their ID on the part. On a large part they might use a stamp with their full identification--e.g., eagle/HZaJt18, for Heers Zeugamt Jngolstadt (Ingolstadt), depot 18. On small parts there is not room for the full ID, so they used small stamps with limited information--in your case, Depot 20 of a Heers Zeugamt in a city which cannot be identified because of a weak stamping.

The straight wing eagle came into use in 1937, but was not in full use until 1939. By then there had been four manufacturers of P-08s--DWM, Erfurt, Simson, and Mauser. A Zeugamt might have in its posession parts made by any one of them.

Although the Zeugamt stamp certainly will not reveal the maker, other features might. The parts made by Erfurt and Simson were all inspected and stamped by Army inspectors--Erfurt by a crown/letter, Simson most commonly by an eagle/6. Mauser spare parts are usually found stamped with the spare parts code S/42 or 42. DWM parts were not inspection stamped.

If your extractor has one of those stamps, you can be sure of its source. If it does not it was probably made by DWM, or possibly by Mauser.

--Dwight
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