Quote:
Originally Posted by mrerick
Hi Jim - Congratulations on your new Luger!
I can't see the bottom of the barrel. Does this also have your serial number stamped in it? Does the witness mark lineup with the receiver?
The barrel does not have a serial number on it. You can see where 8.81 was polished down. The bore is nice and shiny. It is probably a replacement at some point.
Someone went to great pains to make this appear to be a pristine all matching Luger. The presence of the toggle's axle retention pin (which appears to be still in the white) makes it possible that the train is in the original finish. It is rather well done work!
The restorer STRAWED the axle pin!
VoPo Lugers usually had obvious refinishing work. They also should have entered the USA with importer marks. If these are not present (sometimes they are under the grips - be very careful if you remove the grips; easy to break, particularly the left one at the safety lever) it's possible that they were removed when the gun was refinished to increase it's value. That, of course, would have been a federal "no-no"...
I would like to see a closeup of the serial number on the front of the frame. Is the second digit overstamped? I have a 1936 that has a serial number factory overstamped in that area. Would be interesting to see if that happened again.
I will try and take some snapshots outside in natural light in the next couple of days so we can get to the bottom of all this.
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Marc
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[B][FONT="Courier New"]Thanks very much for your thoughtful expertise.