Thanks guys for all your help and thx. John I did visit the P38 forum.
The reason I became doubtful was because of the Seller. I won the auction, sent the $ and FFL dealer license the next day, asking him to tell when he ships it with possible tracking link so that could anticipate to go pick it up.
Well I didn't hear from him for over a week, so I sent him an email 2 days later and no reply. Then a few more days I called him and he answered with really a bad demeanor and said he had just received my pay'mt, ya right, Priority letters don't take that long, so, I thought he lied.
So, I went and looked up his feed-back, and guess what, --2 negatives and 1 neutral out of about 25. One of the negatives the buyer was outraged he said he received a fake and the seller would not refund his money. So, thought that might have happened to me too.
Oh, btw, the gun arrived yesterday and it did look original, felt like steel, and functioned nice and solid with no slop, except for the 'Carpentersville, IL' and the darker coating (dipping), which made me wonder what was that doing on a gun from '43?'
The bore looks good except I think it needs cleaning. I have a cleaning solvent that will make it look like a mirror.
Manuel