[mrerick]

Welcome to the forum. Thank you for helping your friend.

The pistol has a retail value of $1850 to $2000 if all matching and in original finish with that magazine and in that condition. A formal appraisal could be done, but for an estate, that estimate should be adequate.

You can use a blunt flat tip bamboo chop stick and a polymer faced hammer to gently tap out the rear axle pin once you have relieved any firing pin tension that might be on the upper. Be sure to completely support the receiver while gently tapping. The pin only comes out to the left (numbered) side of the receiver. Don't try and remove the other axle pins once the toggle train is out of the receiver.

If you do any more soaking, pull off the grips. Be very careful when removing them - particularly the left grip. Lift it just enough to slide it down from the area of the safety lever to avoid chipping it in that area.

It is a very nice Luger and appears to be in high condition. If the new owners have political issues with firearms, do your best to help them place the guns in responsible hands that will preserve their history.

A side note, my 1936 Mauser made Luger is also in the "i" block of serial numbers, a couple hundred earlier than this one. In this period, Mauser was still making Lugers using the rust bluing technique, and these are some of the last of these before transition to salt bluing, which started in 1937.