DMW commercial year?

[Jtoon2b]

I am needing help identifying this commercial Luger. I believe it’s a new model 1908. It’s a 30 Mauser. All numbers matching except mag and safety bar. Also someone sanded off most of the grip lines off of the back strap. In looking I can’t find one with these lines which is odd. Any help would be great. I’ll try to include a good picture of the back strap.

[Jtoon2b]

Here’s a couple of more pics. Thought I had a picture of the back strap. I’ll have to add it later. It does have the line above the N b

[Doubs]

The suffix letter appears to be a p so my guess would be 1925 or 1926.

Has the stock lug been ground off? If not, the frame is not correct for an alphabet Luger. All alphabet Lugers were made with a stock lug.

[Major Tom]

The marks on the barrel may indicate a barrel swap?

[Edward Tinker]

Also, unless someone has changed the barrel, it is in 30 Luger (30 Mauser is a different cartridge).

The 30 luger is also known as 7.65mm luger


lugers were also made in 9mm luger

[Jtoon2b]

Sorry I’m a new Luger guy. It is a 30 luger. Original barrel. No stock lug was original on the gun, so not ground off. Frame number matches the barrel number. I’ll also send a picture of the frame number. All other numbers on parts are on the bottom side of each part. With the grips removed I can’t make out the numbers.

[spangy]

I would like to see a picture of the back of the gun from the rear including the stock lug area and the area where you believe the grips have been sanded.

Thanks Jtoon2b and welcome to the Forum

[Jtoon2b]

Thanks for having me. I’ll post that picture later today. I take it the letter p under the serial number represents the year?

[spangy]

The letter 'p' is known as the suffix of the serial number on your gun.
The serial numbers start @ 1 and go to 9999 whereupon they start over at 1a - 9999a, 1b - 9999b etc etc etc.

As to which letters are used and which are left out thats another question that I will leave to our site experts.
It's a slippery slope.

[m1903a3]

Originally Posted by spangy

The letter 'p' is known as the suffix of the serial number on your gun.
The serial numbers start @ 1 and go to 9999 whereupon they start over at 1a - 9999a, 1b - 9999b etc etc etc.

(snip)

Actually, the s/ns went from 1 - 10000, 1a - 10000a etc.

10,000 per block.

[Doubs]

To further confuse the OP, the military serial numbers went from 1 ~ 10000 beginning with each new year. The second series of 10,000 were 1a ~ 10000a then b etc. Therefore, 1911 will have serial number1234a and 1912 will also have serial number 1234a. Thus the year is important in identifying your specific Luger if it's a military pistol. To further complicate things, both DWM and Erfurt made Lugers in the same years with identical serial numbers so the maker is also important. When Mauser took over military production in the 1930's, they didn't begin a new serial number sequence each year but went through the alphabet at least three times for some suffix letters in a continuous series without regard for the year.

Commercial Lugers, OTOH, began with serial number 1 and continued through the years in a continuous series until after WW1 when they reached approximately 92000. Concerned that it would soon become necessary to use six digits in the commercial serial number series, they decided to continue using five digits plus a letter. Because each letter represents a block of 10,000 Lugers, they began with the 9th letter of the alphabet which is i. It is commonly thought that the first alphabet Luger was serial number 2001i which would be the equivalent of 92001. Some think that the first alphabet Luger began with serial number 1i as some have been noted below 2000i.

The first commercial alphabet Lugers were made in mid-1921 and the letter i was followed by k, l, m, n, o, p etc. Each suffix letter was produced in blocks of 10,000. Knowing that the Finns placed an order for 5,000 alphabet Lugers in 1923 and the first delivered were in the k block and the q block pistols were delivered in 1928, it's reasonable to think that your pistol was made in 1926 or 1927. I said 1925 before and I now think that is too early.

ALL alphabet Lugers were made with a stock lug so yours was either ground off OR an earlier frame without a lug has been renumbered to your upper. Seeing pictures of the back of the grip will tell the story.

[Jtoon2b]

Updated pictures

[Doubs]

It looks like it did have a stock lug that has been ground or filed down and may have had material added to smooth it all out. It could be smoothed and polished even more and cold blued.

[Edward Tinker]

I've had a couple of lugers with a removed stock lug, happened a lot during the 60's and 70's with folks freaking out about a stock could get you 10 yrs in jail if found together.

[MFC]

There were a small amount of Alphabet Commercial Lugers made for the Swiss commercial market (1906 style) with grip safeties and no stock lugs, beginning in the 2xxxi serial range and continuing sporadically throughout production..

[spangy]

Originally Posted by Doubs

It looks like it did have a stock lug that has been ground or filed down and may have had material added to smooth it all out. It could be smoothed and polished even more and cold blued.

I think Doubs has it right ... material was added via Tig welding and filed/ground to shape. It is painstaking work and requires the welder to be focused and concentrating all while wearing a welding mask with dark lenses ... its not easy and this task was expensive. It looks to me that this job was not fully completed yet and needs more shaping and then hopefully hot bluing as opposed to cold blueing, I mean if your going to go to this much trouble you might as well do it right ya ??