After too much delay, I finally got the resurrected DHE back into the field at a bird ranch this weekend, and it performed admirably with 1 oz RSTs. It now feels like the resurrection project is truly complete.

Again Justin a beautiful job on completing that gun and now you got to enjoy it in the field. Good job....!

How did you solve the problem with the damaged doll's head. It seems like you would have had to add metal.

I don't know the details. My gunsmith (Sergey Lyalko of Nattick, MA) described it as "welding, reshaping and engraving", and he fitted it to the frame beautifully. Hard to tell its not original.