Stock Book Help
 

While doing a research letter on a 1881 hammer gun, the stock book entry showed some extra information that is usually not seen due to the way the stock books were copied at Remington. I'm trying to figure out exactly what it is.

Usually the far right of the stock book copy ends with the weight of the gun. In some stock book copies, to the right of the weight column, you can sometimes make out the patterning information. From seeing an original stock book, I know there is more information to the right of the patterning information and as I remember, it contains the type of shell used for the patterning.

While reviewing stock book #6, I can see a column that I've never seen before on our copies. The gauges are all 10's and 12's and the column contains numbers and fractions. The only 3 I've seen are 2 1/4, 2 3/8, and 2 1/2. Are these chamber length's, drams, or something else. Usually if the chamber length is noted in the stock books, it's on the left side of the page.

Any ideas what those numbers represent? Perhaps some of the guys that did the copying know the answer.

Chuck, are those recorded fractions against 12 ga guns or 10 ga guns?

Chuck, you would have to tell us what the columns were labeled before the figures you mentioned. I have very few stock book copies, since they were so hard to load on the copy machine.

They could even be DAC measurements I suppose.

They look more like DAH measurements. Never heard of 2 1/4" chambers or DE.

I was thinking the same thing - DAH or DAC. But are those dimensions shown elsewhere in the entry?

Nope, they aren't DAH measurements, DAH measurements are listed separately in a different column.

Murphy, there is no column header for that column. The column that lists the patterning info is labeled "Target".

I'll scan a page and post it tomorrow.

Could it have something to do with chokes maybe???

How about pitch dimensions.

I wouldn't think they would narrow pitch down to the 1/8"

I will look forward to seeing the scan. Thanks, Chuck.

Here is a sample scan. Sorry for the poor quality but now you know what I'm faced with when doing a research letter.

It doesn't matter if it's a 10 or 12 gauge. Either gauge will have 2 1/2 - 2 3/8 - or 2 5/8 or 2 1/4. I did find a 16 gauge that said 2 1/4. I think it has something to do with the barrels, not drams.

Chuck, Could it be Dram Equiv.?

:eek:Ouch! You need to charge more for a research letter Chuck....at least enough to cover new glasses each year!
PS Please wait until I get two more through! :rotf:

Dave, I thought that at first too but in Parker literature, they recommend 3 dr for 12ga and 3 1/4 for 10ga. I doubt they would use such a light load for their patterning.

John, you get used to it but sometimes it's quite a challenge.

Could it be department codes IE: which group of craftsmen made the gun?

Trying to find pic I took that had a faction in pencil on stock when I removed butt plate.
Craig

This might be one heck of a long shot, but, could it be trigger pull weight? 2-1/4 might be 2lbs 4oz, 2-5/8 = 2lbs 10oz. Sounds kinda light for a hunting gun I would think.

Like I said, a long shot.......

What was under the buttplate should be the serial number or at least the last few numbers of it. That is common on guns with buttplates. The number would be hand written on both the wood and the plate.

Brian, just found it, was thinking it showed something more than the faction.

Craig

Huh, that has a lot of things written on it.

Look in your Parker Gun Identification & Serialization books on Page 45 in the chart under "WIDTH", guns with frame size 1 and greater see column F, "width across bolsters".

Dean has it. It is the frame size. Look at the weights of those guns. The 12 gauge guns are very heavy, indicating maybe a #3 frame, which is a 2 1/2 in Parker shop language. Chuck, what does Dean win? By the way, for those of you that don't own a Serialization Book, the same information is on page 527 of The Parker Story. Good work, Dean. I spent five days in those books and couldn't figure it out.

wouldn't be a DAC amount

That's what I thought until I found the chart in the ID & Ser book. Now I'm convinced it is the width of the bolsters according to the chart and the other specs on the guns.

it may be the length of choke

it may be why we see so many 30 in. barrels cut down to 28 in , if you cut off 2 in. you go from full to impv. cyl. ,just a guess.

Chuck,

There is info in the stock books about Drams of Shot unsed in patterning.
Please refer to page 866 of TPS. It shows a photo of a near full stock book page from 1928. unfourtunately the top neader columns are not in the photo, but it does go all the way to the side. It shows a column with a date in it even ferther than the one you mention. But, it shows the same fractional number after patterning info. In this case, mostly 2-1/2 and 3. But, on this page all of the letters do have "dr." or drs. written after it.

The couple other examples of stock book pages in TPS are photocopies, just like the ones you use, which cut off those last columns. Page 866 is the only actual Photo of a full page in TPS.

Also,

See this attached photo of a stock book from 1913. I took this photo while I was at Remington. It is the one stock book that is on display in their museum. This shows the column headers. The column that you are referring to is labeled "Remarks" in this book. And they same info we speal of is listed here as well. With "Drs" after it. And it looks like they note that 7/8 oz of shot was used in most cases (in a few going as high as 1-1/4 oz) right before the drams of powder.

Attachment 30839

The 1928 example in TPS also shows the oz. of shot and drams. And also those dates. One above that info and then another date with a large "X". Looks like there was a variation in header titles from 1913 to 1928.

xxx edited out

WAIT A MIN... !!!!

I noticed something else when looking at the photo I have of the 1913 stock book from Remington.

Later stock books used a column just after the grade to record frame size. The first ones were hand written and the even later ones used rubber stamps for the frame size. The 1913 example does not have a column next to grade for frame size. However... they list frame size in the final column under the "Remarks" column along with the shot size and drams of powder, but above that info in the row.

See in this cropped down photo of that page, that the top row actual says "Frame", and then the other rows following just list the number. In the first many examples they are 0 frame guns in 20g. as shown by the bore size a few columns before.
But... Look about 3/4 of the way down when it gets to three rows for 12 bore guns. It lists 2-3/8 as the frame size???

Attachment 30841

What is up with that method of recording the frame size? In this 1913 example 2-3/8, no doubt means 2 frame. But why the 3/8?

Very interesting stuff here. So can someone define the frame sizes as they correlate to our commonly used 0,1,1 1/2,2 etc.?

Hard to tell from the example I showed since only 20 and only a few 12g guns are listed.

I just checked my photos of the other page from that same book and it is the same deal. All 20g guns with only two 12g labeled the same way. As 2-3/8 frame size.
They were making a lot of 0 frame 20s that week.

In the days of hand written frame sizes in actual frame size columns (around 1928), I was able to confirm in the research for my article on the Hayes Prototype Trojan that sizes written as 1/2 were actually 1-1/2. But this earlier frame size oddity does not make much sense at all.

Chuck,
Are you able to maybe take a tally of what you see by way of those fractional number markings and how they correlate to the bore size. However, we are talking about 1881 as compared to 1913. So no doubt there may have been some differences.

Dave, Dean and Bill clarified that in earlier posts. Charts on page 45 in the Serialization Book and page 527 in The Parker Story correlates the inches width of bolsters to frame size. The 2 1/2 at the factory was a #3 frame stamped on the gun, and so on. Brian, it makes sense if we realize that the later books use the sizes actually stamped on the gun and the earlier books identify frames in inches and fractions of inches.

Once again..... look at the chart in the ID & Ser. book on page 45 re: Column F 'width across the bolsters' for frame size 2 is 2 3/" as I spoke of in my earlier post.

Ok. I see now. So now chuck can add frame size to letters.

Its a curious thing that we generally measure the distance between firing pins centers in discovering the frame size but rarely, if ever, refer to other dimensions of the gun. Possibly there is a difference in this measurement between a 1-frame 16 and a 0-frame 16.... I sispect so without looking at the chart again.

Also, why would they mark an 0 frame as 0 but the others as the bolster measurements?
And... they were marking the locking lugs with the common 0, 1, 1-1/2, 2 etc... So why would they record them differently in the book?

By process of elimination, I don't believe the numbers are DAH, as guns of that period were almost always close to 3" and more. I also don't think it's loads, because they were usually 2 3/4 Dram Equivalent or greater.
I have to believe Dean is correct. I only have one 12 bore hammer gun, and it is a 1 frame, measuring 2 1/4" across the breach face. The column which shows, what I assume are gun weights, matches guns one would assume were heavier, i.e. 12 30" 12, 32" 10, 30 ", 10, 32". It would make sense that a 10 bore with 32" barrels, would be heavier, and logic would suggest they were on larger framed receivers.

I think I will save this discussion to my files. Right now I'm going to warm up a 2 1/4"gun at the skeet field......:)

I have an interesting thought. You could start a new thread.and have members measure across the balls and submit it along with the serial no and the frame size if so marked. Then someone with the serialization books could take the serial no match it to the ones in the book and see if that measurement corresponds to the no's in the book. Soon you would build a data base and confirm deans theory. Then you could possible use that information to determine frame size on guns that are not marked. Just a thought