Need help evaluating case color
 

Every time I get a new Julia's catalog, I realize I have not been properly trained in evaluating case color. Seems I'm too conservative. Would anyone share with me their opinion as to the amount of case color remaining on this frame? Thx, Ray

I would say there is very little remaining on the receiver. Only a little around the dogs and none remaining on the water table. Still a beautiful gun.

Ray, I would humbly disagree with Chuck and believe there is more case color than meets the eye. You need to photograph the gun on a neutral background. Your blue background washes out the color on the gun. Light to medium gray is the preferred neutral.

Please show us again with a different background.

BTW, I DO agree with Chuck that it is a beautiful A!!

Incidentally, do you have a "Squirrel Poster" to go with that wonderful gun??

Dean, my ability to take photos is poor. My camera is junk. I can never get the right light. I tried to take these outside with some could cover. The blue background was a bad choice. I'll try again with the backgrounds you suggested.

That said, it has a lot of CCH. It is faded and hard to see because of the engraving. The blue you see is pretty accurate. What you don't see (because I can't get the right photos) is the pink colors. Especially on the floorplate. If you study the floorplate, you can tell there are faded pink colors with blue at the bottom.

I don't have the poster. Here is a better photo of my squirrel!

BTW, one of the things that confuses me is how to judge faded colors. Sometimes I see a listing stating that a gun has 70-80% CCH, but they are faded. I think how can it be 80% if it is faded? I would think 80% is pretty close to new vivid colors. I think that is were I go wrong in my evaluations.

The thing about the gun shown is that the CCH is faded. The only place it is gone is on the fences and on the bottom of the frame at the hinge. Otherwise, there is CCH every where to some degree. A lot of pink but it is hard to see in the photos.

To your point. Is the percentage of case color determined by the percentage of vivid color remaining relative to when it was new or percentage of any color on the surfaces? It would seem to me that it must be percentage of any surface coverage because there is no way to know how vivid they were when new for a comparison to then.

Robin, that is my confusion. If the test is any CCH, then it could be gray or brown. Certainly not what is was originally. On the other hand, if CCH determines a condition of a gun as to compared to new, fading must be taken into account. For example, a 100% gun connotes original factory conidtion. The CCH can't be faded or turned color in that case.

I guess what confuses me is color vs. orginality.

If there were color on every surface of that A Grade, would that be 100% remaining case color. Not in my lifetime, for sure. I would grade the A Grade at zero remaining case color if I were advertising it for sale. Great gun, by the way.

In my humble opinion case color remaining, not worn off, even if it has gone to gray, is what should be considered when specifying percentage remaining. I'm sure there are those collectors (like Murphy...;)) who would insist on only vivid color remaining, but that formula would not necessarily speak to the 'wear' factor.

Bill and Chuck say there is no CCH even though it can be palinly seen in the photos. Dean says there is CCH there and it doesn't matter what color is so long as it isn't worn off. These gentlemen are know much more then me. No wonder I'm confused.

I tend to agree with them all to some point. To me, condition has to judged against orginality. I repectfully disagree with Bill that there is 0% CCH. If the vividness was the only test, than nearly all guns would be 0% under Bill's standard since most all guns do not have vivid colors. In other words, a gun that was never used, stored in a gun cabinet for 120 years, having all of its color but faded by time, would be 0%. That can't be.

Now Dean says all that matter is that it is there. So that same gun stored in the gun cabinet would be 100% even if all the color faded away and only greyish hues remained. That can't be either.

Figuring out the percentage of the frame that has CCH on it is fairly simple. It is just a matter of measuring the coverage. The most wear is at the squirrel. Even the fences have a little CCH. The rest if it has CCH except for the sharp edges and a few other spots. I'd say the coverage is 70% holding it in my hand. None of it is vivid. It is all faded to varying extent. So under Dean's standard, it is 70% and under Bill's it is still 0%. Each standard is simple to apply.

I guess my standard is that it is some where in between, but where? How much of a deduction should there be as a result of it not being as vivid as the day it was made?

Everyone can establish there own standards. My guess is that most of Bill's guns are 0% except for those that have been hermetically sealed for decades. On the other hand, probably all of Dean's guns have CCH to him.

Maybe the better question for me to ask is whether there is any generally accepted industry standard for making the evaluation (as opposed to asking personal opinions)? Something that can be applied objectively (and I don't mean Bill and Dean's standards cannot because they can). If so, where do I find it? Does anyone know what standard Julia's uses? (I have to say their evaluations are begining to make more sense to me).

Ray,
I believe there are two standards when judging percentage of case colors. One is used by sellers and one is used by buyers. If I were looking to purchase your gun, percentage of case colors would be the last thing I would be looking at. The wood and engraving along with those beautiful Damascus barrels would consume all my attention. It seems to me that guns with a lot of engraving tend to loose color faster than a VH. Besides, when the only CC remaining is down in the engraving cuts, I think it highlights rather than hides the real beauty of the guns engraving.

Larry, I agree with you. There seems to be too much focus on CCH in determing value. I like to look at the whole package. I just raised the question because it seems to be so important to the Parker collecting community. Thx, Ray

Ray, and others, you will notice hat I preceded my comment with "IMHO" and everybody has one... an opinion that is.
There are hose who disagree with my opinion and there are "NRA Standards of Condition" but I don't know exactly what they are so I don't resort to them.

Dean, thank you for sharing your opinion. That's what I asked for in my initial post. Only when there seemed to be such a wide differences in opinion did I wonder if there was an industry standard. Maybe I posed my initial question incorrectly.

Btw, I looked at those NRA standards and they don't help much. They are rather vague and subjective. Maybe there is no answer to my question. Maybe Julia's is what I should rely on as they are a respected leader in the industry when it comes to buying/selling guns. Their evaluations are nothing more than their opinions but it is something to go by.

Thx again

Very good questions and responses. I to am somewhat confused about CCH %. I also agree that many VH Parkers seem to have more CCH than equal condition higher grades. Ray: Beautiful A. I would love to have one like it even without any CCH. Bob

i hope ya ll figure this one out i m confused also...charlie

Thx, Bob. I don't think a VH has more. You can just see it better because it doesn't get lost in the engraving. The CCH on guns with less engraving also looks glossy because the polishing if the frame comes through. Frames were highly polished before engraving. The more engraving the more the the glossy appear was removed.

I once saw a circa 1920 BHE that was almost brand new. It had all of its CCH but it appeared dull except for the few areas that were not engraved where it appeared glossy.

Thx, Bob. I don't think a VH has more. You can just see it better because it doesn't get lost in the engraving. The CCH on guns with less engraving also looks glossy because the polishing if the frame comes through. Frames were highly polished before engraving. The more engraving the more the glossy appearance was removed.

I once saw a circa 1920 BHE that was almost brand new. It had all of its CCH but it appeared dull except for the few areas that were not engraved where it appeared glossy.

On the other hand, the intricate and delicate engraving of a high grade gun like your AH is often somewhat obscured by a high percentage of CCH. Personally, I would prefer to be able to see fine engraving over vivid CCH. But again, that's just my humble opinion.

I appreciate the question(s) as have been ask, and the answers as they have appeared. I am really curious to hear other thoughts as the thought process really is almost 180 degrees apart, coming from some astute collectors and purveyors.

This is a subject that will be debated until the end of time I think.
The faded color question applied a lot to later LC Smith guns. I see many of them that have dearly all of the original case color patterns showing, but they are about half as bright as thy were originally. I personally would be less inclined to call it a 50% gun, but certainly not a 100% gun. Compromise at 75% maybe?

True that guns like the subject A grade with a lot of engraving coverage hide case color. Especially color with a little wear.
I own a SC that has the stipple engraving on it. At first glance one would say there is little color remaining, but when looking closely in the right light, one would see that there is at least 80% remaining on the sides. I found that lower indoor light shows the colors on that gun better when looking at it in hand.

As Brian and others have stated this will be debated until the end of time.
I believe Julia's is quite consistent in the standard they use to judge CCH. I feel they state the % of CCH as a percent of the total area ( includes the water table and breech faces) . Therefore, as an example a gun with 90% CCH will typically have no case color on the trigger plate. If the CCH is faded they will state that. The problem as stated is there is no "industry standard" to express the level of CCH.
It would be better and helpful if the % of total coverage was one expressed as one value and the remaining intensity as another %.

I think we are getting some where. How about this for a fair way to measure it?

Start with Dean's method of deteriming how much of the surface is covered with any CCH regardless of it's color. Then rather than trying to assign a value to the originality of the color, just describe it. For example, the gun shown could be described as ____% CCH faded original colors. If the CCH was still there but faded to grey, it could be described as ___% CCH faded to mottle grey. This provides an objective evaluation and accurately describes the condition and originality of the gun.

I think that is more or less what Julia's does. With some exceptions, they are pretty consistent at it. Trying to describe the percentage of CCH and then the percentage of original color is difficult for a couple of reasons. First, one would have to know what the original colors were (which I actually think are fairly known to us). Second and more difficult, is to determine how much of the original color is left and how it may have faded. This would be subjective. Whether they were shown as two values or averaged would still lead to a subjective result that reasonable folks could differ on.

If we adopted something like I suggest, you would have a value for condition, ie the amount of CCH remaining, and a description of it originality, ie the color compared to the day it left the factory.