Best authentic pad for CHE 12 ga
 

I’m lucky to have found a beautiful CHE with beavertail and straight stock. Stock may be a replacement as it is 15 1/2” and has a non Parker horn butt plate. My Parker letter states 14 1/4 LOP with no mention of skeleton butt or pad. I need to have it shortened so I can shoot it and probably will opt for a thin pad. Please advise what brand would have been a possibility in 1918 when this one was built.
Thanks, I’m a new member and this is my first post.

Danny

A Silvers pad was by far the most common in that time frame.
I have a 1912 DHE with the original Silvers pad as stated in the research letter.





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Your suspicions about the stock not being original are likely correct. Given the length and the horn plate.
A silvers pad would be correct for nearly anything. And they can be thinned down to be less than the 1” they come in.

Making it a wood checkered butt would be nice too. Or you MAY be able to put an ssbp on it.

Would a classy leather covered pad also be correct?

Doggone right it would!





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A leather covered pad would not really be correct looking for any American gun.

But they're very classy looking.

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And so are checkered cheeks on trojans and V grades.

Your chances of getting a leather covered pad that would satisfy you is about one in fifty. I have two that are perfect, but they are rare birds. Imperfect leather covered pads cost the same as perfect ones. Use a Silver pad and grind it down to the length you prefer. Forget about the leather.

Good points Bill...

However, Abe Chaber did mine and I’m very pleased with it. Never had a problem. If Abe had a problem doing it he certainly didn’t mention it and his price was as quoted.





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Abe is among the best of the best.

Silvers type pads are my favorite. For some reason the vented type don't appeal to me and I wouldn't ever put a leather covered pad on an American double. That is just my weird idiosyncrasies!

The OP asked about the best “authentic” pad for a gun. I don't know why we are even discussing leather covered pads. It couldn't be farther from authentic.

Other pre-WWI pads included the D-W, Funkes, Huntley Shock Absorber (Omaha) and “Perkins” Recoil Pads (both advertised starting in 1915), Tryon #6, and the American Silver pad (sometimes called Grieb; possibly by the Ajax-Grieb Rubber Co.) - AFAIK no repros are available

The first Jostam Anti-flinch ad in Sporting Life was August 19, 1916

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...qNnHshpKQ/edit

CSMC's offerings
https://connecticutshotgun.co/recoil-pads/

“Glue on leather at end of recoil pad“ - looks like?
 

Comments above have made me question whether a leather pad could ever be a Parker Brothers factory original.

The letter for this CH Bernard suggests that a leather pad was indeed available (in 1905 at least). I am referring to the next to last sentence in the final paragraph.

Uncommon perhaps, but something involving leather on the pad was available.

http://parkerguns.org/forums/attachm...6&d=1625950340

Unrelated comment. Restating something I’ve said before. The PGCA discussion board has perhaps the only section selling items on the web where an abundance of information is available for reference.

Welcome aboard Danny. You may want to give some consideration to a leather faced pad versus a leather covered pad. Parker Brothers may have did leather covered pads, I am not sure. I do know that they did provide leather faced pads, at least I have been told this has appeared in research letters. I think they add a nice touch of class.

My double trap has a leather faced pad on it as noted in the letter. It does add a bit of class.

That would be a leather faced pad. Which was a common treatment for american silvers pads. It would be different than fully leather covered.

I don't know bout dat...

Here's Burt Spiller's VH 20 with a leather faced Silver's pad... class? Maybe when it was new.


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They do look good when they are new. I have done a number of them.

A leather faced pad is fairly common on Foxes, quite a bit less common on Parkers. Pretty elegant on either.

Real Silvers Pads can be ground to 3/4" thick safely. Beyond that may shorten the life of the pad due to the internal air pocket.