help out a newbie to parker
 

hey guys i picked up this parker just off a hunch . the fine craftmanship and beauty made me unable to leave it their. (could not live without it)LOL Not sure if its refurbished or not i hope its in original condition. any help would be appreciated. here is the questions i have. #1 is it safe to shoot with modern ammo?23/4 #2 has it been refinished? #3how to tell chokes? i have a good caliper can that tell? #4 what is it worth

You have a 12 gauge VH grade Parker built on a number 2 frame. From the quality of the pictures I can’t say for sure if the wood is original but I’m leaning towards not. Barrels appear to be redone. Frame appears to be hot blued. Take better pictures of the muzzle and frame. If it’s been redone value will be greatly diminished and uninteresting to the collectors. Stay tuned in and you’ll learn a lot about your gun. Thank you for joining the PGCA.

Thanks for the info. I’m trying to learn what I can.

The wood is not original and isafter market. Receiver has been hot blued & it appears the barrel has been hot blued & many holes drilled in the bottom rib. Probably to deal with rust caused by the hot bluing.

So dumb question why would they drill holes in the bottom rib? Will you explain further please

Hot bluing probably seeped in between the barrels & bottom rib causing rust to seep out & holes drilled to put in oil to stop rusting action.

That makes sense. So some oil should be added to the holes from time to time

My copy of Price & Fjestad notes the original length of the barrels to be: 30 inches. Page 323

Also, that this was manufactured in 1901. Page 57

The gun has been completely refinished. The frame is incorrectly blued. The barrels appear to be hot blued which is a big no-no with SxS guns. The gun has been restocked, butt and forend. And the quality of the work appears to be only so-so.

Nobody over the internet can tell you if the gun is safe to shoot with what loads.
This is not an appraisal service. So the value is something for you to determine. All I can say is that the value is greatly negatively effected by the amount of alterations the gun has had. I suppose the gun is worth to you what you gave for it.

I will measure but I don’t think it’s gonna be 30”

No. The barrels should be rust blued (low temp) & not hot blued. Hot bluing soft soldered barrels is too hot of a temp. & can melt and/or weakin the solder joint. Hot bluing soldered barrels is a no no. You better have this looked at by a competant gunsmith to Determine if its safe to shoot. All of those holes in the bottom rib are not normal.

Why is hot blued bad . Besides not being original

There are surviving Parker Factory records for your gun.

Typos in the book is an acknowledged fact. Not common, but it did happen.

Ordering instructions for a letter begin at the home page.

Welcome to the forum, hope your appetite and interest in Parker Bros. gets ignited by this first acquisition. It is a pleasure we all enjoy on this forum.

John

I understand thanks

Is there a way to determine if in fact it was hot blued for sure?

Hot bluing is a caustic solution process that attacks the solder & the hot bath of the bluing salts is too high of a temp that can cause the soldered barrels to weeken & possibly come apart. You need to have a competant gunsmith check it out to see if its safe to shoot

Competent gun smith around here is going to be hard to find I think. For something like this anyway.

John I’m wondering if it could have been shortened. I’ll check tomorrow

If anyone knows of a gunsmith in NC east of Raleigh that would be knowledgeable about this please let me know

Thank you Mr Dudley for the information

Bill Graham in Durham can help you out.
https://www.niceolddouble.com/

Thank you Dr Bob

Barrel measures 26 1/8

Also by measuring known chokes I have for other guns best guess is a improved cylinder actually measured 8&24 ten thousandths

It looks like barrels have been cut, which means no chokes. If it were me I'd take it back & get my money back. One of the problems with buying old doubles is many have been screwed with. So, if you're not familiar with what to look for, either get a knowledgeable friend to help by inspecting, or get the seller to agree to let you have it inspected.

I agree David I knew it was a big risk but considering the looks it does look good in my collection . I don’t know what the actual monetary value is but I didn’t break the bank on it.