pre-dawn Parker
 

Running down a rumor of an engraved Parker whose hammers were supposedly “missing”, I set the alarm clock for 0500, because the flea marketer said that if I wanted to see the gun, I should be there at 6:00 a.m.

He does business early, then goes home while most folks are still arriving.

All before daybreak, to examine what turned out to be a Parker G-grade.

A Hammerless; 12-gauge, 95XXX-serial number range; Damascus bbls; 28 or 30-inch bbls; I believe a 2-frame, but am not sure as barrel lug looked faintly struck (and lighting was only the battery-operated kind).

Barrels rang, OK – no thunk, anyway.

Are intact composite barrels any less apt to ring “like church bells” than would fluid steel?

No sign of barrel bulges; maybe felt one small nib, outside; bright inside. Damascus pattern quite discernable for a gun that had no signs of refinishing or tampering.

Screws apparently unturned, except for trigger guard.

Engraving looked faint (so may have been buffed) but the sun had not come up yet!

Two birds engraved on floor-plate, both of syncretic upland, walking, persuasion.

Minimal blue left, some under top lever; plenty on protected fore-end iron.

Chip out of dogs-head butt plate

Mechanics seemed tight and true

Overall used, not abused (unless frame was polished at one point). Frame as I saw it had very light patina.

Would water-table have frame size as well as the “G” for grade? There was a “2” as well as a “G”. (Confuses me with the gun being a “2” grade.)

It was not quite what I was looking for, but was an early morning adventure, nevertheless.

The frame size is stamped only on the bottom of the lug.

My experience with barrel ringing is that fluid steel barrels usually produce a very clear "gong" or "clang" while most composite barrels produce a somewhat more subdued "tung" sound that doesn't last as long in duration as the fluid steel barrels.





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Did you buy it??

Ed:

No, I did not buy the gun, as it would not have filled the immediate, perceived, “gap” in my gun needs.

You can understand how I had to investigate the tip that came my way: That a Parker gun, with its hammers missing (we have people that can fix that, don’t we?), with engraving, is being offered by a flea market dealer.

Even at the risk finding out that it was a Belgian pretender, which it was not, it was worth checking out. Every gun we handle probably adds to our knowledge base.

So how much was the over inflated price tag ?

Craig:

Not over-inflated at all.

$900 smackers on the barrel-head would have taken it away.

Quite true, but I never gave it much thought. The reason is pretty basic metalurgy. Iron and steel have a very different structure, easily seen under high magnification in the metalography lab. Actually one of my most interesting courses in college.
They each, by themselves, do have a resonant property, but in a composite barrel of almost any damascus gun, one can easily offset the other.