ssdave said
As those of you who know me would know, I'm not much of a Winchester guy, except for 1885's and model 70 rifles as a basis for custom rifles.
However......  I've always wanted a 92 in .25-20.  Don't ask why, I just have wanted one.  I picked one up the other day along with a bunch of other rifles.  Didn't look at it close at the time, just put a nominal price to it and bought.  It's a well used ranch gun, stock worn, barrel blue worn, action shows a hundred scratrches, just beat up from 120 years of haystacks, barns, and pickup floors.  
I looked at it today, and realized it's a bit special.  Half octagon, thin barrel.  Half length mag tube, and it's a takedown. Made in 1893.  Bore is good.  
I happen to have in my parts a spare takedown flange.  Checked, it fits correctly.  Cool, I can make a multi-barrel set.  I can easily mill a blank to match the barrel contour, and could have Hunter Restortion mark it to match the .25-20 barrel.
Then, it occurred to me:  There's only 3 calibers.  25 wcf, 32 wcf, 218 bee.  I sure don't need a 32 wcf, and 218 bee would be one step more worthless than a .25 wcf. 
What to do?  Or should I just pass it on and pretend I never owned it?
  

Good morning,

Can you please post some images and the serial number of the rifle.  Then we can assess and advise.

Michael

Pictures would help us help you, with at least a conversation.

Tony

One has to ask themself, if a rifle was bought 1890, did the buyer of this said rifle choose to buy it and leave it in storage? With it's original finish and protective coating on it to keep it pristine?

I highly Doubt it!

Where's the box and paper work? We know that keeping that back then wasn't considered anything that was really done. Just taking it out over the years to play show and tell with family and friends can show some handling marks. This ones metal finish looks new! So is the wood!

I highly doubt it!

I know that I wouldn't be interested in it, as a restored example for $18,000.00! One could get a Turnbull example for that kind of money that seems to hold they're value and possibly increase with provenance!

I do agree, it's a very clean example, and a pretty nice job was done on it, as the work out there has improved that we are seeing today!

Tony

However......  I've always wanted a 92 in .25-20.  Don't ask why, I just have wanted one.  I picked one up the other day along with a bunch of other rifles.  Didn't look at it close at the time, just put a nominal price to it and bought.  It's a well used ranch gun, stock worn, barrel blue worn, action shows a hundred scratrches, just beat up from 120 years of haystacks, barns, and pickup floors.  

I looked at it today, and realized it's a bit special.  Half octagon, thin barrel.  Half length mag tube, and it's a takedown. Made in 1893.  Bore is good.  

I happen to have in my parts a spare takedown flange.  Checked, it fits correctly.  Cool, I can make a multi-barrel set.  I can easily mill a blank to match the barrel contour, and could have Hunter Restortion mark it to match the .25-20 barrel.

Then, it occurred to me:  There's only 3 calibers.  25 wcf, 32 wcf, 218 bee.  I sure don't need a 32 wcf, and 218 bee would be one step more worthless than a .25 wcf. 

What to do?  Or should I just pass it on and pretend I never owned it?

Because of this, the asking price of $18,500 is well beyond exuberant.

Mike

I suspect that there were at least 1,500 duplicate serial numbered model 94s that were manufactured.  I have one serial number that appears to have a triplicate... 2138903XX.

The is the complete list of all the Model 94/64 duplicate "X" serial numbers I have found thus far.

Bert

TXGunNut said
Very nice. IF restored seems to be an above average job. 
 
Mike 
  

I agree…..☝🏽 

Mike 

The earliest "X" suffix M70 I've found to date (not counting the odd R&D gun) is s/n 75829X (1947).

Those "D" prefix M70s perplex me.  Besides the (4) in the clip below, there's s/n D8702 that RatRod Mac recently ran across.  There's nothing at all "special" about these guns, and you can see that there are numbers in-between that lack the prefix.  These are the only "D" serial numbers out of about (24,000) in the survey and they're in a block of (50) or so...

I've wondered if maybe the guy stamping M70 serial numbers on a Friday in 1937 forgot to record the last number he used, causing the next guy on Monday to start in the wrong place and stamp a whole block of duplicates?  I asked Pauline Muerrle to check the original PR logbook for 8690 through 8740, but there's nothing there to indicate duplications (or explain the "D").

Which raises another question... How many M70 receivers were actually made?  We know s/n 1 was stamped on Jan 20, 1936 and the last number used, 581,471, was stamped on Oct 18, 1963.  But "X" serial numbers are not rare, and it doesn't appear that the factory "skipped" the next number to keep the count accurate.  For example, I have s/n 422990X.  If there was a 422989, 422990, 422990X, and 422991, then there's one more M70 receiver out there than there were serial numbers used.  In the M70 survey, it appears to me that the number of "X" serial numbers may be as high as 1 in 500 to 1 in 1000, which would suggest (600) to (1200) more than 581,471 M70 receivers were made.

Hmmmmm...

Lou

That would agree with both Rule's book and what's in the survey.  It happens that my relatively few 1955 or later Super Grades (excepting the Africans, of course) have the Redfield 255.  All my earlier Super Grades have the Redfield 254 except the 24-inch heavy barrel 375 Magnum.  It has the 0.260" tall Redfield full gold, which is the same height as the Lyman 31W gold bead found on (at least most) of the 375 Magnum Standard rifles with that barrel.

It's hard to know what "should" be on a heavy straight taper 375 Magnum Super Grade (they aren't too common), but I've got enough of the Standard rifles recorded to know that they used the lower Lyman 31W front sight with that heavy barrel.

Best,

Lou