Another Sterlingworth ID

[Ebowskiwitz]

Greetings,
I'm new to your forum but glad to be here. Just wondering if anyone here could help with a date and any other info about the following gun.
Sterlingworth
Serial number: 254254
Oddly enough, a lot of the stampings seem to be very light. The STERLINGWORTH on both sides of the case is missing the I and the date on the receiver appears to be OCT 17 1905 - JAN 16 1906 but is light stamped so that you can only read the bottom half of the numbers. It appears most like the 1927 era. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Pete

[Ebowskiwitz]

Here are a few more pictures. The stock is cracked in two places and loose on the receiver. Other than that, it is in pretty good shape.

[fox-admin]

It is a 20ga Sterlingworth from about 1916 according to this chart http://doublegunshop.com/dgsnos1.htm
The roll stamping of "Sterlingworth" often times has missing letters or parts of letters and the stamped patent dated on the water table are often light.
It appears to me as if your gun has been re-case colored and re-blued. Depending on the nature of the crack, it can most likely be repaired by a good stock man. Craig

[Ebowskiwitz]

Great info! Thanks a bunch! How can you tell that it has been re case-colored. How would someone do that? Thanks again>

[fox-admin]

The colors on your gun are the wrong hue when compared to factory original colors, see examples on the Sterlingworth page on this forum. Many gun restoration services will re-case color a gun properly.

[FRBRIT]

From what I see your gun looks like it has what is commonly refered to as a split head crack. Do yourself a favor and get it to a good stock repair man before you try shooting the gun. This type of repair is fairly common with older SxS shotguns and in most cases they can be repaired so the gun can be shot for several more trouble free years. If you let it go the stock could turn into firewood rather quickly and be a lot more expensive to re-stock it to save the gun.

Ask some questions of the gunsmiths your talking too about the repair. The guy's that know what they are doing will be able to make an invisible internal repair. The hackers will install a screw or bolt externally to draw the head back together.

If you search the archives here you will see some threads on doing this type of repair correctly.

Good Luck and enjoy your new toy!