Fox Collectors

Just recently joined the forum, but have been lurking around for quite a while. Participate on the doublegun BBS pretty reguarly and have been trading and selling off all my single barrel units in favor of the 2-barrel variety for the last 10 years. Once I owned/shot my first "Elmer Fudd" SxS, it was all over. I was hooked! Side by side fever hit me. It's official, I now break out in cold sweats if I don't at least get one out of the safe and fondle it every other day. I prefer to shoot something with feathers, but in the offseason, I have to be content with hugging and squeezing and cleaning these pieces of fine American craftsmanship.

Have bought mostly shooters over the years. .410's to 10g with several nice examples of each. Remington 1889, Parker VH, Aya 10g, Pre-war Stevens (when they were competing with the big boys), SKB, Browning etc. Nothing high dollar, but still near and dear to my heart. And yes I shoot them all. I have always said, that if the gun is too nice to carry in the field then it is too nice for me!

(I swear I really do have a Fox question) This week I finally found a Fox that was in my price range. So I made it mine. Early A-grade serial#108XX, 12b, 28" barrels M/I (ring true) and no pitting in or out, Barrels have spots with very little/no blueing, but no dents or dings. Rec. has traces of CC, but mostly shiny finish with standard early grade engraving. Wood is good with really nice checkering BUT someone has added a 1" piece of wood to the end of the buttstock to add about an inch to the LOP. This is what made the gun "in my price range". That's fine with me as I am going to use a laceup slip on pad to cover the extension and just make it a hunting gun fo me. My question is regarding the checkering. Right behind the receiver is a raised gold diamond in the middle of the checkering pattern. I've never seen this on any other guns pictured on this site or any that are for sale on the various sites. Does that mean the stock may not be original? Sure looks original and matching to my untrained eye. Is it worth restocking with a modern dimension stock since it's not a collector gun? Or put the lace up on it and see what I can hit? I only paid $400 for the gun so I could afford to re-blue the barrels and replace the wood and still not be up-side down in the gun. Opinions please and thank you in advance.

If I'm reading it right, the gold diamond may well be brass covering a repair behind the head of the stock. Or it could be solid brass through and through, as a repair. If the looks don't bother you or affect function of the gun, I'd bang away with it for a while and see how it holds up. $400 is a pretty good buy on a working gun. Welcome to the wonderful world of Fox guns.

FC 16- I'm sorry about not being clear. The diamond is just cut into the wood, like the checkering. It's not made of any type of metal and I don't believe it's there to cover anything up. Maybe this stock is a replacement allready. This must not have been something that Fox used in their checkering pattern. How do you check for original wood? Letter from Mr. Callahan?

The diamond inlay may be covering a bolt to reinforce a split stock. Check it out with a magnifier to see if there are any fine cracks or splits. If you don't see any it might be that the inlay is purely decorative. If its cut isn't too deep a good stock man might be able to remove the inlay, reshape the wrist and recut the checkering to look close to original. The stock extension could be removed as well. You didn't say if the gun has a recoil pad but if not, a repro vintage pad could be added to extend the LOP and still look decent. Good restocking is fairly expensive and if you restock you'll probably want to redo the forend, barrels, trigger guard, etc. so the new stock doesn't stick out like a sore thumb. It really boils down to how much $ you want spend. I'd suggest trying the gun first to see how you hit with it. Target shooters usually want higher stocks than hunters; it really depends on what you shoot at most and how you want to see the target over the barrels Silvers

ironman, if that checkering is on the cheek(directly behind the action) I'd be suspect of a crack and/or a repair. A grades are not usually checkered there from the factory. However, it is often done later on to cover up a repair. In any case, if it is sound, I wouldn't let it worry me.