doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Why are Remingtons second class citizens?

Reasearcher ---- I have a 1894 in my hot little hands that will have to have a replacement top rib installed along with other repairs. My goal is to bring this ol girl back to life --- Lord do I love a challenge. Would you (when you have the time) forward me all the highest grade Rem. engraved pictures in your library ? I hope to somewhat duplicate the engraving once the new Eng stock is completed. This request also applies to anyone interested in helping me with this project gun. Many thanks guys,

Ken
kenhurst@suddenlink.net

In regards to engraving, to be fair; I’ve seen cheesy engraving on all American doubles. Some of the LC Smith engraving had to be done by a blind man. They all have good and bad.

Good commentary on Remington getting out of the double gun business. Perhaps because they didn’t stick it out?? It probably was a good move on their part dumping the doubles when they saw the writing on the wall.

I have an 1889 hammer gun and I think it’s a nice piece. Mine is plain with no engraving and decarbonized steel barrels. The stock is short and has a whole lot of drop, making the gun almost useless for me. I’m trying to learn how to stock doubles and once I learn, this gun is getting all new wood custom fit to me.

So, any other ideas whey Remington’s are second class citizens?

#1 - Remington never established any brand name pnash. They made fine shooting machines, but they just never aroused much emotion from their brand name. #2 - The SXS's are very "ordinary" designs; very little differentiation. #3 - they didn't make enough of the guns in enough grades. #4 - They didn't make the guns long enough. #5 - there is nothing really special about their quality.

The Remington 1894 is one of the best of the American damascus era.
In the looks dept., just put one up against a Ithaca damascus gun of the same period - and you'll see!
Remington's high grades are some of the very best, and the working grades are some of the very best also. Only 41,xxx made, so you had better get it now. I searched for well over a year for my AE.
They're not second "class citizens" by a long shot.

One very serious Remington collector who I know is of the strong opinion that Remington left the double business to concentrate on the repeater boom taking place. His thought was that they had a limited amount of room and could not afford to expand the plant to make both. They elected to go into the repeaters instead of staying with the doubles. From the point of history they were right to do so. One by one every maker left the double market, went under or both.

There were several fianacail depressions or panics during the late 1890 to 1910 period. Cheap imported doubles were taking the bottom market, several makers like Syracuse Arms and Lefever were strugging. "Fox" in one of the several different companies were in the same period. It was a tight market with no real upside.

Perhaps the buyer of the day made the his choice on price and quality and the Remington did not make the cut. If they are as great as we now declare why are there so few?
bill

Rocketman nailed it: marketing. Remington had very few vanity grades. Look at Parker. They had fewer field grades than vanity grades, if you start counting vanity grades at the DH. How many professional shooters used a Remington compared to Parker, LC Smith, etc? Remington got out because they (probably) really knew how much/little they made on a SXS, while Parker had only a rough idea. The strategic decision to get out of the SXS business was the correct one.

Prolly, they just didn't make that many.
Which brings us around to today..."why are they so few," makes them all the more interesting.
Ending-up in a St.Louis Hardware store is good enough for me and the local farmers.

The Remington Hammerless Doubles were made from 1894 thru the end of 1909 with some cleanup for the sale to N-S in early 1910. They made something like 98000+ K-Grades and 41000+ A to E Grades, so about 140000 doubles in a 15 year period. That is more then Lefever ever made, and certainly more then Parker Bros. made during that period, and more then Ithaca made during that period. That Remington abandoned the double gun market when they did probably prolonged the deaths of the other makers.

Interesting that they ended up with Parker though.