doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com What’s this neglected Darne worth?

That gun was proofed with powder S, and is almost certainly pre 1900, and, likely pre 1898. It is the 1894 patent version of the R model, nice enough design, but, way past it's prime. The grade marks are the old style, not seen regularly because they are very old. It was, at one time, a very nice gun. Myself, I'd use it as a wall hanger AFTER I recovered the main spring and the ejector hooks (the only parts that break with a bit of regularity on a Darne R model) but, it would be on a wall in my garage-not my house. And, I've got a crummy house.

Best,
Ted

viva la france!

Few guns decline to have a negative value. This is one. Sad and sorry looking gun. Not a wall hanger, more like a tomato stake. Why waste time and money in trying to fix or restore this gun? You need to say when a gun has been abused enough and this gun has reached the end. Unless you were stuck fixing this gun up to save your life in some TV reality show, leave it as is and where it is.

Ed Good=Troll

Thank you all very much for your comments.

And I agree, it is too far gone to even try to make it look respectable again.

The bores looked very dirty but did not see any serious pits. But dirty enough that pits could well be present. The outside of the barrels do have some serious pitting however.

I will let the owner know what he has: a pathetic example of what used to be a very fine shotgun and its value is near zero (0).

And thanks again for your comments.

Jolly

I beat snakes to death with nicer guns!

John Boyd

This gun could be an Ed challenge

Tent stake IMO. PS. Make sure it's a tent made in France.

There was a guy on another forum looking for a junker double to use as a fire poker at his camp. This one may have a use yet! LOL!!

Ponder this-
Ted frequently remarks about Darnes (I have none) having very heavy barrels in order to manage balance and recoil.
If a person had an interest, these barrels might be excellent for learning to strike, and actually might be useable.
Secondarily, the stock would need to be replaced. Most would say it was not worth the money, and that all sliding breech shotguns are a bear to restock. Robert Chambers claimed vociferously, and ..amusingly, that they were not that hard to restock,and that he had done it economically. I think he even gave an inletted stock to someone.

So, purely for discussion, and in the interest of adding to the great pile of incomplete, clapped out, shotgun projects in the universe we share, I would have to say that if there was enough wall thickness, it might be made serviceable. I don't know why anyone would want to expend that much file time to create a field grade Darne, but heck, there's a black guy in the whitehouse, and he isn't the cook.
I don't know why anyone would want to, but as a learning tool, if the wall thickness was as Ted has described, it would have plenty of meat to file.