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After re-reading the article in an older Double Gun Journal about The Meriden Firearms Company's Aubrey shotgun several weeks ago, what should appear to my wondering eyes yesterday but an Aubrey shotgun. Until reading this piece I had never even heard of such a gun.
A friend of mine has some sort of miraculous ability: neat old guns seem to launch themselves out of forgotten closets into his hands. He just picked up this Aubrey (and a Winchester .30WCH lever gun, and a POS American Arms double) for less than $500 last week.
The point of this post is the Aubrey gun: it is covered in some sort of sticky black gunk and so is difficult to properly describe. It is a 12 gauge, appears to have nice damascus barrels of good pattern and thickness, has some barrel pitting, some decent engraving (flying bowling ball type) and seems to have a pretty nice piece of lumber on it. The stock is cracked through at the wrist, although nothing that couldn't be easily repaired. It has one of those pull off fore ends. A fair amount of nicks and dings on the wood, but nothing really on the barrels or action.
I have no idea at all of any value of this gun, but it does appear that it could be a nice shooter if the owner so chooses. So my proposed actions are aimed at re-making the gun into a shooter, with the appropriate ammo.

Any thoughts, suggestions or comments? Actions to be taken?

At this point my next action is to suggest that we set up an appointment with Kirk Merrington to get his thoughts and potentially get him to do a strip & clean, check & repair the action, re-brown the damascus, hone down the worst of the pits, clean the wood and do a through the wrist screw and acgraglass repair ???

No?? Yes??? What??

Thanks very much for any input.

Too much expense for too little result. Not every old shotgun can be made "new" at a reasonable price. Sorry.

Bill is correct. It is at best a parts gun. Now find one in good shape and enjoy it.

Pete

"some sort of sticky black gunk"

Sounds like Cosmoline......

Yes, they are both correct! But in doing what your thinking also keeps our Economy going so Make it your own if you have the means. There is something about enjoying (and saving) a piece of our history no matter what the cost if the cost is not as important as the final result. I have a nice old Meteor shot gun that I spent some cash on to put in 16ga inserts because I didn't want to take the chance to shoot 10ga in it because of the Damascus barrels. The inserts cost about $400 for the pair but with every pull I almost enjoy it that much. Although it may also be that they used a Meteor shotgun at the OK corral a few years ago. Enjoy!!

If you look at everything from an investment & return angle only,,it's not going to be worth the investment.

But the idea of just plain enjoying an older firearm and maybe also the enjoyment of bringing one back from the edge is sometimes over looked.
It is a hobby after all to most people. The money could be spent on many different ventures and hobbys that'll never bring you any plus monetary return either but instead bring enjoyment.
That's what it's supposed to be about.

I have a Meriden Single Bbl hammerless damascus that I'm restoring (slowly). It'll never be worth anything much, but it's a neat, seldom seen gun and I like it. So what's wrong with those reasons.

Nah, it's not cosmoline; I know that is. The gun was stored in the back of some closet in south Texas for xxx years. No rust; it's dry here and it was not wrapped up. You can rub it off with your fingers.

my heart does a little flip flop when I hear about meridian doubles!that was the very first double I ever had 40 yrs ago!
personally I would get action cleaned up and fix the wrist with acgraglass,thats what I did to mine many yrs ago .eventually I had briley 20 ga tubes put in it ruined balance of whole thing.i showed to the previous owner aftr I had it all fixed up ,thinking he would get a kick out of seeing resurrected(he was in 80 s by then and had owned for 60 yrs)his comment was ,sure putting a lot of money in that old gun!but as was stated before its a hobby not an investment,i wouldn't trade mine .the old guy is gone now n I have his legacy !

Well, its not my gun. It does seem a real shame to me not to fix the old girl up and take her to the dance again. The basic gun looks to me to be in fairly good shape: action, barrels. The wood, "as through a glass darkly" gives some promise of being nice as well. As do the barrels. Although damascus and pitted, they are plenty thick and I couldn't find any major dents or bulges.

Just the gunk and the broken wrist and I am sure 80 years of built up crud inside the action/locks. Pins are all there, screws are not buggered.

You know that Double Gun Journal article said around 75,000 Aubrey guns were made, but no more than 200 had been "located". This one might look, if it were cleaned up, like that D model pictured in the article. At least the engraving does. Forend is different.

Ah well, who knows?

The model # should be on the receiver. A Model 18 with 30" steel barrels



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