doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Charles Daly hammer gun opinions/info?

Mark,

I disagree with Joe's assessment. This isn't some Belgian clunker that retailed for $10 in a hardware store someplace. If you pull those locks, you'll see the craftsmanship that originally went into this gun.

The critical piece here is the barrels. Some of the old Daly hammerguns are absolute tanks when it comes to the barrel wall thickness. The barrels may be able to be safely cleaned up. Again, it all depends on how deep the pits are and how much barrel thickness you are working with and where that thickness is. Removing barrel metal isn't going to make the gun stronger, but sometimes the aesthetics can be improved with just a couple of thousandth of an inch honing. If the pits are really deep, I'd cut my losses.

I've seen your skill on the woodwork. I would bet that stock cleans up very nicely. The gun can be put back on face for a couple hundred bucks. The barrels are the big question. I would make for a pretty cool project. If you are trying to make a quick profit and that is the only motive, this may not be the best candidate, but it is not look this is some dog that would be only worth $200 when you were done.

In regard to the gun itself. Forget the "empire" and "superior" quality grade terms. Those terms don't show up until circa-1930. Charles Daly brand owner Schoverling, Daly, and Gales (SD&G) sold their guns by model number. In the 1880s, SD&G introduced the "diamond quality" designation or quality grade. Originally, this term applied to one hammerless and one hammergun model. However, twenty years later, "diamond quality" was an umbrella designation used on five separate hammerless shotgun models alone. There is a big difference between a Daly model 225 "diamond quality" shotgun and a Daly model 375 "diamond quality" shotgun. Both are "diamond quality" guns, but there is a big difference in their level of embellishment AND a big difference in their retail price. Period SD&G catalogs lay this out pretty clearly. The Blue Book is no help here as it perpetuates the incorrect idea that SD&G used the "empire/superior/diamond/regent diamond quality" terminology throughout their production run.

I'm away from my research material so I can't look up the likely model number of your hammer gun yet, but I will take a look. What type of markings are on the action and barrel flats?

Ken