doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com First Model 21?

I�m starting a search for an American-made SxS for pass shooting doves, the occasional ducks and moderate amounts of clay shooting. The Model 21 is high on my list and specifically a 30� barrelled version with a straight stock and BTFE. I�d prefer fixed chokes but am not completely opposed to choke tubes. As much as I�d like a little engraving, it�s not likely the budget will support it. As a shooter, originality is not required.

I am new to Model 21s and was hoping for a bit of a crash course from the members. Are there certain eras or serial number ranges to avoid or pursue? Any common issues or repairs to be aware of? What would be the current rate for such a gun? I�ve found two in the desired configuration for $5k+/-.

Thanks in advance.

Anyone who puts choke tubes in a Model 21 needs to be horse whipped.
Just sayin'.

Since same profile barrels were used for both 2&3/4 and 3" chambered guns I would look for gun with longer factory chambers called Duck grade and later Magnum grade. There are couple of benefits to this firstly resale value secondly it will have longer barrels and chokes will likely be on tighter side leaving room for opening per your personal requirements. Prior to buying one I would get to understand patent 1797320 as you want gun with some room left for due to wear. I hope that helps.

Anyone who even thinks about putting choke tubes in a Model 21 needs to be horse whipped.

Choke tubes are pain in ass and not really needed unless one wants one shotgun for deer hunting, small upland game and turkey hunting. For that there is special gun called a Drilling. What I find shocking good used sample can be had for $2500 to $6000 just like they were 30 years ago. By good sample I mean one of sensible weight with rifle barrel for which ammo is commercially available.

That's what I found. They start around $4,999.00 in 12 gauge and go up from there. I couldn't find anything local but on the internet saw a beater at $3,999.00 and it didn't last long. I've concluded that there are no bargains out there in Model 21s.

You want a Model 21 you're going to pay for a Model 21.

That in itself should tell you something right there.

There are a lot of 21's out there. Be patient and look at as many as you can. In other words don't buy the first one you find. I'd make a list of all the features you want in the gun. Then decide if some are deal breakers or just gravy. I'd like two triggers but others will go two or one just the same. If you are interested in BTFE make sure where it is attached has no play in it and the hanger must be secure. BTFE have been known to pull off under heavy use. Enjoy the search.

Briley thinwall chokes in a Model 21 12 ga. are just fine if you want to make it a versatile gun for hunting and clays. I once owned a no. 1 engraved trap 21 with 30" barrels that had Briley thinwalss in it, and it was one of the best shooters I've ever owned. One of the finest late winter dove hunts I've ever had was with that gun. The 21 collector I sold it to could not have cared less about the choke tube installation. Should have kept that gun, but the $2,000 profit I made on it looked pretty good at the time.

This is a really nice piece at Steve Barnett's that meets your criteria, and is priced right about where these guns are now. Steve will bargain, but cash speaks the loudest:
https://stevebarnettfineguns.com/winches...nt-rib-12-gauge
JR

Personal opinion here, but I'd scratch the engraving from the wish list. For the most part the factory patterns were pretty uninspired. It's not until you get to the very top end of the in-house engraving or nice custom work that it really begins to look good.

Ive got a beautiful double trigger, splinter forend mdl 21 I'd sell for $3000. Factory 28 in choked cyl/mod as marked on the barrels.

I've had a lingering case of Model 21 wantitis myself, and I've successfully warded off that virus by owning a couple of Sears and Roebuck imported, AyA made, J.C. Higgins Model 100 shotguns, and the pair didn't cost a thousand dollars.

The AyA J.C. Higgins Model 100's sold in the 1954 Sears Wish Book for $125 as "Sears Best", and on the same page the Model 21 Winchester was listed for $295.

The Model 100's mostly came in 12 gauge with 28 inch, slow rust blued, chopper lump barrels, choked modified and full, with a non selective single trigger. They aren't a Model 21, but they resemble one, and it was Sear's attempt to market a half price Model 21 replica. They are certainly, a very high quality shotgun that scratches my Model 21 itch for very little money invested.

If you are interested, search Gunbroker and the other auction sites for J.C. Higgins Model 100 that looks like a flatside Model 21 Winchester. Sears imported a lot of Spanish guns, but only that one, is a high quality Model 21 "homage" gun.

Sometimes you see them mistakenly listed as Matadors, but they aren't. The Model 100's were made to a very high standard, had firing tips in the hammer noses, beautifully made and finished barrels, horn buttplates, and were top notch guns.

And if you don't like a Model 100, it's not hard to move one down the road to somebody that does.

Hope this helps.

Nobody who ever had an itch to own an AC Cobra was satisfied with the purchase of a Ford Focus.

Two barrel set, covers all your bases.

https://www.gunbroker.com/item/736781699

There you go bud, there's your Model 21. I wish I could have found a deal like that locally. I would have jumped all over it.

He wants a 30" barreled gun. Not everyone understands why that is so important to some of us.

SRH

He's going to run right into a bad case of sticker shock.

To some of us who know what we want, we'd rather have nothing than have something that's not right, regardless the price.

I can't see too bad sticker shock with a screw choked 32" M21. Remember, he said he was okay with choke tubes, even though he was somewhat ridiculed for it. If choke tubes are that bad in a 21, it ought to lower the price a good bit, eh?

SRH

They are out there, you might want to check out the upcoming auction houses. I just picked up a nice circa 1948, 30" barrel, ejector gun, for $1,700.00 hammer price. About $2,050.00, delivered to my FFL. I'll post a photo when I get back form the Vegas gun show.

I agree, yes it would lower the price. I might have gotten discouraged a little to soon looking for one of these things at a decent price.

I just hope he has better luck than I did.

I have no idea what a good price is. I guess it would depend on whether I was a buyer or seller.

But here is one that sold recently. Only measly 28" barrels oan a12 gauge though.

https://auctions.thegunrunner.com/lots/v...28-barrels-1932

That�s an extractor gun. In other words, NO ejectors. That�s why it�s only $2500. They go for a lot less money than Model 21 Winchester shotguns with ejectors. You can count on the fact that they are a whole lot less. But, if I were looking for a shooter.......and didn�t care about ejectors...

I don't know the values of these at all. I'm ambivalent about ejectors. Never had an ejector gun actually.

My shotgun season is done, so I'm just looking around at "stuff" to tide me over 'til turkey season.

Looks like a boat anchor compared to mine. Might have to raise my price if someone is willing to pay for that gun.

Let me pitch the AyA Model 100 alternative, just a bit more.

The Model 100s had selective ejectors, a beaver tail forend, and were finished inside and out, like a Swiss watch.

When I shoot one of my Model 100's at a sporting clays range, it's quite often somebody comes up and complements my nice Model 21 Winchester. From a few feet away, they look like a Model 21 flatside, only with dark, European walnut stocks and forends.

For just a few years in the middle 50's, Sears imported and branded FN Mausers as JC Higgins and the Model 100's from AyA, and offered elaborately hand engraved High Standard pump and automatic shotguns, as Imperial grades.

The Model 100's aren't flat out copies of a Model 21, but you can tell that Sears aimed the Model 100 straight at the Model 21 buyers that wouldn't, or couldn't, justify $300 for a Model 21. Money was worth about ten times what it is today. The Model 100's weren't cheap, and the Model 21's were very expensive.

A wise seller, knows what an AyA Model 100 is, and they keep it, or price it near a thousand dollars. The trick is to find a seller that thinks he's selling a Sears and Roebuck branded Matador, and you'll buy them for three or four hundred bucks.

Like a lot of "Wish Book" guns, you can often find a J.C. Higgins Model 100 that looks like it was opened by dear old Dad on his last Christmas, shot a few times, and then stayed in the family until the ungrateful grandchildren sold it because it didn't have choke tubes.

It's not a Model 21, anymore than a real A.C. Cobra is one of those replicas that cost a tenth of the real thing.

But it sure ain't no Matador, either.

They were solid, well built, nice double guns that anyone should be proud to own.

Take your time and search. There will be one out there for you

Someone IS willing to pay that plus a 10% hammer price, plus shipping and FFL fees for that gun.

Post some pictures. I'd like to see what it looks like for reference. Prices seem to be all over the place for some vintage firearms, esp. double shotguns, and rock steady for others (Alphabet Marlin 39a's for example).

As 992B said might be worthwhile to look for one of them J.C. Higgins 100s made for Sears Roebuck & Co. One in excellent condition depending on gauge will set back about $600 to $800. The metal polish bluing is excellent with finely checkered walnut of good density and figure. The butt plate and grip caps were bovine horn. One has to hold and examine one to fully appreciate what is there. I'm not sure how much better Model 21 field grade is but the price indicates 5x to 6x better which it proly isn't.

What is so hard to understand about "American made", 30" barrels, with a preference for the 21?

JM, you are so quick to always suggest something other than what the OP asks about. You have such a vast knowledge of doubleguns that you've reached the highest pinnacle of an armchair expert. You don't own or shoot them! Why don't you just use that storehouse of gun trivia to answer the OP's question, instead of diverting it with an attempt to change his mind. Do you look down at everyone's ability to know what they want that much?

To everyone else, sorry for the rant ..............I'm just tired of that crap.

SRH

Ok, Coach or Salvadore Ferragamo is not Gucci. Model 21 30" or 32" barrels with 3" chambers F-F would be nice to own. The F-F would be great because one could change that combo to individuals needs.

If you want to depreciate the value of a vintage Model 21, just go ahead and jack with the original chokes.

He said as a shooter, originality not required. I modify for you by saying nice 30" or 32" 3" gun with signs of field use and nice functional vented recoil pad. Does that help? As I said F-F would be preferred because it would leave room for choke alteration in each tube. This is like buying suit off rack at better clothier where pants were left long so they could be shortened by in-house taylor. I used Spector's when I lived in Albany NY.

If you are catering to the collector's value limitations based on originality, you are not going to get much use or enjoyment out of your Model 21. If you buy a Model 21 to put in the safe, pull out on occasion to admire and roll around in your hands or show off to someone who you're trying to impress with your savvy collecting prowess,by all means protect its originality with your last breath.

No one who wants a 21 to use and enjoy should hack it up in some weird way, but altering impossibly tight chokes or having Briley Thinwalls installed to suit your game is not a crime in my book. What would be a crime would be having said work done by some curmudgeon "gunsmith" that botches everything he touches.
JR

Choke tubes or intentionally modifying the factory chokes in a mdl 21 is a crime. Want choke tubes, buy an RBL.

Why?
JR

Crime against your wallet. Of course it makes the 5 I own worth more.

We all have shotguns, already. We probably have so many shotguns, that we'd have to pause to remember how many we own.

The five thousand dollars a nice Model 21 with ejectors, beaver tail forend, and a single trigger costs, buys a very nice American made shotgun, but after you'd take it home and the new wore off the thing, it wouldn't shoot or be any better shotgun than a Model 12 Winchester that can be bought for five hundred dollars.

The nicest AyA Model 100 in existence, still in the box with the wrappings and bows from Christmas 1954, probably won't bring a thousand dollars. My two cost under four hundred dollars, each, and are very nice shotguns.

In the 1954 Sears Wish Book, the AyA Model 100 cost more than a field grade Model 12 Winchester.

The Model 100's were an excellent value in 1954 because of favorable exchange rates with Spain, cheap Spanish labor, volume buying power of Sears, protective minimum pricing practices of Winchester, and Sears' determination to market some flagship firearms like the FN Mausers and AyA shotguns as "halo" products to sell cheaper firearms.

They were a little less than half the price of a Model 21 in 1954, but they were closer to the Model 21 for quality and features, than the price difference.

Today, the Model 100's are five to ten times cheaper, and are a better value now, than sixty some years ago.

If you are in the notion you want a Model 21, if you try the Model 100 first, you may get out of the notion, or postpone the purchase.

At least, if I send one of my Model 100's off to Mike Orlen to turn it into a skeet gun, I've not depreciated the gun.

Shotguns are for shooting, the way I see it.

If you like the Model 100 enough, then you can always sell it for about what you paid for it, and spend five or ten times more for what's basically the same type of gun, that was made in New Haven, Connecticut, and has dovetailed chopper lump barrels, instead of merely chopper lump barrels.

And Sears didn't shoot two thousand blue pill proof loads through their Model 100 AyA's either.

What are you, the field rep for the JC Higguns mdl 100? Give it a rest for sake. I'm starting to think you and Jaeger might be one and the same.

Amen.
JR

JR, Im done too. This one is so far off topic even Im starting to think I need a mdl 100. Too bad its so hard to post pics, me and you could start a show and tell thread. JW

Said who? Where have they proven themselves? There are more than a few here who have subjected their Model 21s to all sorts of high volume shooting without any problems. I can't remember anyone here ever mentioning the same about a AyA Model 100.

For the average day out hunting, ok. So? A lot of shotguns can do that.

No, we know he and Jagermeister are not one and the same because he owns at least one double shotgun... unlike Jagermeister who owns zero double shotguns and acts like an expert on guns he has zero actual experience with.

Of course, this is the same connoisseur who talks about Rolex watches, Gucci shoes, and tailor made suits... yet gets all stressed out over the price of a box of .410 shotshells. In other words, just another internet poseur and loser with a pathetic need to be somebody or something which he clearly is not.

Production of less than 30,000 originals,
Survivors, who knows?
Couple of hundred thousand Parker�s made, ruin those if you must.

992B,

We get it. Model 100 shooters are missionaries even among the Spanish gun shooters. You just want to hear somebody say you're right. OK. I think all your information is prett much on the mark.

Apparently the only reason AYA quit making them is that they realized the Mod.100 cost too much to produce.

However the big problem is,I've never heard of one with barrels longer than 28 inches. If they had 30 or 32 inch barrels several fellows here would probably already have one.

How does it "ruin" a Model 21 to open the chokes or install Briley Thinwalls?. Straight answer please.
JR

Take the $500 you'd spend on Briley's and buy spreader loads.
Shoot those, all the while learning how to center your target and
you can leave your Model 21 barrels unmolested as God had intended.
Problem solved.

Spreaders kick like hell. I've made it to AA Class in the NSCA, so I guess I've learned somewhat how to "center my target", Bob.

But you've yet to answer my question, which I suspicioned would be the case. Rest assured, The Almighty couldn't care less.

Where's the "problem"?
JR

I'll / I've put my "money where my mouth is".
I wouldn't own a 21 with Molested barrels.



These guns were made in America by Americans for Americans.
Screw in chokes in a Model 21 is just downright un-American!

There you go John, a collector that said he wouldn't touch one that was altered. So if you alter it you just eliminated a lot of collectors willing to spend money. I wouldn't risk it.

Damn, I love that 28 gauge of yours!!!

So I guess we can all agree,
Model 21's are a gift from the Almighty himself
and only a Commie would molest the chokes.
'Nuff said.

MGSPlzzy......get a Winchester 21; you won't regret it, especially for the purposes you outlined....use Bismuth for ducks and light loads for doves and sporting clays. Don't worry about F&F chokes; as one of the greatest shotgunners ever told me..."you're either on 'em, or you ain't" - Robert (Uncle Bob)Brister
But I warn you....getting a 21 is like eating potato chips; you won't stop with just one. I convinced my long time shooting buddy to get a no. 5 engraved VR trap gun with 32" barrels for pigeon shooting....he now owns 30 Winchester model 21's. Another 4 have passed through my door since this pic was taken. BTW - get a copy of Schwing's book on the Winchester 21 for a reference if you seriously start looking at them. Best of luck.

Not really, Bob, they're just shotguns, not the Holy Grail. You obviously think differently. Must be lonely in that ivory tower.

And I knew my question wouldn't be answered. Good luck with your collecting those precious "unmolested" Model 21's.
JR

Is that supposed to matter? If I bought a 12 gauge Model 21 to shoot and enjoy at clays and game, I could not give a lesser frig about what the collector crowd wants. You think Bob's position is all there is when it comes to 21 owners? What's more, they're STILL BEING MADE in New Britain, CT.

I'm through with this tarbaby.
JR

I wrote "collector" because it was easier to write that than "people who buy Model 21s" all the time. They're expensive and there is only so many people out there willing to pay the cost and most like their Model 21s 'in original Factory condition.'

Look at the Lefever collectors or Parker collectors or LC Smith collectors, Colt collectors, they're all the same and they all like their guns in 'original factory condition.'

I�m pretty sure President Trump said tarbaby right before he said shit hole.

Can't let that go unanswered, because that's a pretty far-fetched wild a$$ assumption, Bob. But here's something that might help you understand where I'm coming from:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tar-Baby

Worth mentioning and an fyi before I go: I only base my opinion on this subject based on standard, un-engraved field-grade 12 ga. Model 21's, not small-bores or Grand Americans, or important guns of former notable owners with provenance that are sought after strictly because of rarity or uniqueness.

Now then, I'm done with this tarbaby.
JR

John,

Years ago I had a conversation with the only gunsmith to come from this area who had a national reputation. At the time he was installing screw in chokes. He told me never put screw in chokes in a good gun, because sooner or later those threads are going to crack. He said everybody even Briley. I know it's easy to say that technology has changed and improved and things can be repaired.

The other side of the coin is that most people who buy a Model 21 just do it for the Winchester name. They have more money than they need or know what to do with. When something goes bad they just buy a new one. It's hard to argue with Deep Pockets.

All, thanks to those who provided constructive feedback. Apologies for the delay, I was offline a few days dealing with an unexpected death in the family.

I appreciate the offers on other 21s but none are quite the configuration I�m looking for. Like Stan said, my heart is set on 30� barrels. I did locate a 3� F/F gun but I need something a little more versatile choke-wise. I feel it would only be a matter of time before I�d want them opened. I will brush up on the patent and get a copy of Schwing�s book.

Some really nice 21s posted! Looking forward to �wasting� my money on one.