doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion Classic & Custom Single Barreled Sporting Rifles @ doublegunshop.com Schlegelmilch Mauser

Steven:

I too would very much like a book on marks with definitions but evidently once the product was out the door the manufacture didn't think anyone would be interested in the info on the initials. I've seen the "E.W." before and need to make some more comparisions. If the "480" wasn't on the tube, I might guess that ole Rob. purchased the reciever in the white from Mauser and purchased the tube in the rough from Sauer and made the barrel. Circa 1890, Sauer had a monopoly on Krupp tubes and if yours had the Krupp ring stamps, it still might be the case that Sauer made the tube in the rough and "E.W." did the fine work. The more I dig about the marks, the deeper the pit of marks becomes. It's akin to digging in sand or quicksand. It is interesting that around the mines and areas of raw materials that they gun making centers developed. For quality control of early Prussian military longarms you see many inhouse and crowned inspectors marks in fraktur or gothic script along with the proof eagles of Beschussadler neuer Art for post 1813 and pre-1891/1893 marks that are found on Dreyse and Mauser-Dreyse models. The crowned gothic script inspectors marks may be from earlier French occupation. Early all most of the weapons were produced at government arsenals at Danzig, Erfurt, Spandau and Amberg(Bavarian Arsenal) with support of private contractors like Greenwood & Batley Limited(Leeds), C.G. Haenel(Suhl), Mauser of course, Osterreichishch Waffen.(Steyr), National Arms & Ammunition Company Limited(Birmingham), Sp. & Sr.(Spangenberg & Sauer-Suhl) and V.C. Schilliing(Suhl). Erfurt is the result of Essen's rifle makers moving first to Saar in the Ruhr circa 1840 and on to Erfurt. Essen is where you'll find Krupp and the Krupp folk could also have been weapons makers before going totally to steel. Spandau was established in 1855 as a result of the Potsdam facility, which was founded in 1722, moving to Spandau. And of course the earlier unknown Peter Paul Mauser worked at the Wurttembert Government Arsenal/Armoury at Oberndorf. Having the employee records as well as subcontractor info would be of great benefit but it looks as if we'll just have to continue to guess and be awe struck by the puzzles.

I got on a tangent but was meaning to note that Mauser, Sauer, Simson, etc. had their own inhouse marks prior to the establishment of proofhouses circa 1890. I can't say if the same eagle proof mark had the same meaning or if there was some guy hired to spend a week a month at each facility administering the same stamp. The early stamps on the underside of the tubes ahead of the flats are quite interesting. On some Sauer longarms there is a lower case gothic "g" beside a gothic "K" and then a "H". The "g" could also be an upper case G atop a lower case and might stand for Gesetz Geschutz or registered design. I'm curious if the early pattern welded tubes utilized Krupp iron & steel thus the gothic script "K". According to W. von Menges, barrels on the German rifle Model 1849 had "Barrel browned, octagonal to the sight, then conical to the muzzle." Then later the barrels were polished instead of browned to show the slightest amount of oxidation so that they would be maintained. So would browned have the same definition as we know it today? The word "STAHL" atop the barrel in front of the receiver didn't appear to circa 1860-1870.

Kind Regards,

Raimey
rse

Steve, from time to time one of the 1950s Flaig sporters with a fancy barrel shows up at an auction house or a gun show, in an American calibre, usually an '06, .270 or .257. The Flaig stocks are quite undistinguished and the guns usually go for under a thousand bucks, sometimes well under. For anyone interested it is worth throwing the stock away and keeping the fancy barrel and the good FN commercial action it is most often screwed into.

I'd be interested to see what anyone can make of these marks from a WWII bring back that a friend gave me. I've been curious as to what model 98 action they started with. Obviously a military, could it be post war?




The gun has no marks other than someones name written in ink in the barrel channel.

That's a very nice rifle Rob, and here is the Rob. Schlegelmilch returned. Wouldn't say it was restored, or refinished, more like refurbished. There was one crack behind the tang, more of a wood stress crack than recoil caused, so I installed a dutchman with aproximate grain match. As you can see, the wood was very dark in this area.



I don't like to strip stocks but soaked this one to raise (some) dents, lightly sanded the stock, didn't try to get all of th blemishes out, some were quite deep. Finished the wood with (Herter's) French Red stock Filler and top coated with boiled linseed, which I very rarely use. Had to reinlet everything after bathtub soak and then re-cut the checkering.



It was quite a chore getting around the back of the 'bag' grip, but that's the way I like to checker my own stocks. Re-cutting the narrow borders was a bit dicy, and mostly done with a V gouge.



I cleaned all of the metalwork, re-rust blued the barrel without removing all of the dings, and heat blued many or the small parts withour complete repolishing.



The rifle has all the feaures: 25" oct/round ribbed barrel, short keyed uncheckered forend with schnable, paneled stock, checkered horn buttplate (now filled worm holes), semi unusual round knob pistol grip, color case hardened action and bottom metal with lever release (unhinged) floorplate, double set triggers and nicely shaped and proportioned cheekpiece.


The Only thing that had been 'gunsmithed' was the folding-leaf rear sight (which I think is installed backward but the matted surface in to the front this way and the witness mark aligns) The bolt may have been replaced as it's numbers don't match (all match on the bolt and all on the action, just not each other).



I built a similarly styled small ring Mauser in gunsmithing school in 7x57, and a Krag with this type of stock , but never owned an original. I'm quite pleased to own this one.



It has cast-off and toe-out in the stock and I've now got to come up with some ammo to shoot it.



It's a .318 bore, but my buddy Tim has dies, and a swage die to squeeze .323. bullets to size. It's beem a lot of fun and along with this new board, I've renewed my enthusiasm for these old sporters.
Thanks, Steve

Nice work Steve, it's always nice to see these older sporters that need work have it done right. I've been thinking of starting a thread on restoration work. Terry found a G&H at a auction that had been buffed until all the holes were dished out,the corners all rounded off then hot blued. The stock had something sticky (true-oil??) which grew into little mounts of gooey dirt.

Thanks Mike, this one was relatively easy in the grand scheme of things. I've done some, in the past when I had more energy and enthusiasm, that were badly buffed and heavily sanded. The hours seem to drag on forever with those jobs.

Steven,
You might find this thread of interest
http://www.doublegunshop.com/forums/ubbt...=true#Post72047

Thanks much Story, do you know of any connection betweeen Ernst and Rob.?
I'm assuming the Mauser is pretty early for a M-98 from the proofs (?!?) and wonder if Rob is the elder?
Found anything further Recoil Rob?

No Steve, the marks on my gun are pretty sparse, I'm fairly certain no recognizable name was involved with my gun, I thought someone could tell me more about the origin of the action from those marks.

Rob

Thanks for checking in Rob, I just with I had some bullets to shoot this puppy! We have what is called a "B" tag in MT (second deer) and the SCI would take the meat for the underprivelaged.
But my Springfield sporter is sighted in!
Springfield-Mauser, springfield-mauser......
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