doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Belguim Guild Gun - Thoughts

Rocketman's well researched pricing analysis goes a long way to answering both the why and the how much of this discussion.

We live in a world where brand name has value. Anyone involved in consumer products understands that. Rocketman has tried to quantify that value in the specific area of our interest, older double guns.

Brand name is consumer shorthand for quality level, sometimes accurate and sometimes not.

But the net effect in the marketplace is if you are concerned about resale, include brand name in your calculation. If you are only concerned about product quality, do your research and form a conclusion about the specific item.

This subject begs the question for each of us. Why do we buy or collect the guns we do? For monetary gain? For monetary security? For status? For use? For personal satisfaction? The answers will be different for each of us, but the answers are a good guide for considering brand value....for guns and for anything else.

We hunt and kill because we want to go back, consciously or otherwise, to a time when we went to woods and water for food. The guns we carried were simpler, too, no clickety-clacks and push-button scope rangefinders, just doubles for feathers generally. Why else old hardware store guns in our pantheon of the greats? They're what our forefathers used, not Purdeys or A&Ns. I'm sort of a dinosaur compared to most others in my community, beating myself up roughing it when there are more comfortable and productive things to do. Looking around, when I'm gone before too long most of this will be, too. Our disappearance will be reflected upon as were the dinosaurs.

Guys,

I have a question. That BSS I mentioned earlier has side plates. I understand that the Browning Side locks (and box locks) were made in Japan, except for the high grade side locks that were made in Belgium.

Were would a side plated and heavily engraved BSS box lock have been made?

Not enough covering the top of my head to speak off it, Joe. I need to save what little covering I have left!

Let's see . . . I currently own a Lebeau-Courally and a Thonon. Have owned a few Francottes, although without checking my records to verify, I think a 25E was probably the highest grade. Couple Belgian-made Charles Daly OU's, likely by Masquelier from what I've read. Couple Centaures. Plus miscellaneous more basic guns from people like Manufacture Liegeoise and Fabriques d'Armes Unies. And at least a couple no-namers.

How about you, Joe? You surprised me (and probably a lot of folks) with some actual substance on a Scott thread. You have anything of substance to contribute here??

RCC, all the BSS I'm aware of were made by Miroku in Japan. I've never heard of a side plated BSS, unless maybe you were looking at a BSS Sidelock. They had a fair amount of engraving. Mostly scroll, although a few were game scene engraved.

I'm looking at a Masquelier from the 60's for about 1/3 of cost of the gun that started this thread. It looks darn near new. There is not a lot of information about this maker out there, other than that the quality can be on par with Francotte.

Anybody out there have first hand knowledge they would like to share about this Belgian maker?

I took a good look at this 20 ga. Masqualier at Robin Hollow a few months ago.
Masquelier

The gun was made in the 60s and seemed fairly well finished, and it handled nicely, even with the BTFE. I was looking for a Brit game gun so the BTFE and PG (and the price) killed any interest I was developing. From I what I came across, the BTFE and PG are standard on these more recent Masqueliers - not sure if that was an American market thing or not.

Here is a bit more.
http://www.littlegun.be/arme%20belge/artisans%20identifies%20ma/a%20masquelier%20gb.htm

The Masquelier name has been tied to Britte
http://www.doublegunshop.com/forums/ubbt...h=true#Post6342

Pete

Thanks, but I saw all of that in my preliminary search. Anybody have any hard data about models, American imports, quality of construction, etc...

Any lemons, reliability, things to be wary of?

I won't claim to have scoured the earth for an answer, but I came across nothing when I was asking the same questions that indicated any significant issues with Masqueliers.