I picked up an early Ithaca Crass grade 2 NE in 10 bore recently. The gun is in pretty nice shape other than the forend which is a working replacement. By that I mean someone found a forend that almost fit and fixed it to the gun by drilling and tapping a hole into the for end lug. It works so I'm not knocking it, but I would like to make it more "as original". The current for end has no latch and the only metal on it is where it joins the action. The way I see it I have 3 options:
1) Find a 10 ga. forend for the same model/era of gun. Probably unlikely.
2) Fit a 12 ga. for end of the same model/era of gun. I don't know what the dimensions are 12 -vs- 10 where the for end iron meets the action. I'm doubtful they are the same. That would be too easy.
3) Weld the latching bar off of a 12 ga. for end to the current forend metal and fit the lot to the gun.
I know that with the money currently spent on the gun itself I will shortly have more into the gun than it will ever be worth. I'm ok with that. Frankly I've never ben an Ithaca fan but this old gun really spoke to me.
Thanks
Nick
