I recently purchased a pre model 36 chiefs special unfired from a gundealer buddy I have done a lot of business with. The firearm is in the orignal box with the cleaning rod and paperwork. The grips match the serial number and are perfect and there is no sign of being fired. Here is the kicker, the Smith and Wesson stamp on the barrel is weak on the ss in Wesson. Is this normal? I brought this up to the dealer and he told me a lot of Smiths from this time period (1955) had weak barrel logos. Is this true? I will try to post pictures as soon as possible. This is the only problem I see.

When they are building lots of guns they usually don't have time to check roll stampings for depth. I've seen many that had weak stampings and others that had rolled up(flowed) edges on the lines they were so deep. I wouldn't give it a second thought, weak stampings are not uncommon.

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Dick

Sounds like a great little gun. I have a sqare butt flat lacth pre-36 myself. Love it. It would be great to have one like that in the original box. I'd go for it. I've seen weak stampings on both Colt's and S&Ws. It's not that uncommon.

Roll stampings can be shallow or completely missing. S&W Historian, Roy Jinks says that S&W collectors put way too much emphasis on minute details. S&W was like any other company trying to get product out the door. As long as the gun fired and the stampings appeared to be there, the gun was shipped. Through the years, S&W mis labeled many things like the Model of 1955 barrels that are marked Model of 1950. If the gun locks up and the timing is good, buy it.

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James Redfield
LM #497

I just checked mine from 1955 ...all the s's are light struck. Serial num 716xx. How close is your number to this?

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ASA/NSA 67-71
NRA Benefactor

The ones that bother me are those .44 Magnums that you read about that have a .41 barrel...That's just plain scary.

Personally, I wouldn't buy a cosmetially flawed gun. But I'm picky.

T-Star

The serial number is 784xx. Thank you all for the help. I am very glad to part of this forum. I will try to post pics soon.

I just checked a bunch and noticed a few soft impressions on one of my Baby Chiefs # 248X. The last line of the 4 line address is shallow. A few others also show some shallow letters on the barrel rollmarks, very minor and I doubt it is uncommon at all. Enjoy your new acquisition!

Cheers;
Lefty

Like Flatfoot says, don't worry be happy!

I have an early 70s Bodyguard Airweight that is missing the leg of the letter R. It reads "AIPWEIGHT" instead of "AIRWEIGHT".
A lot of the J frames have lightly struck S&W logos on the left side of the frame. Doesn't really bother me.

If you are unhappy with this pre Chief's Special, contact me and maybe I'll buy it from you.