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S&W Hand Ejectors: 1896 to 1961 All 5-Screw & Vintage 4-Screw SWING-OUT Cylinder REVOLVERS, and the 35 Autos and 32 Autos


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Old 02-15-2010, 03:27 PM
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Smile Jan 1939 Registered Magnum 4405

After a week or so of discussions, photos and a little negotiation, I acquired the much discussed RM (several threads in various sections of this forum) from TiffineyPI. I spent an hour or so on the phone with her cousin, who had the gun out and although not a revolver guy, he is a gun guy. He did a great job of walking me through an honest evaluation of the gun and was nice enough to take the time to be my eyes in inspecting the gun. Based on this conversation and some photos that he sent me, I came to the conclusion that although there is a star on the grip frame and a date under the stocks of 1 - 44, that the gun was not refinished.

When I received the gun, I strip cleaned it and polished it with Ren Wax. The star on the rear of the gun is stamped through the bluing and has not been blued over. All of the edges and roll marks are sharp and the bluing is consistent with all of my other "clean" RM's. None of the screw holes are dished nor are any of the pins buffed flat (all are appropriately rounded).

Needless to say, I am very happy with the transaction. Here are a few photos with a box that I finally purchased (I have known about the Box for about a year, but finally put down the outrageous cash required to buy it from the seller).









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Old 02-15-2010, 03:31 PM
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Great looking package!!

Bill
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Old 02-15-2010, 03:39 PM
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You sure won't be disapointed with that purchase! I know what you mean about prices of Reg boxes,I looked through the fellows whole estate looking for the box for my Reg Mag,good buy!!What type of wax did you use and where did you purchase it,thanks Dale in Canada
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Old 02-15-2010, 04:05 PM
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Why are you convinced it wasn't refinished? What else was done if not refinishing? It looks beautiful, but back then S&W did beautiful refinishing.

I'm not saying it was reblued, I'm certainly not expert enough to tell, but that's what I think first when service marks are present and I'm curious as to why you have dismissed the possibility. .
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Old 02-15-2010, 04:13 PM
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You sure won't be disappointed with that purchase! I know what you mean about prices of Reg boxes,I looked through the fellows whole estate looking for the box for my Reg Mag,good buy!!What type of wax did you use and where did you purchase it, thanks Dale in Canada
Dale:

I use Renaissance Wax and I Googled it and purchased it over the Internet. I don't remember exactly what site...
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Old 02-15-2010, 04:31 PM
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Renaissance Wax can be purchased from Brownell's or on ebay. A can will last a lifetime.

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Old 02-15-2010, 04:32 PM
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holy smokes. that sure is purty. i gotta get me one of them.
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Old 02-15-2010, 04:44 PM
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Smile Refinish ----maybe, maybe not...

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Originally Posted by SaxonPig View Post
Why are you convinced it wasn't refinished? What else was done if not refinishing? It looks beautiful, but back then S&W did beautiful refinishing.

I'm not saying it was re-blued, I'm certainly not expert enough to tell, but that's what I think first when service marks are present and I'm curious as to why you have dismissed the possibility. .

SP: I have not dismissed the possibility that it has been refinished, it very well may have been and if so, I agree with you that "back then S&W did beautiful refinishing." I have several factory refinished pre-war RM's and several that I believe to be just as they came from the factory ("clean"). I do not consider myself an expert on refinishing and as a CPA and an aspiring student of S&W revolvers, I have learned to avoid the absolutes, but with the following reasons I believe and have convinced myself to a 95% level that it has not been refinished:

1) The star is stamped through the bluing and the bluing has been disturbed around the star. I tried to capture that in the photo, but it does not show up very well. I would have believed that if the factory refinished the gun, they would have done so after they stamped the star.

2) All of the roll marks are crisp, in certain cases even more crisp than my "clean" RM's.

3) All of the straight edges are very straight and crisp.

4) The front face of the ejector rod nob is still "in the white," as are the "teeth" on the rear of the ejector star.

5) None of the screw holes are dished or rounded at all.

6) All of the pins appropriately protrude from the flat surfaces and are not flattened.

7) The bluing is that beautiful pre-war blue (but since it went back to the factory in 1944, they could have been using the same blue). Also, I am not sure that during the war, the factory was spending much time on re-finishing guns (I would love for someone with more knowledge to shed some light on this).

Like I said, I do not consider myself an expert, but I have looked at a lot of RM's and I own more than a handful. And since I have no real interest in ever selling pre-war 357's that I own, I have "almost convinced" the only person that matters (me), that it is not refinished. But I could be wrong, and it would not be the 1st time...nor the last.

I am excited for the SWHF to complete its digitizing of the factory records so that at some point I may know exactly what happened to this revolver in the midst of The Great War.
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Last edited by RKmesa; 02-15-2010 at 04:47 PM.
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Old 02-15-2010, 04:49 PM
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Richard, Isn't that serial number in the range of the serial numbers that have been digitized by the S&W Historical Foundation and you can now get a factory letter thru them that includes all the info. in the archives, such as the original order, shipping info, build sheet, invoice, correspondence, and the repair invoice for 1.44 ? That will tell you exactly what was done to the gun in Jan 1944 and if that work included a refinish. Ed #15
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Old 02-15-2010, 05:05 PM
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Richard, great looking package. I would not be surprised that when the letter comes back it shows that the gun was once owned by someone of prominence/position in government. Why? S&W was in wartime production mode in 1944 and it took someone with pull to get a revolver worked on during the heart of the war.
Chuck
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Old 02-15-2010, 05:12 PM
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Richard, that's a beautiful gun and -- in my opinion -- well worth the wait. I know you had a lot of time involved in the discussions over this gun. Congratulations on bringing the long conversation to a successful conclusion.
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Old 02-15-2010, 06:28 PM
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Ed/RK...The digitized records are completed only through 1941. When the records for post-1941 are done, we may be able to provide information on what was done to 4405. Our plan now is to work backwards from 1935 before moving ahead. However, we should be able to provide the invoice, order form, etc. when that system is in place (we are working on it).

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Old 02-15-2010, 07:32 PM
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Wow that is very nice!!
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Old 02-15-2010, 08:57 PM
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"I would not be surprised that when the letter comes back it shows that the gun was once owned by someone of prominence/position in government. Why? S&W was in wartime production mode in 1944 and it took someone with pull to get a revolver worked on during the heart of the war."

Maybe, maybe not. I asked Mr Jimks about my star marked 1926 .44, stamped 2.42, and opined the same thing. He said that S&W did NOT shut down the service department during the war and it continued in operation.
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Old 02-15-2010, 09:06 PM
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Ed/RK...The digitized records are completed only through 1941. When the records for post-1941 are done, we may be able to provide information on what was done to 4405. Our plan now is to work backwards from 1935 before moving ahead. However, we should be able to provide the invoice, order form, etc. when that system is in place (we are working on it).

Bill
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Bill:

I will patiently wait. In the meantime I probably should send some $'s to SWHF. I always meant to be an early contributor, somehow I just never got around to sending the check...
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Old 02-16-2010, 12:06 AM
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That is one beautiful RM!!
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Old 02-16-2010, 12:58 AM
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Richard,

What a beautiful and elegant RM! I will look forward to what the records yield about that gun in the future.

Great Post & Pics,

Jerry
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Old 02-16-2010, 01:08 AM
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What a lovely magnum. I have never been a fan of the longer barrels, but in that case I make an exception. That is a wonderful find.
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Old 02-16-2010, 01:25 PM
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I responded to her originally to try to buy the gun before I ever saw a pic. Me and my brother were going to go halfway on the gun. She said something like "well someone said it was worth $5k". I think I gave her my phone number. It was probably in September. I wondered what happened to it. Congrats on a great RM. Now I see what I'm missing
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Old 02-16-2010, 06:26 PM
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It's possible, like Chuck suggests, that a VIP owned this gun, however the Service Dep't operated semi-independently of the regular wartime production portions of the factory, and still had the oldtime employees there that could do the expert polishing, fitting, etc. needed to repair a gun. Their skills did not always factor into sandblast blue type Victory models, etc. so they could stay employed doing repairs, or assembling VIP guns, like the specials made for Spike Jones, Rex Applegate, William Knudsen, etc. Quite a few S&Ws have shown up with WW2 era date stamps for work & repairs, so it's clear you didn't have to be a front page name to get your old S&W fixed by the factory. Ed #15
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Old 02-16-2010, 06:55 PM
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Thumbs up Thanks for your Insight

Quote:
Originally Posted by opoefc View Post
It's possible, like Chuck suggests, that a VIP owned this gun, however the Service Dep't operated semi-independently of the regular wartime production portions of the factory, and still had the oldtime employees there that could do the expert polishing, fitting, etc. needed to repair a gun. Their skills did not always factor into sandblast blue type Victory models, etc. so they could stay employed doing repairs, or assembling VIP guns, like the specials made for Spike Jones, Rex Applegate, William Knudsen, etc. Quite a few S&Ws have shown up with WW2 era date stamps for work & repairs, so it's clear you didn't have to be a front page name to get your old S&W fixed by the factory. Ed #15
Ed:

I always appreciate your thoughts, insight, and of course ... any photos of your collection that you are willing to share.

Thanks for taking the time to share. I look forward to meeting you, along with many others, in Tucson this summer.

BTW: The gun is lettered and shipped to a hardware store (I cannot remember where off the top of my head and I am at work), so if it was sent back for repairs by a VIP, that person purchased it from a hardware store.
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Last edited by RKmesa; 02-16-2010 at 06:58 PM.
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